The Tired Baby

I had a recent e-mail from a client that went like this: My one-year-old is waking up at 4:00 AM, and won’t go back to sleep even after I nurse him. He then, struggles to make it to his first nap of the day. He goes to bed at 7:30, and has two solid naps during the day. How can I fix this? First of all, Cara, you are not alone in this. This is the number one question that I get from parents every day, their baby’s waking up too early. I got three tips around that for you, Cara. The first would be to have a look at darkness. That’s always the first place I look. People often think that they’ve got it dark enough, but it can always be darker, because even the slightest change in light variation can stimulate a wake up in anybody. As an adult, you can look at the clock and notice that it’s not time to get up, yet. A baby can’t do that. I want it dark in there. I want it to be as dark as it would be if you walked in, in the very middle of the night. That’s tip number one. Tip n...

It’s not always obvious when a child is getting tired… Here’s how to recognize “sleep signs” so you can get your child to bed BEFORE they become overtired! The following question is from Trish, who wrote: “Help! Why can’t I recognize my three-month-old’s sleep signs? No yawing, no eye rubbing. She seems to go from quite happy to very upset in a split second and then it takes awhile to settle her down and get her to sleep.” Usually when someone refers to “sleep signs,” clear signals that the child is tired, they think of yawning and perhaps eye rubbing. Some signs you may not be aware of though are nose scrunching and ear pulling, anything that has to do with rubbing the face. Once a client’s son kept rubbing his nose and he looked tired. She replied “Oh really? I thought he just had allergies.” It’s easy to miss some of the signs of fatigue, but if your child is doing any type of rubbing or pulling, they’re definitely tired. Don’t wait for a yawn. Trish’s baby seems to ...

7 Tips To Help Your Child Sleep Better Of course, there is no ONE secret. Teaching a child healthy sleep habits is a combination of lots of different things. But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t some shortcuts, either! With that in mind, today I’d like to share with you 7 different shortcuts you can start trying over the next few nights to get your child sleeping better. Let’s get right to it: Sleep Shortcut #1: Watch the waking hours One of the BIGGEST enemies of sleep, especially for babies and toddlers, is overtiredness and many parents are surprised to learn just how soon their children get overtired! Here’s a quick guide to how long your child should be awake between naps during the day: Newborns (0-12 weeks): 45 minutes of awake time 3-5 months: 1.5-2 hours of awake time 6-8 months: 2-3 hours of awake time 9-12 months: 3-4 hours of awake time 13 months to 2.5 years: 5-6 hours of awake time If you make sure that your child is put down for naps BEFORE they get ...

Why Won’t My Baby Sleep? This is a question I often asked my first son when he was an infant. I asked it in a sweet voice, I asked it in a pleading voice, I asked it in an angry voice, but no matter how many times I asked, he never gave me the answer. I can remember the night (some of you will know exactly what I’m talking about) when I felt like I could not take it anymore. My son just would not stay asleep and I had hit rock bottom, exhausted from waking up multiple times every night and having to soothe him back to sleep. My husband found me at 3:00 in the morning sobbing in our bathroom. When our babies don’t sleep well, we tend to look for an explanation. We think it might be teething or gas. We worry that she’s too small and she needs to eat in the night, or he’s too big and he needs to eat more or he won’t feel full. The list goes on and on. Are any of these explanations the real truth? Sometimes. But barring those times when your child has a burning fever or a new too...