5 Reasons Your Baby Isn’t Sleeping Through the Night
You are tired and wondering how why and when your little one will give you a full nights sleep. You are not alone and as much as it would be amazing to have a crystal ball to know what this will happen; we need to set ourselves up and trust it will come together.
1. They aren’t developmentally ready yet!
The tricky part is that there is no set timeline that dictates when a baby can sleep through the night, this can be determined by nutrition, growth, health and their temperament.
2. The day routine doesn’t support the night.
Many clients come to me with a night problem but the place we start working is the day routine because this allows us to help bub be as well regulated as possible going into the night.
If bub has too much or not well distributed day sleep it impacts their drive to sleep at nighttime making settling harder and the drive to push through the sleep cycle transitions.
On the other hand, if bub has too long awake or not enough day sleep this can cause their body to produce more cortisol which acts like adrenaline in the body – not a hormone that is conducive to sleep.
3. The sleep environment
Creating a comfortable, safe sleeping environment allows your bub to have the best chance possible sleeping at night. If there are getting cold or something changes mid sleep it can create more wakefulness because your bub’s body signalling something isn’t quite right.
4. They are assisted to sleep, and it is getting in the way.
This isn’t the case for all babies, some babies can be assisted to sleep and then sleep perfectly well but for a lot of babies I work with the settling method isn’t working anymore resulting in false starts, more night waking and early rising.
For some they can seem startled that their environment has changed from when they fall asleep others don’t know how to relax their body while laying down (particularly if only ever settled in arms) or without sucking/drinking (common for fed to sleep babies) they don’t know what to do. So when they do wake after sleep periods they seek the support to get back to sleep.
Other things I see if babies having extended settling at bedtime and overnight because they have outgrown the “go to” settling method.
If you are stuck here, there is hope, we can absolutely work on solutions – without crying it out or any form of it!
5. They are genuinely hungry!
Some babies will hold onto a night feed for a bit longer and this is fine as long as it is working for everyone!
One common challenge that parents run into is that night wakes increase, and milk is the main source of settling then come daytime bub isn’t that hungry and we end up in a vicious cycle of reverse cycling. If this is the case cutting back the volume of milk overnight can help swing the needle back to a better balance in calorie intake between the day and night. That might look like dropping a feed and resettling or reducing the volume at each feed.
If you are feeling lost in the land of sleep deprivation, hope is not lost, and you don’t have to choose between waiting it out and crying it out.
Check out what our past clients have to say, this could be you too!
If you want to chat about your sleep situation to understand if and what support would be right for you, book a free 15 minute chat before you commit or shoot an message on Instagram.
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