A Healthy Child Needs a Healthy Brain, A Healthy Brain Needs Healthy Sleep

• A. Is it the baby?

For over 2,000 years, it has been known that there are common painful diseases that cause a baby to wake up at night:   Aurelius Cornelius Celsus (c. 25 BC – c. 50 AD) lived in Rome and wrote a medical book,  De Medicina.  The diseases that he described were:

Aphthous stomatitis, also known as canker sores, is a common condition characterized by painful ulcers in the mouth.

Vomiting

Ear infections

Omphalitis, an infection of the umbilical cord stump, the remaining piece of the umbilical cord that stays attached to the baby after birth. 

Here are four translations, from Latin, of  Book II, Chapter I:

1. As to the different ages, children, and those a little more advanced, have their health best in the spring…For the peculiar weaknesses, that appear at different times of life, first of all infants and young children will be troubled with spreading ulcers of the mouth, which the Greeks call aphthae, vomitings, nightly watching, humour in the ears, and inflammations about the navel. 
2. As regards the various times of life, children and adolescents enjoy the best health in spring,.. At these periods should any indisposition arise, it is very probable that infants and children still of tender age should suffer from the creeping ulcerations of the mouth which the Greeks call aphthas,⁠ vomiting, insomnia, discharges from the ear, and inflammations about the navel. 
3. With regard to age, infants and young children, just entering the period of puberty, are most healthy in spring…When there is any debility predisposing to disease, the chances that infants in arms and young children will be affected with spreading mouth-ulcers, which the Greeks call aphthas, with vomiting, night-watchings, ear-sores, and inflamations around the navel.
4. Infants and children who are still of tender age [may be] attacked by…wakefulness at night.

But what causes a baby to wake up at night when there is no observable disease?  Physicians always assumed that something must be painfully wrong with the baby. 

Many incorrect ‘explanations’ became popular over time (Blog Posts 36, 37, and 143) such as ‘teething’ pain’. An infectious disease might coincidently occur when a new tooth erupt because between 6 months and 3 years, a new tooth erupts about every 6 weeks.  In the 16th century, teething pain was attributed to the sharpness of the tooth puncturing the gums so cutting the gums to allow the tooth to erupt easily was advocated as a ‘cure’. Teething was a recognized cause of infant death in England in the 19th century (5% of deaths were attributed to teething),  In the 20th century, rubbing opium containing liquids on the baby’s gums was popularized to reduce teething pain. The continued popularity of this myth might be related to advertising of baby teething products to help prevent ‘sore gums’ (valued at over $650 million in 2024).

Other myths to ‘explain’ night wakings are ‘spicy’ or ‘gassy’ foods that the breast feeding mother consumes, iron in the baby formula, acquisition of a developmental milestone such as learning to walk without support, ‘growth spurts’ and  ‘sleep regressions’.

• B. Is it the parents?

When parents skip naps or keep their baby up too late at night, the result is pre-sleep arousal that causes frequent night-awakenings (Blog Posts 204, 233, and 235C-E).  

When parents give their baby too much soothing attention during the night (Blog Posts 145 and 234D), they deprive their baby of the opportunity to learn self-soothing skills at night which causes more frequent night-awakenings.