Sleep is serious business. If you have not already done so, please read Blog Posts 1 through 5 that describe how sleep is important and beneficial, from the point of view of the United States of America Department of the Army. A major point, emphasized by the Army, is that more sleep produces more benefits for Soldiers. Also, more sleep produces more benefits for children. Even small amounts of extra sleep help Blog Post 6. At every age!
Another point made by the Army Blog Post 5 is that “Soldiers [Children] best accomplish sleep extension [more sleep] by going to bed earlier.” The Army is clear about who is in charge: “Planning for sleep is a leader [Parent] competency”.
An early bedtime may prevent sleep problems from developing in the first place. A slightly earlier bedtime alone might completely or partially solve a sleep problem. An early or an earlier bedtime, even just a slightly earlier bedtime, might produce:
In short, your child may fall asleep and stay asleep better when the bedtime is early. This is because a bedtime that is too late causes increased brain arousal that interferes with easily falling asleep and staying asleep. This results in a shorter duration of sleep and less consolidated (or more fragmented) sleep.
An important point for babies and young children is that, when the bedtime is too late, although night sleep may be shortened, and naps may be longer, often, the total (24-hour sleep time) is less. Long naps do not fully compensate for short night sleep. Further, when the bedtime is too late, even when total sleep is normal due to very long naps, the child suffers adverse consequences because the short night sleep alone harms the brain. Again, long naps do not fully compensate for short night sleep.
If your child has a sleep problem, moving the bedtime just a little earlier, perhaps 10 to 20 minutes earlier, may produce a small amount of extra sleep that, in turn, solves the sleep problem, because a small amount of extra sleep makes a big impact Blog Post 6.
At about 6 weeks of age, counting from the due date, not the birth date, three predictable changes occur because of brain maturation:
The failure to move your baby’s sleep schedule earlier will cause a cumulative sleep debt to occur that will eventually produce bedtime resistance and night wakings.
Hi Dr Weissbluth,
My 5 month old child has problems sleeping at bedtime. We have tried bedtimes between 6pm-8pm after a warm bath and an evening formula feed. Most of the time he falls asleep within 30 mins of his meal, but then he ALWAYS wakes up crying after 30 mins, no matter what time we try to get him to bed! Within an hour of this crying he is easily soothed to sleep (10-15mins) but wakes up within 10-15 mins again. This continues for an hour or so, after which he seems no longer sleepy and just lies awake in bed, playing by himself. Most nights he only manages to fall asleep around 9-10.30pm. We have tried soothing him many times but it does not help him sleep earlier. This also seems to lead to his long night waking (1.5 hrs of awake time!) after his 2am/ 3am feed. Help! What should we do?
Because his bedtime is too late, he is at a higher level of neurological arousal that causes him to have difficulty falling asleep and staying asleep at night. Either use his drowsy signs (Blog Post 9) to determine an earlier bedtime or just move the bedtime to 5:30-6:30pm for just a few nights. Then, evaluate naps and bedtime routines. He might nap better and after a few days you can move the bedtime later to maybe 6:30-7:00pm, but 8pm is too late. Please report back and describe how it goes.
Hi Dr Weissbluth,
Thanks for the prompt advice!
We have tried an earlier bedtime between 5.30-6.30pm for a week. He still woke up exactly 30 mins from when he fell asleep. There was a slight improvement where for 2 days of that week, he was able to go back to sleep after 30 mins of soothing (but woke up twice in between needing soothing before going down for the night around 9pm). For the rest of the week, he treated the 5.30-6.30pm bedtime as a 30 min nap, waking up fully for 2 hours after, before he goes down for the night at around 9pm.
His wake/sleep times are: 7.30am wake-up, naps 9am-10.30am, 12nn-1pm, 3-4pm, 6.30pm-7pm (attempted bedtime), actual bedtime around 9pm. In the night he used to be able to sleep 5-6 hours and wake up just once around 4am for a feed, but in the last 3 weeks has been waking up twice in the night at 2am / 5am for feeds. We started him on solids as he turned 6 months last week but it doesn’t seem to change anything… Help! 🙁
If the ‘slight improvement’ was a novel event, be optimistic that you are on the right track. At 6 months of age, 84% of children are taking 2 naps a day and 16% are taking 3 naps a day. Please continue the plan but additionally, eliminate the 3rd nap (perhaps start on a weekend when you have extra help to get through a rough patch in the late afternoon). Read Blog Posts 19 and 24-27 to think about possible ways to help him sleep better.
Dr. Weissbluth, My son is five months old. We began sleep training using your method about three weeks ago. He is doing very well going down by himself at night. He stays asleep for about three hours and then weeks for a feeding. After that, he is waking about every hour and a half to two hours. I know he does not need to be fed that frequently, but he cries for about 45 minutes each time that I do not go in and breast-feed him. Please help!
Thank you so much for your wonderful book!
The Sleep Solutions chapter in my book is long because there are many age-specific and family-specific variables to consider when creating a successful sleep solution for a particular family. For your child’s age, the general principles underlying a successful sleep solution is to focus on early bedtimes (Blog Post 7) based on drowsy signs (Blog Post 9), and naps (Blog Posts 53-56). Try to be flexible (Blog Post 14) and optimistic (Blog Post 66).
Hi,
My baby is almost 6 weeks old, and I want to create a “bedtime” for him so that he hopefully starts sleeping longer stretches. I’m not really sure how to being that he doesn’t have so much awake time and I’m having a hard time keeping him up in order to nurse him right before he is ready for an early bedtime. I’m not sure if this makes sense, but I can’t seem to create a different situation for an actual bed time to occur for night.
This might help organize your thoughts:
A. Healthy Sleep includes soothing, timing, and ‘many hands’.
1. Encourage sucking (nutritive or non-nutritive sucking) when soothing to sleep.
2. Begin soothing to sleep when drowsy signs (Blog Post 9) appear.
a. Get Dad or others to help with soothing to sleep (Blog Posts 17 and 18).
B. More calories do not make your child sleep longer.
1. If your child is hungry, then feed your child.
2. If your child is drowsy, then soothe your child to sleep.
3. Feeding and soothing may, or may not, occur at the same time.
Thank you for responding, Dr. Weissbluth! I’m going to try to keep those points in mind and see if it helps my baby sleep longer.
We’ve been putting our 8 month old down between 5 and 6 based on drowsy signs for about a week now and she still takes a long time to fall asleep. She could be falling asleep in my arms but still start to scream and stay awake for a minimum of a half hour after I put her down. She won’t usually fall asleep before 6:30 no matter when we put her down.
Please describe a typical nap pattern, a typical overnight sleep pattern (awakenings for feedings and awakenings for only soothing), and the usual wake-up time in the morning.
Please describe in detail her mood and behavior around 4PM.
Hi,
I have a few issues that I’m not sure how to handle. My baby is now about 2 months old. (1) I’ve been doing an early bedtime for weeks already, but he still won’t really sleep long stretches at night. I have a bedtime routine, and I put him in somewhere in the 6s. He usually doesn’t fall asleep until somewhere in the 7s. He’ll only sleep for around 3 hours for that first stretch. A couple times he has done a 4 hour stretch, but that is not the norm, and it is very exhausting that he is not doing any type of long stretch. And after that first stretch, he sometimes isn’t even sleeping for more than 2 hours straight. (2) Additionally, once it reaches around 4 am, he doesn’t seem to be fully sleeping and fusses around for hours. (3) Another issue is that during the day, for his naps, he often wakes up after 20 min, or sometimes more, and I have to put him back to sleep (usually with a pacifier but it can take time). He doesn’t generally stay sleeping for even an hour straight. I generally put him down before he gets overtired, and he thank Gd can self soothe and fall asleep on his own (with or without a pacifier). So I’m not sure what the problem is.
Any advice would be much appreciated. Thank you!
What was your child’s gestational age at birth?
How does he behave and look around 4-5pm?
About how long is the bedtime routine?
What’s the most common time you are leaving him at night after the bedtime routine?
He was born at 40 weeks + 4 days.
Usually around 4-5 pm (and later) he’s a little fussier and won’t nap as well, although sometimes he does nap.
The bedtime routine is short. I change him, talk to him quietly, say a prayer with him, and sing a bedtime song.
Do you mean how long do I leave him after the bedtime routine? I usually have to keep going in to put his pacifier in and stroke his cheek for at least a half hour if not more until he falls asleep. I sometimes pick him up again for a minute and just rock him (but not until he’s sleeping. Just for a minute to calm him)
Early bedtimes emerge (around 6 weeks) before naps begin to get organized (around 3-4months). So, for now, because he is “a little fussier” around 4-5pm, I suggest a trial of 3-5 days with a bedtime that is 20 minutes earlier. Over time, this should improve night sleep (first) and naps (second) at which point the bedtime might become a little later. Also, to enhance self-soothing skills, try to either give less attention after the bedtime routine or have someone else do the curtain calls or both. What are your thoughts?
Sweet Dreams, DrW.
Thank you so much for all your advice! I will definitely try that and see if it helps, including giving less attention after the bedtime routine. I have referred to your book for all my kids and really appreciate your approach.
Thanks again!
Hi again Dr. Weissbluth,
My now 2 1/2 month old (11 weeks) still does not seem to be picking up on longer night stretches, despite my attempt to do an early bed time (even earlier than I was before, like you suggested). He keeps waking up after just 3 hours of sleeping, sometimes even less, sometimes a little more. He only once recently went 7 hours without eating – so I know he could do it – but that was with me putting the pacifier in 1-2 times instead of nursing. He didn’t seem to be waking up to nurse because he went right back to sleep with the pacifier. I try doing that other times too, but even after 3 hours he sometimes just continues to fuss/cry a bit until I nurse him.
I’m trying to set him up for success to be a good sleeper so that hopefully he can get into a good routine and maybe I won’t have to let him cry it out to train him.
I’m so tired though being that I also have 2 other kids to care for (and a very helpful husband thank Gd, but neither of us can do everything).
Any advice and help would be much appreciated! Is my child just defying the rules and being stubborn :)?
Please clarify how many times he awakens at night and how many times you nurse him at night.
He nurses 3 times a night usually, which basically ends up being every 3 hours and sometimes less. And he usually gets up 1 or 2 other times and either needs a diaper change or just fusses a bit and I put the pacifier in and he’ll go back to sleep (that often happens in the early am, around 5).
Here are some possibilities to consider; they are not mutually exclusive. Most children this age need 1-2 feedings at night: One in the middle of the night and one in the early morning.
1. With 3 children keeping you busy, perhaps your breast milk supply is low and he is awakening at night because he is hungry. Here are some ways to make that determination.
a. Watch the suck-swallow patter: If he is truly hungry, the general pattern is suck-swallow, suck-swallow, suck-swallow, etc. If not truly hungry, it is more like suck, suck, suck-swallow; suck, suck suck-swallow; etc.
b. Offer a test bottle once (perhaps have Dad do it) to see how much and how quickly he swallows.
c. If you are expressing breast milk, perhaps there has been a recent decline in the volume pumped.
d. Ask yourself, have you become more thirsty recently?
e. Has his recent weight gain been appropriate?
If you determine that he might be hungry, consider drinking much more fluid during the day or talking to a lactation consultant or your pediatrician.
2. The night waking might be a developing habit. If so, a 3-4 night trial of a sleep solution (‘No cry’ or ‘Let cry’) might be considered with only 1-2 feedings at night.
3. With 3 children, perhaps your baby has not had the needed nap opportunities that are age-appropriate. If so, he is then way over-tired at the end of the day and has difficulty settling.
Please share your thought with me.
Sweet dreams,
Marc
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
Our daughter just turned 5 months old. We were committed to your strategies with our first child with great success. He was self settling from 3 weeks old and required minimal efforts when learning to sleep through the night. He’s testing the waters again now with many curtains calls (which we respond to with a silent return to bed) and early wake ups (5:15-6:00) where he is super emotional for the first hour of his day and sometimes longer. He goes to daycare 5 days a week and fights nap but always at least rests. His bed time is between 6:00 and 7:00 pm depending on how his day has been and how he is acting. Yesterday he probably needed to be in bed at 5pm but I was struggling to get dinner on the table and had a grandparent drop by for an unannounced visit just before our typical dinner time at 5:00.
All that, and I’m actually here to ask about my 5 month old.
She self settles well and has done so since she was about two months. She typically naps from 8:30 or 9:00 until 10:00 or 10:30, 11:30/12:00 until 2:00 (I have to wake her by 2:00 to go pick her brother up from daycare), and 4:00-5:00 – this nap is the one I struggle with the most as we are often on the go at this time trying to stay out of the house as my husband works from home, but when she does get this nap it’s an hour long at least. Bedtime is about 6:30 or 7:00. She goes down for most sleeps with little fuss and can connect sleep cycles during the day with typically no fussing. Her night sleep is a whole other story. She wakes every two hours and screams her head off until she is fed. I have to say, I am terrible at settling her any other way. She screams until I cave and she’s at the breast. The only time it doesn’t end with me feeding her is if I put headphones in and crank up white noise for myself. She is a healthy weight and I have been told by our pediatrician that it’s time to start dropping some of those night feeds (no joke!) but I just can’t seem to get over the hurdle. She will scream for over an hour at each waking. If she does return to sleep, she’s awake again within an hour. I’m utterly exhausted. Between her being up all night, and her brothers frequent curtain calls and night visits I hardly sleep. She can’t be truly hungry can she? Is it just a habit at this stage? Why can she self settle during the day and not at night? Is it the rocky 3rd nap?
Any guidance would be much appreciated!
Abigail
Let me first say that my advice might not comport with your values and lifestyle, therefore ignore that which is unacceptable to you. Secondly, I apologize for having to be concise and blunt in this format. Additionally, you are currently very sleep deprived so I deliberately want to keep this simple.
Because your older child is not napping well at day care, his current bedtime is too late, and this is causing his night awakenings. Simultaneously, attempt to move his bedtime earlier and implement a ‘let cry’ sleep solution. If both are doable, you will see improvement in 1-2 nights. Also, be strict about sleep on weekends to help compensate for not napping well in daycare.
Because you have to wake your baby from the second nap, the best strategy is to skip the third nap and strive for a much earlier bedtime. Feed her only 1-2 times overnight and implement a ‘no-cry’ or ‘let cry’ sleep solution.
The ultimate success or failure to help your children sleep well depends on your husband’s help. Have him read the relevant sections in my book, especially the role of the father. Blog Posts 17,18, and 23 might help. You cannot do this alone.
Please share your thoughts with me.
Sweet Dreams. DrW.
Thanks so much for such a prompt reply. We will implement your suggestions and report back. Fingers crossed we see some improvement. I have two questions. My firs question is related to dropping the third nap. I worry her wake time will be quite long. How early are you suggesting for bedtime? Second question is related to the night feeds. When you say 1-2 feeds is that from when I initially put her down for the night?
Thank you again,
Abigail
As your daughter begins to show drowsy signs, then begin to soothe her to sleep. Or as soon as you can thereafter.
Children her age are usually fed in the middle of the night and early in the morning (twice) or just once in the middle of the night.
Thank you for all those pointers and thoughts. Regarding the “no cry” sleep solution: Is that what I was doing with just putting the pacifier in instead of nursing when he wakes up around 9/10 oclock? Then I skip that feeding and he goes longer. Would he eventually just stop waking up at that earlier time in theory, and then hopefully only wake up 1-2 times a night? Based on what I read in the book, I would just keep trying to soothe him back to sleep without nursing him if I use that solution?
And what about for “Let cry” – can I do that with delaying the time when I go in and console him? At what intervals should I delay? Do you have other advice about that aside from just letting him cry without checking and consoling at all (I’m not sure I’m ready to do that just yet)
Can I try one of those sleep solutions for a few nights and then switch it to a different one if it doesn’t work? (Assuming the baby isn’t hungry). Thanks!
Blog Post 19 summarizes ‘No Cry’ sleep solutions and Blog Post 25 summarizes ‘Let’Cry’ sleep solutions. Many parents start with a ‘No Cry’ sleep solution and see partial improvement and later switch to a ‘No Cry’ sleep solution and see more complete improvement. Blog Post 26 compares these different approaches.
With 3 children, another factor to consider is ‘teamwork’: Please review Blog Poss 17, 18, and 23. Perhaps your husband’s contributions is more important than you have considered.
Please tell me what you have decided and how it is, or is not, working.
Sweet Dreams,
DrW.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth. Im trying check and console for now because I don’t think I am ready to just let him cry. Some nights I can go in and put the pacifier back in between 9-10 when he wakes up and he goes right back to sleep for another 2 hours or so. So I don’t think he is waking up to nurse really. But other nights, I try the pacifier and it doesn’t work. Then I try to hold him and he goes back to sleep basically right away, but he wakes up when I put him down. So on those nights after trying that for a little, I end up just nursing him. I read in your blog that this is still part of check and console being that I’m trying as little interaction as possible (with just putting the pacifier) and if not, I hold him. And if that doesn’t work, I nurse.
Should I just keep trying this for a bit longer and see if it gradually improves a bit more?
He can fall asleep on his own without being rocked and even without a pacifier sometimes. But he can’t seem to implement those self-soothing techniques when he wakes up at that 930 pm wake up when I don’t think he needs to nurse (although he does usually go to sleep on his own after nursing as well).
For naps, he still wakes up after about a half hour/45 minutes and needs to be put back to sleep – and sometimes, he won’t even go back to sleep even though I can see he’s tired. He’s just 3 months tomorrow, so I know that naps can take another month to be more consistent possibly, but he just never sleeps for an hour or more straight. I’m not sure how to improve that as well.
I have had my husband go in a couple times at that 930 wake up to try to put him back to sleep instead of me, but so far, it hasn’t worked. I can keep trying.
What is the usual bedtime or range of bedtimes currently?
Between 6-630 but he doesn’t always fall asleep right away
Currently, when does his last nap end?
How does he behave and look around 5-5:30pm?
It’s really different everyday – I’m not sure there is any consistency yet. Today, it ended around 4:15 I think and he ended up not falling asleep and napping again after that. I put him to sleep before 6:15. He went to sleep very easily and didn’t cry at all – I didn’t even go in once to put the pacifier in or anything. He was very calm around 5-5:30 today. But other days, his last nap is earlier and even though I try to have him nap again so that he doesn’t get overtired, he doesn’t always. And then he won’t be calm at 5/5:30…
1. Your son has self-soothing skills: “He can fall asleep on his own without being rocked and even without a pacifier sometimes.” Congratulations! Because of his age, naps are highly variable in duration and length. I would not attempt to start a new nap after around 4:00pm in order to protect an early bedtime, even if he appears like he might want a nap. Please review Blog Posts 9 and 83 regarding Drowsy Signs and think of a bedtime that is temporarily super-early (around 5-6pm). the bedtime will vary because the naps vary. Try to determine the bedtime based on drowsy signs. Over time, the naps will get longer and he will comfortably have a latter bedtime.
2. Be consistent at times of curtain calls at bedtime and throughout the night: For check and console, respond promptly to crying (perhaps delay your response to low-level fussy sounds), soothe him but do not pick him up and do not feed him unless it is for a feeding.. Continue to have Dad do this, as much as possible.ant
3. You decide when you want to feed him (once or twice) overnight.
Please share with me your thoughts on this plan.
Sweet Dreams,
DrW.
Thank you so much for all your responses!
I can try this. But what if during a check and console time, he does not settle without being picked up and/or fed? How long should my husband try/should I try? What if he just continues to cry?
He also will wake up sometimes at 530 even after he was just awake at 430. And he is definitely still tired. I assume it is all connected to his sleep patterns and that it will hopefully improve as his night sleep improves…
For check and console, respond promptly to crying. If soothing without picking him up fails, then pick him up but do not feed him unless you are certain that he is hungry. If Dad does this consistently for 2-3 nights, he might improve faster. Do you ever hear him up or fussy at night and he returns to sleep unassisted?
Ok, thank you. We will hopefully try that.
Sometimes in the early morning he fusses a bit – not cries – and I think he sort of goes back to sleep but not into a deep calm sleep. So far when he has been up at night and I hear him, I end up just picking him up and nursing him before he even cries.
“So far when he has been up at night and I hear him, I end up just picking him up and nursing him before he even cries.” Currently, how often does this usually occur? A few weeks ago, did it occur more frequently?
Usually 3 times a night. But sometimes, like this morning, after waking up at 4:15 am to nurse (which was the 3rd time of the night), he woke up at 5:30 am, and I’m not sure why. He still was tired but after I picked him up and he fell back asleep, he woke up again when I put him down.
I know the pattern can vary, but when are the three times that you usually nurse him at night?
9:30/10 if he doesn’t just take the pacifier and go back to sleep. Around 130 or so and then some time in the 4s.
If your breast milk supply is ample, he does not these 3 feedings. Feed him once around or before midnight (for example, 9:30/10pm or later) and once after midnight (for example 3-4am). If you hear him in between, then Dad goes to soothe (hopefully without picking him up) or practice extinction or graduated extinction now for this middle of the night awakening. Today’s Instagram post (#marcweissbluth) is on this topic. Please let me know how you feel about this.
My husband tried last night around 830 to first soothe him without picking him up, then he held him, but he woke up when he was put back down. And he wouldn’t settle until I finally nursed him (even though that wasn’t supposed to be the goal).
Another question is don’t I want him to do a longer first stretch and NOT have 930/10 pm be the first nursing? I would rather get him used to skipping that feeding and do one at midnight or later.
Thank you again for all your advice and prompt responses! I talk about your approach and book anytime a conversation comes up about babies and sleep!
I agree with you. How certain are you that he was actually hungry around 8:30pm last night?
I’m not sure. I just wasn’t sure what else to do after my husbands efforts to soothe him didn’t work and the baby got very worked up
If you are not sure he is hungry, then don’t feed him. Have Dad walk with him around the house, shushing, and rocking until he is drowsy agin and calm…then back to sleep. You should leave the house at this time for your peace of mind and your baby will sense that you are gone and he knows that Dad can’t nurse him so he’ll calm down sooner. It will be easier for all three of you. If, on the other hand, you persist in using your breast as a pacifier to soothe him, he will not be able to easily learn self soothing. Thoughts?
Yes I totally agree and want to implement this. It’s just very difficult sometimes 🙂 But I know this is what needs to be done. Thank you very much for all the help!
Hi Dr Weissbluth, I have read several blog posts and your book. We have had some success with my 17 week old using extinction, but some issues remain. He naps 4x a day- the first nap is typically very strong (1.5+ hours) while the others vary. Bedtime can be as early as 6pm due to short naps, and it is never later than 7:30pm. For several weeks, we applied check ins at bedtime as it was taking up to an hour to fall asleep. We pushed bedtime by 15 minutes to create more sleep drive and moved to full extinction eight days ago. Since then, he falls asleep independently within 5-10 min. but wakes approx. 40 minutes later. We do not go in unless we believe there is a need (usually if crying persists 40+ min.) but this wake up will last 2+ hours leading to a “new bedtime” that is very late and then creates a 5am wake up. How can we work past this “false start” at bedtime? Finding the peak of the sleep wave feels impossible. Thank you for your writings and research- it has been invaluable to me as a first time parent.
Even though there is day-to-day variability, please describe the common times of day and durations of the 3rd and 4th naps. Also, if you have not already read it, please read ‘Parents Reports’ section 2: Bedtimes.
Question! Little one is eight weeks old. She currently sleeps from 8/8:30-6:15ish (depends on her naps– sometimes she is down at 7:30 if her last nap ended earlier in the day). Sometimes at 6:15 she is ready to get up for the day and other times she finishes her bottle and easily goes back to sleep for another 1-2 hours. I keep reading about the value of an early bedtime. In a case like this, would I want to try and move bedtime back at all? As she’s reached this stage, her naps have gotten shorter (30 min-75 min). She’s also pretty hard to keep awake after 45 minutes– it’s a struggle to reach an hour sometimes, let alone anything close to her 90 minute maximum (she’s typically always in bed after 60-65 minutes). Should I be putting her down as she gets drowsy at 45 minutes??
Please keep it simple and enjoy your baby. If she appears hungry, feed her; if she appears drowsy, sleep her. Watching her is better than watching a clock. Go with the flow and try to not control her (“it’s a struggle to reach an hour sometimes”); be patient. Nap rhythms begin to emerge at 3-4 months of age but long and regular naps are not well developed until 4-6 months of age.
Are you OK with this or am I missing something?
Hi,
I have not managed yet to skip a night feeding and to do extinction/graduated extinction. I am going to try in a few more weeks if he doesn’t get better on his own with sleeping. Recently, he seems to have been doing a longer sleep stretch/stretch without eating at night, although it’s still not consistent. I know I need to take out one of the 3 feedings to make it 1-2 a night, I just don’t feel ready to yet.
But there have been times where I heard him fussing around at night and then he put himself back to sleep. So maybe we are on to something! There seems to be slight improvement in certain regards. He is now about 15 weeks.
My question is though – he can fall asleep on his own without being rocked. Sometimes, I need to rock him if he is overtired or if he wakes up after a short nap and still tired. But he has the ability to just be by himself in the crib – with out without a pacifier – and go to sleep.
But sometimes, I’ll just leave him to put himself to sleep, and he won’t fall asleep, but he won’t be crying. I’m not sure what to do in that situation. He’ll just stay awake for hours, not willing to let himself fall asleep, but also not be crying. And I can’t always rock him to sleep since I have other children – and I don’t even know if I should be rocking him to sleep for those times. He’ll let his eyes close for a minute and then just open them again – but not cry. Am I making sense? It’s not even a situation of “let him cry and fuss a bit to learn how to fall asleep on his own” because he is sitting there on his own, and just won’t go to sleep.
Why do you “just don’t feel ready yet”?
He is still in our room next to me, and I feel like it will be easier once we move him out. I also keep giving in to nursing him every time we’ve tried to have my husband put him back to sleep and he kept crying. I need to be more committed to it so that I don’t give in and just nurse him. I know it’s okay to let him cry for a bit if need be, I just feel that I am not committed enough yet and then I will just keep giving in, if that makes sense.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
My twins are now 3 years old- we used your book to guide us through their younger years and we had really great sleepers until a few months ago when they turned 3. My little girl, who has always struggled more than he brother with self-soothing to sleep, is now strongly resistant to sleeping when we put her down. She naps for 2 hours reliably everyday, and rarely protests naps. She wakes around 6:30/7:00. When we try to put her down around 7:30, she has a difficult time and doesn’t go to sleep until 8:30/9:00. By the numbers, it seems like a decent amount of sleep and we’re happy she’s still napping. We are concerned bed time is “too late”. What are your thoughts? What constitutes “early to bed” for 3 years old? So far as proportion of time napping v proportion of sleep at night is 2:10 a good ratio? Is there much we can do to shift the time she wants to fall asleep at night to earlier? Her bother seems happy to go to bed at 7:30, and we want to keep them in the same rhythm as much as possible.
Please describe your daughters behavior and mood between 5-6pm.
Based on your report, because they are fraternal twins, I might, or might not suggest an earlier bedtime for your only your daughter. Is your husband available to help or do you have other help earlier in the evening?
Please read about Bedtimes in my Blog in the sections “Blogs by Topic’ and ‘Parents Reports’.
Thank you so much for responding! Around 5 I would describe her as a little fussy. This is when I first start cooking dinner so I always assume her blood sugar is a little low and now I’m focused a little more somewhere else. If her dad is home by then, she seems fine to play with her dad and brother. By 5:30/6:00 we are eating and I’d describe her as happy, calm, a little spunky/playful some days. But generally not crabby. My husband helps with bedtime most nights so we could stagger if we had to.
Is 8:30/9:0 too late for 3 years old if she sleeps 10- 10.5 hours at night and naps for 2 hours? On one hand we are concerned she isn’t getting her best sleep by going to bed so late on the other hand I’m wondering if we are expecting too much and fighting some kind of biological setting that doesn’t want to sleep more than 12 hours.
Your daughter’s sleep tank is going to dry around 5pm (“a little fussy”), not low blood sugar, but her sleepiness is masked by playful interaction with Dad and the family around dinnertime.
On the 3rd birthday, 92% of children are napping 6 days a week. On the 4th birthday, 57% of children are napping 5 days a week. So depending on their birthdate, your twins will be napping less in the future and the bedtimes will need to be earlier because of less day sleep. Please read, and have your husband read about bedtime (Blog Posts by Topic #2 and Parents’ Reports #2). Because of individual variation, your daughter might always need a bedtime that is earlier than your son. Your daughter now has difficulty falling asleep with a 7:30 bedtime.
My suggestion for your daughter is to attempt a 6:30pm bedtime (lights off) for only a few days to repay her accumulated sleep debt and after that, experiment with a bedtime between 6:30-7pm. Keep a detailed record of day sleep and night sleep and report back how sleep is going. Also. move your son’s bedtime earlier by 10-20 minutes to see if he falls asleep earlier. If so, then you know that his current bedtime is too late (keep a separate record of his sleep).
Another relevant factor may be that our twins were sharing a room at night time (separate rooms for naps since they were roughly six months old) but we recently separated them for night sleep. When they shared a room, they would chat sweetly with each other about their day for a while before going to sleep. But then she started getting out of bed and it would really rile him up when we came in to put her back. So we moved him to his own room- he loves it. She seemed uneasy about it the night we switched him and she has said a few times that she wished he was back in her room at night.
Transitions in sleep can sometimes be rocky. As you embark on earlier bedtimes and you know that their naps will decrease and disappear, I suggest that you utilize Sleep Rules as described in my book (page 309) so the transitions will be easier for the entire family. Let me know how it goes.
Sweet Dreams,
DrW.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth;my 13 month old has this past week started waking up at 5am everyday and we are wondering how to get her to sleep longer? She is in bed between 615 and 630 every night. She also has been napping very poorly as well as of late (we’re lucky to get 45 minutes). Should we be trying an even earlier bedtime? Thanks for any advice
An even earlier bedtime will help. Please read about early bedtimes in ‘Posts by Topic #2’ and ‘Parents’ Reports Topics #2′ and give me your thoughts.
What causes my 5 month old to have a lot of nighttime awakenings screaming? Sometimes he will fall back to sleep on his own, sometimes just cuddling him, but most of the time i have to nurse him back to sleep.
This happens frequently. Even if he has had three good naps that day and falls asleep without trouble at bedtime. Which is (6:30-7:30).
When he has 2 good naps, how does he look around 4-5pm?
When he has 3 good naps, how does he look around 5-6pm?
Two good naps, he usually skips his third nap, which consist of him not sleeping past 4:30 and signaling bedtime around 6:45-7pm.
Three good naps he is ready for bed 7:30-7:45.
His first two naps are usually around 2 hours long and his third if he takes one, 1 hour or under. When he wakes up before two hours, say 1 hour 10 minutes I will try to soothe him back to sleep but if he doesn’t and stays awake, the rest of the day he just seems easily irritated and moody. Even when I move his next nap up a little and it is a good nap, it seems his body is just still out of ryrhym.
How often doe he take 2 naps and how often does he take 3 naps?
Is it possible that in either case that he might be able to fall asleep 10-15 minutes earlier?
If sleeps past 4:30 then his third nap will be skipped. Which he does a couple times a week.
Yes, I will try putting him to bed a little earlier way.
For now, please try for the earliest bedtime possible because the third nap will disappear soon. Let me know how it goes.
Thank you for your time and recommendation. I will update soon.
I have been putting my 5 month old to sleep a few minutes earlier as recommended but he still is very restless with a lot of wakings at night. Last night he didn’t take his last nap of the day so I put him to bed at 6:35 and he was asleep in 3 minutes but woke up almost every hour, sometimes putting himself back to sleep and sometimes I had to cuddle him or nurse him. The previous nights I put him to bed around 7pm and he’s usually asleep in 10 minutes or less but still has the night wakings.
Is he sleeping too much during the day?
I haven’t let him sleep past 5:30pm.
What is his common nap schedule (times and durations) and how does he look and behave around 4-5pm?
The past two weeks I have been sleep training him. He is waking up around 7:30 am and down for his first nap at 9 am and the duration has now shortened to around 1-1.5hr instead of 2 since training. Second nap around 11:30 and is anywhere from 1-2 hours but mostly his naps are more on the shorter end. His third nap is between 2-4pm depending on his previous naps and is around 1 hour or under. I don’t let him sleep past 5:30pm. If he doesn’t take his 3rd nap he is whiny and quiet around 4-5. If he does take a nap he is a happy camper until bedtime. At 7pm. If third nap is missed bedtime is 6:30.pm
When he takes 2 naps, when are ‘lights out’ the end of all feeding bedtime routine, soothing, and you leave the room?
When he takes 3 naps, can you have ‘lights out’ before 7pm?
With 2 naps I turn lights off, fan on, and then nurse him at 6:30 then lay him down and he’s asleep in 10 minutes or less. Usually around 3-5 minutes if the last nap is missed. 3 naps same routine but I start nursing at 7pm.
If he takes 2 naps, “If he doesn’t take his 3rd nap he is whiny and quiet around 4-5.” “With 2 naps I turn lights off, fan on, and then nurse him at 6:30 then lay him down and he’s asleep in 10 minutes or less.”
Currently, with 2 naps, based on his behavior around 4-5pm, he should be asleep around 5:30pm, not 6:40pm. That means that you begin all bedtime activities much earlier so he is actually asleep at 5:30pm.
If he takes 3 naps, I suspect that starting nursing at 7pm is also way too late. I would suggest that you do everything needed so that he is asleep between 6 and no later than 7pm. The earlier, the better.
Can you do this? Do you want to try this? If so, do this for 3-5 nights and report back regarding times asleep and night waking behavior.
Also, it seems he becomes restless in the early morning hours. He rarely wakes before 12pm. Usually most awakenings are around 1am-5:30am
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
First, I just want to thank you for your work. Your sleep research and advice have been instrumental in helping me raise a happy, healthy little girl. My daughter is 20 months, and – until recently – has been sleeping from 6:30pm-6:30am and then typically napping 11:30am-1:30pm. Recently, she has begun resisting her early nap. She seems to want to nap around 1:30pm-3/3:30pm, which seems too late to me given her early bedtime. (Also, she wakes up crying and crabby from the later nap, which makes me think she’s not well rested from the nap.) Is this shift to a later naptime common for toddlers? Any advice would be appreciated. Thank you again!
How does she look around 11-12noon before her nap?
How does she look around 5-6pm before bedtime?
Thank you for your quick reply. For the past week, she looked wide awake from 11am-12pm and 5pm-6pm.
Understood.
Was she calm, relaxed, playful, independently playing without electronic stimulation (TV, Video, etc) or fussy, whiney, or needing attention?
hey dr weissbluth! so we have a 5.5 month old (6 months in a week) and she’s been so hard to get down at night! usually up several times the first few hours with lots of false starts. she just recently started going 11-12 hours without a feed at night but wakes up and can be soothed otherwise. she is often up at 8:30 am and asleep by 8:30 or 9 pm but i don’t know how to try to move her bedtime earlier. i tried last night to put her down at 6:30 pm but then she just woke up at 7:30. since she usually eats around 8 should i just have fed her and tried to get her down? she used to put herself to sleep but has been sick and needed rocked to sleep most naps and at bedtime. usually she’s awake for 1.5 hours before her first nap and naps for 1.5-2 hours and then is up for 2-2.5 hours before her second nap, which is usually 1.5-2 hours also. because of another feed she then has a third nap a few hours after that. but it makes bedtime so late. if i drop that nap, she then is up so long before bed! any tips for a suggested schedule? thank you!
If I understand correctly, you want to move the bedtime earlier from 8:30-9:00pm? Is this right? Does she have self-soothing skills for her naps?
ideally, yes. only because it can take hours for bedtime. isn’t 9 pm too late? or because of her late wake up is it not an issue? how many hours in a day does a 6 month old need? she just has such a hard time at bedtime and usually is up and down till 1 or 2 am before settling down till 8:30 or 9 (i often wake her). what am i doing wrong?? should i start her day earlier? cap her naps? i tried a 2 nap schedule today and did 2 hours of awake time, she did a 2.5 hour nap. then 3 hours of awake time and i woke her at 1.5 hours bc it was 5:30 and wanted her in bed by 8:30. she uses a pacifier to soothe at naps/nighttime, occasionally her fingers.
What is a typical nap schedule (both time of nap and duration of nap)?
ideally up around 8/8:30 am, asleep 2 hours later (sleeps 1.5-2.5 hours—is there any reason to cap this?). then can sometimes make it almost 3 hours for this next time and sleeps another 1.5-2 hours. then 3 hours before bed.
Does she have self-soothing ability for her naps?
Do you want to move quickly or slowly to help her sleep better?
Please read Blog Post 8 carefully.
she has some self soothing abilities! i’m ok moving quickly (i think haha) i can’t imagine she needs less sleep, but with increased naptime sleep we’ve had split nights!
Your daughter is sleeping out of synch with her circadian sleep rhythms (Blog Post 8)
Blog Post 74 explains how to move the bedtime earlier by waking her up in the morning at 7am.
Her naps will be around mid-morning (about 9am) and mid-day 12-1pm). Do not cap naps. No 3rd nap.
Bedtime is based on drowsy signs.
Slow: Do only this and report back in 5-6 days.
Fast: Do this plus graduated extinction or extinction (Blog Post 25) and report back in 3-4 days.
Be optimistic (Blog Post 66) because your daughter has self-soothing skills.
Sweet Dreams,
DrW
ok thank you! i’ll try this! if she takes a long morning nap but then rubs her eyes an hour after waking up, do you lay her down again or try to wait a certain time?
Try to impose an age-appropriate nap schedule: mid-morning and mid-day. Stretch her a little, if needed, to hit her marks but not so much that she gets a second wind.
ok, thank you so much for all your help! last question—how do you handle a nap going late in the afternoon? i missed her sleepy cues and it took an hour to get her down for her nap. so if she goes down at 3 pm, how would you handle bed if you don’t cap nap? will she show sleepy cues soon after she wakes?
No nap begins at or after 3pm in order for the bedtime to become earlier. Work hard to soothe her, distract her, and avoid a situation that might cause her to sleep such as a stroller ride or car ride. Try to gently keep her up until at least 5:30pm for a bedtime.
helllo! so we have done 3 nights of this and overall things are going better! bedtime is much easier and quicker. however. from 11-12 ish she seems to stir a lot and be awake. we do a version of crying and then soothing (5-10 minutes of crying before going in). any idea why? her first nap is long—often 2.5 hours so her second nap is short, about 1 hour. then she’s awake 3 hours usually before bed. is there a way to extend the second nap a bit? thanks!
Congratulations!! Please be patient; stay the course.
correction:she was up from 11pm-1:30 am off and on. and honestly has done this for months. usually by 2 am she’s settled.
Between 11pm and 1:30am, please describe in detail how she is behaving and what you are doing.
she is upset, fussy and crying (usually her mad cry) off and on. we go in every 5-10 minutes to soothe but don’t pick her up out of the crib. we pat her booty and offer the pacifier (she sometimes will take and sometimes won’t) and say “shhh”. at the hour mark i usually pick her up to let her calm down, sometimes she falls asleep quickly. after laid down, she calls back out within 10 minutes or so. repeat the above this till about 1:45 am. she is not hungry—i woke her up for the day bc she’s tired (rightfully so!).
she has moments where she settles and stops crying while soothing her, but then usually cries out within 10-30 minutes. she usually isn’t crying the whole time! but a good chunk of it
sorry-sometimes she is happy for 20-30 minutes before getting upset again and is just in her crib.
Because she has improved and is getting more sleep at night with an earlier bedtime and because she has self-soothing skills for naps, if you did extinction, she would be sleeping much better at night in 2-3 nights. For graduated extinction, 4-7 nights. What are your thoughts?
last night she only called out a few times within 20 minutes around 12:30 and we only had to go in 2 times! she slept then till i woke her. so i think we are on the right track and will keep doing this a few more nights to see if with our gradual extinction it works! (we have older kids whose rooms are next to the baby so this helps keep them asleep and gives me more sanity to check in periodically!). thank you!! i’ll report back in a few days 🙂
how long will we need an early bedtime before we can try to reach a more normal (7pm) bedtime?
Please read about Bedtimes in my book to fully understand the answer to your question.
Hello. My baby is almost 9 months and is struggling with early morning wakeups. She keeps waking around 5:20-35. We leave her in the crib (she usually isn’t crying) until 6am. She goes down for her first nap about 8:30am, which is usually 60-100 minutes, and again around 1:30pm, which is about 60-90 minutes as well. Bedtime is between 6:15-6:45 depending on how long her naps are. Sometimes as early as 6pm. She goes down for bedtime and naps well enough (fussing for less than 5 minutes, sometimes 10).
Are we just doomed with early mornings? Or is there something we can be doing to help get her to closer to 6am?
Please describe her mood and behavior between 5-6pm when your child is alone, not in front of a screen or being soothed by you, or interacting with an adult.
When does she actually fall asleep at night?
She is not typically alone between 5-6pm. Depending when bedtime is (sometimes as early as 6pm if she didn’t have great naps), we might be finishing dinner, going on a walk, or starting the bedtime routine about then. However, the times we have put her down on the floor to play while we finish something (for a minute or two), her attitude is very pleasant. During the day she plays independently very well.
Overall she’s a happy baby, even at that time. It’s not until we get into the bedroom that she starts fussing (she really hates the changing table right now). Bedtime takes 30-40 minutes between washing up, pjs, diaper change, nursing, reading, and nursing again (she doesn’t drink much milk until she gets sleepy, and then she takes a while to get letdowns).
She typically falls asleep 5-10 minutes after we put her down, so between 6:20-7pm, depending on when we put her down. 6:15pm is likely our average the last week, with one might being 5:45pm and 2 nights being 7:10pm. Her naps have been all over the place lately (somewhat unusual). She is getting 3 teeth in right now.
Because she seems well rested, perhaps do nothing and go to bed earlier yourself to help you cope with her early awakenings.
Because “Her naps have been all over the place lately (somewhat unusual)” she might be developing cumulative sleepiness from a bedtime that is slightly too late; teething is a myth.
Consider reading the section in my book on page 214 ‘When the bedtime is too late’ to fully appreciate why sleep begets sleep. Then, super carefully for 4 consecutive nights, you might want to try a bedtime that is 20 minutes earlier than what you normally would do. Here are some possibilities:
1.She falls asleep earlier, has more sleep at the front end and is better rested in the morning and sleeps in later.
2.She falls asleep earlier and she wakes up at the same time as before, but because she starts the day better rested, the naps become more regular and longer which leads, over time, to a later bedtime and a later wake-up time.
3.She falls asleep earlier and consistently wakes up even earlier. After 4 nights, abandon the trial.
4.She does not actually fall asleep at this 20 minute earlier bedtime and is awake for 20-30 minutes at sleep onset. After 4 nights, abandon the trial.
Don’t do anything if you cannot commit to a 4 night trial because improvement might be seen on night 3 or 4. If you do try this, keep meticulous records regarding night and day sleep and let me know how it goes.
Hello. Thank you for the reply. Most nights bedtime is before 6:30, often 6:15. We have done bedtimes between 5:45-6:30 for a while now and she still wakes at 5:30. The last two days she has had great naps but has woken up about 5am. Because we consider anything before 6am night sleep, we leave her in her crib until 6am to start the day. Do you think we should get her up when she’s up and start the day at 5:30? Thank you.
At 5:30 am, I would suggest that you vary your response based on her behavior and your past experience.
Sometimes, she might be quietly stirring and by leaving her alone, she might return to sleep for a while.
Sometimes, she might be quietly stirring and you have learned that a quick change or feed and soothing causes her to return to sleep for a while.
Sometimes, she might be loudly stirring and you know that she is ready to start the day.
Is one pattern more common than another?
Maybe twice in the past several months has she gone back to sleep after waking anytime after 5am. I have not attempted to go in and feed her and put her back to bed, as she seems quite awake when she wakes around 5:30. We just leave her in bed until 6am. Most of the time she doesn’t even fuss – just chats to herself or scoots around in the crib.
I’m actually wondering if she needs more wake time during the day. She has also begun waking at night about 60% of the time the past month. She usually fusses/chats a few minutes and goes back to sleep, sometimes she cries up to 15-20 minutes and goes back to sleep. We don’t intervene. We tried back when this started with no change in night wakings.
I’d be willing to try earlier bedtimes, but the app I track her sleep on shows she’s averaging 13.25 hours of sleep a day (naps and night sleep combined) despite early bedtimes and a schedule that permits up to 14.5 hours of sleep. I’m wondering if she’s just tapped out on sleep and needs more wake time.
That being said… The nights she wakes does disrupt her sleep and she has red bags under her eyes. So that seems like more of a problem now then the early morning wakings.
Unfortunately I’m getting burnt out trying to troubleshoot this. Nothing appears to be working well.
Consider reading the section in my book on page 214 ‘When the bedtime is too late’ to fully appreciate why sleep begets sleep. Then, super carefully for 4 consecutive nights, you might want to try a bedtime that is 20 minutes earlier than what you normally would do.
Are you able to do this?
I will read the section again and try 4 nights. Thank you.
Please keep a detailed record of night and day sleep times.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth. My baby girl is 13 weeks old. After reading your book I realized I made her chronically sleep deprived around 8 weeks old by putting her to bed at 10:30pm! So for a month we bedshared to get sleep (she refused to sleep in her crib). However, when she was 12 weeks old we started extinction method in her crib in her own room. After two weeks of extinction she still has a hard time falling asleep and can take up to 1.5 hours of crying until she finally sleeps.
I am trying to maximize her day sleep still so that she can sleep better at night, but she doesn’t have a strict schedule yet and the naps vary day to day. She isn’t sleeping well or long in her crib still so I usually end up holding her to get longer naps. I try to get her midmorning nap at 9am but she sometimes cries 30 minutes so I have to hold her and then the nap is delayed to 10am. The midday nap starts anywhere from 12-1. The third nap starts somewhere from 3-4. Her nap lengths vary from 30 minutes to 2 hours. After about 1 hour of awake time I start to get her ready for a nap (her drowsy signs are very hard to read).
She is put to bed drowsy but awake somewhere between 6-7pm, but she cries and doesn’t fall asleep until closer to 6:45-7:30. Right now she’s been crying for over 1.5 hr and is still crying at 7:40pm (I put her down 6:10pm). Usually I dream feed her around 10pm and then she wakes at 3 or 4am, so I feed her. Usually she falls asleep immediately after night feedings or after 20 minutes of fussing to sleep. I tried an earlier bedtime of 5:30pm yesterday (she fell asleep by 6:45pm) but she had several night wakings and couldn’t fall back asleep after her night feed for over an hour. She also woke up earlier in the morning at 6:45am instead of her usual 7:30-8am wake up time.
1. How do I help her fall asleep better at night without so much crying? Is she just too young or am I doing something wrong with her day sleep? We don’t want to go back to bedsharing and so feel that extinction is the best option get her sleeping faster than other options (like you point out in your book).
2. And then how can I help her sleep in her crib more for her naps?
Thank you!
Night sleep begins to become organized around 6 weeks of age and day sleep around 4-6 months of age. Based on her age and previous sleep-deprivation, focus on night sleep. Based on her not napping well focus on a temporary 5:30pm bedtime with extinction or graduated extinction. Stop dream feeds. Do whatever you can to maximize day sleep and not worry about a schedule for now, but no naps start after 3:00pm to get the early bedtime. When night sleep improves, improvement in day sleep will follow, and then the bedtime will be moved a little later. How does this sound?
Oops, correction: she has been doing extinction for 10 nights. (Not 2 weeks)
That sounds good! So if I drop the dream feed, how long can I let her go without eating at this age (13 weeks)?
Last night she could not fall asleep and cried for 2.5 hours until I fed her, after which she finally was so exhausted that she slept. When I do these nights of 5:30 bedtime, is it ok if she cries that long?
How many days should I do this temporary earlier bedtime?
Are you breast, formula, or mixed feeding?
Feed her only when you think she is hungry.
After 4-5 nights of the super early bedtime, report back to me’
Keep a detailed written record of nap times and duration, latency to sleep onset, night awakenings, and crying severity (mild, moderate, or intense) and duration.
Note: 5:30 is the fall asleep time, always put her down drowsy but awake, you are walking out of the room then; the bedtime routine starts earlier.
She is breast fed. When she was 8 weeks old she started going all the way to 8 hrs sleeping without feeding so I know she’s been capable of that in the past. Ok, I will keep a record for the next 4-5 days and report back. Thank you so much for your help!
Update: Reporting back after the 5 night trial of an early 5:30 bedtime… And WOW, such improvement!! Baby girl only cries 15-35 minutes before falling asleep instead of over an hour (hopefully that will keep improving) and sleeps about 12 hours now! I dropped the 10pm dream feed and she only wakes to breastfeed once a night. I reread the part in your book that said that even small things like adjusting covers can disrupt their attempts to self soothe so we stopped going in to help her when she seemed in an uncomfortable position, and she just figured it out on her own and sleeps better because of it. It also seems like she cries less when my husband soothes and places her in the crib for the night like your book suggests too.
One thing I’m doing that is probably incorrect… She started waking up earlier than I would like (6:30-7 instead of 7:30-8). So I’ve been treating it like a second night feed by quietly feeding her and placing her back in her crib. She sleeps an extra 0.5-1.25hrs until it’s a better time to start the day. I also reread in your book about the “5:30 bedtime rut” but does that mostly apply to dropping a nap or should I also try stretching her wake time until the first nap time? In an effort to get her to wake up later, 2 nights ago I tried a slightly later bedtime (of 5:50pm; she fell asleep by 6:30) but she woke up even earlier (6am). However last night she didn’t fall asleep until 7:40 and she slept until 8am! Do you think that’s a sign I can start pushing her bedtime back slightly?
You said her naps will start to improve after night sleep does. I try to let her practice self soothing for her midmorning nap (letting her cry 15-20 minutes) and so far that has worked twice in the last week, so I’ll keep trying. Occasionally I can rock her to sleep, place her in her crib, and she’ll sleep for 30 minutes that way. Otherwise she sleeps in my arms or carrier to maximize sleep. She’s between 3 & 4 months old and showing such improvement that I think she might be ready to start the nap drill for one nap a day.
Again thank you SO SO much for the help and even responding! I’m such a huge fan after reading your book (and especially seeing such improvement)! So I’ve been telling all my pregnant friends to read your book too! My husband and I are just ecstatic that we’re all sleeping so much better now. It changes everything.
I am happy for you that all of you are sleeping better!
“She started waking up earlier than I would like (6:30-7 instead of 7:30-8). So I’ve been treating it like a second night feed by quietly feeding her and placing her back in her crib. She sleeps an extra 0.5-1.25hrs”-This is fine, but if she doesn’t return to sleep, don’t let her cry…start the day.
I would gently discourage trying a later bedtime right now; please let a couple of weeks go by to completely repay her sleep debt and see what her common sleep pattern is like before trying any adjustments. On the other hand, if letting her self-soothe for the morning nap seems to work often, go for it! Naps mature starting around 3-4 months of age and by 6 months they are quite regular and predictable. The midmorning nap starts to get organized first and the mid-day nap second.
By the way, how would you describe your husband’s role in all of this?
Thank you!
Ok, so after I continue the 5:30 bedtime for a couple weeks…
1. How will I know when she’s repaid her sleep debt?
2. After 2 weeks and once I’ve noticed her sleep patterns, should I then start pushing her bedtime back…in 15 or 30 minute increments? I’m assuming there will be some trial and error to find what time seems to make her best rested.
My husband’s role was to go into the baby’s room to adjust her (flip her if she rolled or to get her arm out of the crib slats) when we were doing that, although we stopped so she could better focus on self-soothing. During our initial 5 day trial of an early 5:30 bedtime, he was the one that soothed her to a drowsy but awake state and placed her in the crib after our bedtime routine (I mostly do the bedtime routine but sometimes he reads her a book as a part of it). We usually found that she cried for shorter periods when he soothed her versus me.
Try to unobtrusively monitor the time required for her to actually fall deep asleep after she is put down drowsy but awake (sleep latency). Pretend it is currently is 5-10 minutes but in a few weeks, you notice that she quietly moves around and now requires 20-30 minutes to actually fall into a deep sleep. This suggests that her bedtime might be moved 10-15 minutes later. The main advice is to go slow, don’t rush to move the bedtime later and when you do, do it gradually ( a few minutes at a time). Also, be flexible. There will be days (short naps, special events that cause skipped naps, illnesses, family holidays, vacations, etc.) when she does not get enough nap sleep so that night will require an earlier bedtime. Review the section in my book on a ‘reset’; maybe Dad will be in charge of ‘resets’.
Do you agree with this?
As expected you were certainly right about her needing to still go to bed at 5:30 to make up more of her sleep debt. Last night with a 5:30 bedtime, she slept a little over 14 hours!
Yes your advice definitely makes sense so I will go slowly and wait until we’ve given her a couple more weeks of 5:30 bedtimes before I adjust it to be later if necessary. One question I have though is that she is still crying off and on around 30 minutes before falling asleep each bedtime. I assume it will improve over the next couple weeks of continued 5:30 bedtimes… Is this ok or is it most likely because she’s overtired and maybe I need to adjust something? Her wake window before bed is around 1.25-1.5hr, and she does start to get fussy at the end of it. And so far she gets 3 naps equalling a total 2-3 hrs of daytime sleep.
I reread the Reset section in your book. We actually do have a 4-day vacation coming up soon that will require a reset for sure. The vacation will land right after the 2 more weeks of her 5:30 bedtime so I’m thinking that we’ll try a reset (and yes my husband can be in charge of those) as soon as we get back from the trip! Although it seems like she’ll need more than 1 night of a reset since she’s been going to bed at 5:30 every night already, right?
“One question I have though is that she is still crying off and on around 30 minutes before falling asleep each bedtime.” I assume this is intermittent quiet crying, yes?
“Although it seems like she’ll need more than 1 night of a reset since she’s been going to bed at 5:30 every night already, right?” Probably. Discuss with your husband how you might be able to enjoy a ‘modified’ vacation so that you will have an enjoyable time and also, not disrupt your baby’s sleep in a major way. The specific circumstances might make this doable, or not. But if possible, you would like to try to avoid a major disruption in her sleep that might undo all your efforts.
She must have heard me talking about her crying habits haha, because the last two nights she has drastically changed her bedtime crying. Last night she was “intermittent quiet crying” like you assumed for 15 minutes and then mildly (but still loudly) cried for 10 minutes before falling asleep. Tonight was absolutely NO crying for 30 minutes after being laid down (she just laid there while sucking on her hand) before she quietly fell asleep. Strange, since today I had a very hard time trying to maximize her sleep and minimize her crying. I didn’t expect her to go to sleep so well, however a pattern seems to be that when she goes to bed within about 1 hour of waking from her last nap, she cries much less (which was the case tonight). So the crying before night sleep is definitely getting better. But other than these few successful nights she had been loudly crying for about 30 minutes before sleep (with occasional breaks to try self-soothing for a few minutes).
If you think this bedtime crying is nothing to worry about and will keep improving that’s awesome, but if this is not supposed to be happening I’m curious if I should be adjusting wake times or something like that? She does the intermittent quiet cry (or quietly lays there awake) for 15-30 minutes before her first nap of the day too but I assume that will improve with time (unless that means she’s not tired enough yet? The first nap is always about one hour after she awakes for the day).
Ok, yes we will definitely try our hardest to get her as much sleep as possible on our vacation and then do a multi-day reset. I don’t want to undo all our work and progress! Do you have any blog posts or book sections on how to maximize sleep on vacations? Thank you again so much for all your help with our baby girl’s sleep, I am so appreciative!
Bedtime crying will disappear if, and only if, the interval of wakefulness before a sleep period is not too long: “a pattern seems to be that when she goes to bed within about 1 hour of waking from her last nap, she cries much less (which was the case tonight)”.
Blog Posts 26 (Reset) and 63 (Sleep Banking and Recovery from Sleep Loss) might be helpful. Maybe a pitch black room for naps (Blog Post 110) or a sound machine might help for naps-perhaps both only on vacation’
If you are curious, look at Blog Posts 79 and 80 about older children.
Let me know how the vacation goes and her recovery.
UPDATE:
Before vacation: (Baby is now 4 months old.) She kept improving every day! She started dropping her one night feed so she would sleep through the night without interruption around 12-14+ hours every night. Then her mid-morning naps were more consistently in the crib (less contact naps) and started lengthening from 30 minutes to much longer even up to 2 hours! I watch both her drowsy signs (“the stare”) and the clock so it takes her just a couple minutes to quietly fall asleep for naps. I keep her wake window short (1 or 1.5 hours) before her bedtime and when put down she doesn’t cry AT ALL before falling asleep (a huge win)!
During vacation: She wouldn’t sleep in the rental home’s pack-n-play for naps (only contact naps or carrier) but she slept GREAT in it at night, 12+ hours and only woke up one of the nights to feed. I used a blackout travel crib cover for darkness and a white noise machine. In the 4 days since the trip, Baby has been taking consistently longer naps (about 1.5-2 hrs) always in the crib and she seems to be done with night feedings! She sleeps 12-15hrs at night. Two of the first nights home she did protest with loud cries at bedtime for 30 minutes before falling asleep, but we just let that be extinction and she doesn’t do it anymore.
I am now hoping we can slowly start moving her bedtime later than 5:30. I pay attention to her cues in the evening and will only try pushing it back by a few minutes at a time. For example tonight was 5:40 instead of 5:30. I do let her take tiny cat naps in the late evenings when the wake window will be most likely too long from her last nap (say she wakes at 3:15pm) to 5:30 for bedtime. I think you’ve suggested not allowing naps after 3 if we’re aiming for a 5:30 bedtime, but she seems to do well with these occasional cat naps. Is it ok for me to continue doing so?
Thank you so much for your help with me and my daughter’s sleep; we are so appreciative!
“I am now hoping we can slowly start moving her bedtime later than 5:30”
You may have specific family circumstances that encourage you to want to do this and I respect your wishes.
My following comments are in general and may not apply to all families: Providing more sleep to your child encourages brain development (see Blog Posts 1-5). The more sleep the better and the more that the sleep is in synch with biologic rhythms, the better quality is the sleep. Your daughter might become a Nobel prize winner or Olympic athlete or both because she has a big sleep need that I would encourage you to respect.
What are your thoughts?
I honestly don’t have any good reason to push her bedtime back! I just get a lot of shocked comments from family/friends of how early it is and it does keep us at home more in the evenings, but that’s all. I’ll do what you mentioned in a previous comment to me by just observing if it takes her a longer time to quietly fall asleep at bedtime. When that happens I’ll try moving her bedtime back by a few minutes. But otherwise a 5:30 bedtime is really nice for me to have more time in the evening to do things I need to do and rest more! I didn’t realize that maybe my baby just has a higher sleep need than others. I’m on board for Olympic athlete or Nobel Prize winner haha.
Maybe I exaggerated a little, but think of Bob Mathias who at age 17 who won the Olympic Decathlon, the youngest to ever win a track and field event, napping under a tarp in between events! Well, not only was he the only person to successfully defend this win 4 years later, he led the Stanford football team to the Rose Bowl! So maybe you’ll have to settle for only Olympic gold and a stellar college for your daughter. Remember, the peer-reviewed scientific literature clearly states that if you continue to protect her sleep, she will be taller, slimmer, smarter, more creative, and more athletic. Not a bad trade-off for ignoring people who do not understand the power of sleep on the developing brain (Blog Post 38).
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
We are so thankful to have found your book and have begun implementing your recommendations after struggling with other approaches to achieve better sleep. Our 4 month old son needs rocking to go to sleep and struggles to stay asleep with early wakings. His naps vary and aren’t great if he isn’t contact napping or in a carrier.
We are on night 3 of moving our 4 month old son’s bedtime to 6:45 (previously around 8/8:15) and implementing gradual extinction.
-Night 1: We laid him down awake he cried for 5 min then fell asleep. He woke up at 2am (fell back asleep unassisted) and 5am (cried for 10 min so we soothed him with a binki and he fell back asleep). I had to wake him at 7am.
-Night 2: We laid him down awake he cried for 5 min then fell asleep. He woke at 2:50 and 6am (cried for 12 min so we soother him with a binki and he fell back asleep). I had to wake him at 7am.
-Night 3: We laid him down awake and cried for 15 min (put binki in and fell asleep). Up at 7:48pm (cried for 4 min, fell asleep 7:54).
Up at 10:45 (cried for 7 min, put binki in fell right asleep). Up 2am (cried 5 min and fell asleep). Up at 3:30am (cried 15 min, put binki in and fell asleep). Up at 3:55am so I gave gas drops and laid with him at 4:20am until asleep.
He woke up at 7:15am.
How do we help him self soothe better to eliminate the wake ups through the night? I read that you may recommend an even earlier bedtime around 5:30 to help repay his sleep debt. Would you do that gradually or just put him down at the time? With the early bedtime how do we make sure he is getting enough to eat- that eliminates his usual last feeding.
How should we handle naps to make sure they support his nighttime sleep?
Looking forward to your thoughts!!
Why do you have to wake him at 7am?
There is no reason to wake him, I was just under the impression he should be up at that time!
Please let him sleep; the more sleep the better!
Perhaps reading about ‘Drowsy Signs’ in my book or Blog or watching Blog Post 115X will help you decide on the best bedtime or perhaps just try a 5:30 falling asleep time (you have finished the bedtime routine and all soothing and are leaving the room at 5:30pm) for 2-3 nights only and see what happens.
How does this sound?
Hello!
Yes, we can try and move the bedtime to 5:30pm. With that change, how much nap should I be letting him take?
Thanks!!!
No limit to nap duration.
No new nap to start after 3pm; if he is asleep at 3pm, do not wake him, let him sleep.
Okay thank you!! We are struggling to get him to the 30 or so ounces of milk before he goes down at 5:30. Any advice with that?
Does your child’s doctor have a concern about your child’s weight gain?
No concern with his weight from the doctor! That is just how much he was taking with the later bedtime. He has been waking up the last two nights at 4/5ish and will not soothe without a feeding.
I encourage you to feed him if he is hungry but don’t work hard to give him a pre-determined number of ounces. Watch his sucking frequency and strength and not the number of ounces for a while and if concerned. have his weight checked by his doctor.
I messaged the doctor and they said 24-30 oz is perfect for him right now!
Hi Marc
1. Just wanted to get your thoughts and clarification on dummy’s, feeding to drowsy or asleep, and using bottle to help extend naps? All baby sleep material focus on the eat play sleep structure and laying baby down wide awake other wise it leaves baby needing these things in order to get to sleep and connect cycles.
For context, I have a 5 month old who has been catnapping since about 10 weeks. I have been following your advice for an early bed time most days as naps are terrible. Today, I decided to give a dummy for his mid morning sleep and he slept 2 hours. At mid-afternoon sleep, I was able to resettle with some bottle and back to the cot with dummy. Both things I have never done, always scared to use due to ‘sleep associations ’ that will need to be broken down the track
2. Does cat napping in the pram while out impact day sleep and routines?
For context my son can make his 2hr window at home having 3 naps but if we are out he gets tired easily and falls asleep in the pram sometimes an hour after being awake before his mid day sleep
Thanks for your time 🙂
What is his usual bedtime?
How often does he nap in the pram while out compared to nap in the cot at home?
When home, what time do the naps usually take place?
Bed time is 5.30-6pm. How ever I have been considering moving it to 6.30. He still feeds at 9.30pm, 1.30am and 5.30am and often does not resettle after this feed – making it the first feed of the day. I try leaving him in cot for an hour often not successful. We are in a cycle of early naps, short naps and extra naps (pram naps.)
He probably naps in the pram once a day – I need to leave the house with the toddler, but always try to go after his morning nap in cot.
Naps usually 8 or 8.30 and mid day or closer to 2pm if he has had a short pram sleep
I am really struggling to get a consistent routine with him and unsure how to trouble shoot most of it
Thanks again
On most days, how does he behave and look between 4-5pm when he is alone with toys and not interacting with sibling or parents and not in front of a screen?
Hello. Your book and blog have been really helpful, so thank you for that!!
I’m at my wits end with my 14-month-old’s sleep. For almost 2 months now she’s been waking before 5:30am. It feels like we’ve tried everything – early bedtimes, capped naps, unlimited naps, long wake periods, shorter wake periods, later bedtimes, and switching to a 1-nap schedule. Nothing is working. Early bedtimes just results in her waking earlier. She’s crabby and fussy, which is now the norm but didn’t use to be. She’s napping 1.5-3 hours about 11:30am and going to bed between 6:30-7pm, depending on when her nap ends.
I don’t know what else to do. I would greatly appreciate any insight or recommendations for sleep consultants for a child this age. Thank you.
When was your attempt at an early bedtime, how many nights did you try it, what was the early bedtime, at what time did she wake up when you attempted the early bedtime?
Currently, how does she look and behave between 5-6pm when alone with toys (no parental interaction and no screens)?
Bedtime was about 6pm and we make schedule changes for 4-5 days before giving up. She would wake about 15-30 minutes earlier, so 4:45-5.
Your second question is difficult to answer because about that time were either doing dinner or getting ready for bed (possibly walking). Lately she’s been very clingy and on the grumpy side, so I imagine she would only tolerate playing by herself for a short period of time.
“Lately she’s been very clingy and on the grumpy side, so I imagine she would only tolerate playing by herself for a short period of time.” tells you her sleep tank is going to empty.
Consider a 3-4 night trial of a rigid 5:30 falling asleep time (She is fed, soothed, and you are leaving the room at 5:30pm, lights off). Monitor her latency to sleep onset, mood, and behavior. Don’t go to her before 5:30am, even if she’s crying. Keep a sleep diary for 3-4 nights and report back to me. Let her nap as long as she wants. This super-early bedtime is temporary but I don’t know, if it helps, whether it will be days or weeks before the bedtime can be moved later. This will partially depend on naps so try to maximize her nap opportunity by making her room very dark and quiet. Would a white noise machine help with naps?
Thank you for the suggestion. I was worried that would be the case! Unfortunately I get off at 5pm from work, so 6-6:30 is the earliest I can put her to bed. I will try 6pm or as early as possible to see if that makes a difference.
Her naps are in a cool, dark room with white noise.
Excellent, that’s better than 6:30-7:00 previously. Who is caring for her when you are at work?
Hi Dr. Weissbluth!
My son is 7 weeks old and is starting to struggle with night sleep. He’s given us a couple of very long stretches (between 6-8 hours) but they aren’t consistent yet. He has started to wake up every hour and needed us to rock or feed him back to sleep. We have a bedtime routine and he’s usually asleep and in his crib by 7:30. His last nap is usually from 5-6pm. My questions are (1) should we be aiming for an even earlier bedtime? And (2) should we be rocking him to sleep or letting him cry to fall asleep?
What was his gestational age at birth?
40+4
40+4 (he also weighs over 12lbs if that matters)
1. Around 6 weeks of age, there is peak fussiness, crying, and wakefulness. So maybe this is age appropriate and it will decrease over the next few weeks on its own.
2. Maybe read Blog Post 9 and ask whether the bedtime is too late. Around 6 weeks of age, all baby’s need an earlier bedtime. often, it is around 5:30-6:30pm. So maybe his sleepiness around 5-6pm is not a nap but his need to fall asleep for the night.
Details to clarify what is going on are in the age-appropriate section of my book.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
I have read your book and it has been wonderful! My son is 9 months old and was sleep trained using extinction at 13 weeks. He is able to self sooth at bedtimes and naps. He wakes between 6-6:30 in the morning (sometimes even closer to 7) His morning nap is between 8:30/9 and lasts 2 hours, and his afternoon nap is typically between 1-1:30 and lasts 1.5 to 2 hours. His bedtime falls between 5:30-6:30 depending on the duration of his last nap. At around 4 months of age he started having nights where he would wake screaming like something was wrong. I would wait him out a bit to see if he would self soothe but it was very hard as the screaming was terrible and he sounded in such distress. Initially, I could replace his pacifier and rock his chest and that would sooth him back to sleep but over time he needed more help to go back to sleep, and I would need to rock him for sometimes 2 hours. I eventually realized I was making it worse by going in and implemented extinction again. It took a few nights but problem solved! He would then go for stretches only needing to eat once a night (between 2-4) and then back to sleep. Lately he has been waking screaming again. Terrible screaming, not just crying. He is a very happy, social child who hardly every fusses or cries during the day. It feels wrong to leave him, but I think I am confusing him and causing intermittent crying when I go in! I am wondering if you have any guidance as to why he is waking like this? If I let him cry it will last for 1-2 hours but then he will sleep through the night or be up around 4 to eat. I do not think he is hungry as when I have gone to him he isn’t interested in nursing just wants to wiggle and cuddle. I am wondering if he is overtired? I’ve read the book and understand than an earlier bedtime can solve most sleep issues and am unsure how much earlier than 5:30 I should go. I also wonder if his sleep latency isn’t long enough and maybe I’m putting him down too tired?! We have a great routine and after a book and song and quick cuddle he is going down drowsy but awake. He then rolls over a few times and is asleep. Maybe 2 minutes?! Ugghh any help you can provide would be appreciated!
Does he actually fall asleep between 5:30-6:30pm? How often is it 5:30 and how often is it 6:30ppm?
Thank you for your reply! Yes, he falls asleep quickly at bedtime. Within 5 minutes most nights. Regardless of what time he is put down. I have only use a 5:30 bedtime when his PM nap has been short (ending at 2:30 or before) or he seems very tired from having a few busy days in a row. Most days lights are out between 6:00-6:15 and asleep shortly after. So I would say 2 out of 7 nights needs a 5:30 bedtime. I had used your suggestion from the book to make a sleep log, and tracked his sleep most of June and July (we were transitioning to 2 naps then). His napping and nights were good so I stopped consistently tracking. But upon review it looked like he was doing best with a 6pm bedtime (with his last nap ending around 3).
“I have only use a 5:30 bedtime when his PM nap has been short (ending at 2:30 or before) or he seems very tired from having a few busy days in a row. Most days lights are out between 6:00-6:15 and asleep shortly after. So I would say 2 out of 7 nights needs a 5:30 bedtime.”
What you are describing is cumulative sleepiness from a bedtime that is a little too late (Please read Blog Posts 84-86) which you then fix with a 5:30pm bedtime about twice a week. Crying out at night suggests that he is a bit more overtired than you realize. My suggestion is to strictly enforce a 5:30-5:45Pm bedtime for 5-10 days and monitor sleep latency, crying out at night, and behavior and mood between 4-5pm. keep a sleep log and report back to me. How does this sound?
This sounds great! Thank you and I’ll keep you posted!
Hi Dr. Weissbluth! You were so right (of course) about the cumulative sleepiness. I didn’t realize just how tired he was!! I implemented a strict 5:30 bedtime for about 10 days and he is doing so much better! His naps have improved as well which has naturally adjusted his bedtime back to 7:00. Thank you again for your guidance.
You are welcome. Please consider writing a narrative report of your child’s sleep journey and post it here. I would then, anonymously if you wish, use your report as a Blog Post. Your voice might resonate with other mothers better than mine.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth. I don’t have a problem (anymore), but I just wanted to give you a fun update on a success story. You helped me in the comments above when my girl was 3 through 5 months. She was chronically overtired because of a too-late bedtime but with your book and advice here she absolutely LOVES sleep now. (the high sleep-needs future Nobel prize winner/Olympian if you remember from previous comments lol!). At 9 months old she now goes to bed around 6:30pm and wakes up at 8am, sleeping from 13.5-14 hours a night. She takes two naps a day (usually 1-2 hours each). I just wanted to again thank you for all of your research and writings on this subject and your passion to help babies get the good sleep they need. I am so thankful to have found your work for my first baby and will implement for all future babies of course!
One clue that her big sleep need is associated with superior intelligence is “prolonged visual fixation”. Infants, who later are determined to have very high IQs, are observed to stare for long periods of time at novelty. It’s as if they are trying to understand better or absorb more novel items such as colorful glasses or new complex toys. Do you notice this?
Would it be possible for you to write a narrative report on your infant’s sleep journey that I would post on my Blog? Your voice might resonate with other mothers more than my voice.
Oh that’s interesting, we’ve been using the word “introspective” to describe her because she stares at new things and new people for a long time like you mention. I will absolutely update soon with a narrative report of her sleep journey.
One old term used to describe children like your daughter is that she is a “thinker and looker”.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth, here is my narrative report of our sleep journey! I hope it helps other parents/babies out there:
When Hadley was 8 weeks old I was still putting her to bed late, around 10:30pm, not realizing that by 6-8 weeks of age her bedtime should have been much earlier. We had accidentally created a very overtired baby who could suddenly only sleep 15-60 minutes at a time at night.
For 3 weeks Hadley and I bed-shared to finally get some sleep. This was only a temporary solution though since I wasn’t getting the deep sleep I needed and my husband had been kicked out of the bed. I then discovered and read Dr. Weissbluth’s book, “Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child” where I learned that I was putting Hadley to bed way too late, even while bed-sharing, around 9pm.
So I started trying to “maximize her day sleep” by holding her or wearing her in a soft baby wrap carrier in a dark room with a sound machine. Since she was already severely overtired and had no self-soothing skills we chose the quickest method to get her the sleep she needed: extinction method; and we started putting her to bed much earlier, between 6 and 7pm. This was right when she turned 3 months old. For 10 days she still cried before falling asleep at night, sometimes for 1.5 hours! It was so hard to listen to her cries even though I knew it was for her own good.
Because the length of time she would cry seemed longer than his research had shown for the extinction method to work, I reached out to Dr. Weissbluth. He recommended a temporary 5:30pm bedtime and to stop dream-feeding her. I had been “dream feeding” her (waking to feed her around 10pm before I went to bed) because I thought this would mean less feedings in the middle of the night. After 5 nights of a 5:30 bedtime and no dream-feeds her length of crying reduced dramatically to only 15-30 minutes before falling asleep and she started sleeping for 12 hours with only one night feed! My husband and I also learned that she soothed to sleep quicker when he put her down for bed instead of me and when we stopped sneaking in to “help” her (for things like her leg sticking out of the crib).
For no good reason I thought babies should go to bed a little later than 5:30 so when I suggested that I push her bedtime back, Dr. Weissbluth encouraged us to let her continue the early 5:30 bedtime for a couple of weeks to pay off her sleep debt. She still cried before falling asleep some nights for a couple weeks but I learned that the shorter her wake window before bed (1-1.5 hours), the less crying there was. Soon, she didn’t cry at all before bed.
By 4 months old Hadley started sleeping through the night for 12-14 hours without waking to feed at night! Of course that long sleep time meant I had to make some other adjustments like feeding her more throughout the day to make sure she didn’t lose weight and I had to pump before I went to bed to keep my milk supply. Around this time her naps started to become more consistent and longer and didn’t require my help as often.
By 8 or 9 months old she had very slowly moved her bedtime back to 6-6:30pm and would wake up at 8-8:30am. Now (9.5 months) with the time change she goes to bed at 5:30pm again and wakes at 7:30-8am (14 hours)! She takes a 1.5-2 hour nap at 9:30/10am and a 1 hour nap at 2pm. People are shocked and sometimes annoyed that she goes to bed so early but it’s for her own good (and ours) so it’s worth it! In fact today we are going out for dinner with family at 4pm just to protect Hadley’s bed time haha. I am so thankful for Dr. Weissbluth’s research, book, and help through his blog to get Hadley (and me and my husband) as much sleep as we need! It’s been life-giving.
Thank you! Shall I change Hadley’s name when I post this as a Blog Post?
Would you mind adding a little more detail about the role of husband on this journey?
No need to change her name for the blog post.
As far as my husband’s involvement during this sleep journey: my husband helped in the decision-making process for whether we would do gradual or extinction method. For the first week of the extinction method he put Hadley to bed since she cried less when he did that. Once she started to fall asleep with less crying I continued to put her down without a noticeable difference in crying or sleep latency between us. But mostly he provided so much of the moral support I needed on her sleep journey. He also gave Hadley and I the bed and slept on the FLOOR in another room when we bed-shared for 3 weeks haha!
THANK YOU!
You’re welcome, it’s the least I can do to thank YOU!
Hi Dr.Weissbluth
I was hoping you could help provide some insight on my 11 weeks old sleep habits. *she was born at 36.5 weeks*
Wake up: 830 (we wake her up)
She takes 4 naps a day.
Nap 1: usually taken around 940-1000
Nap 2: usually taken around 1300-1330
Nap 3: usually taken around 1600-1630
Nap 4: usually taken around 1830-1845
Up by 1915-1930 from last nap.
Bedtime has been around 2030-2100
For the last two weeks she has been napping for 45-50 mins.. I will go help extend the first and second nap by contact napping with most times.
I was capping her naps at the 2 hour mark to ensure she was feeding every 3 hours to get adequate nutrition/ feedings throughout the day (I know you have said not to cap naps so I’m going to stop now!)
For night time, she has been sleeping a good stretch of 7-8 hours after she settles for bed, with only one waking to feed overnight. She will get diaper change, feed, held for 5-10 mins to help with her reflux then back down to sleep with no issues. (This has been going on for over a week now)
The issue we’re having is the short day naps and the length of time it’s been taking us to settle her for bed. Sometimes it’s taken us over an hour to get her down to sleep for the night, and other times it takes her 10 minutes or less to get herself down.
We have a consistent nap and bedtime routine that we have been doing since she was 6 weeks old.
What can I do to help fix these issues ?
Thank you in advance for your help and guidance.
Your baby’s corrected age is about 8weeks old. The brain wants an early bedtime around 6 weeks of age. Consider skipping Nap 3, and think of a bedtime (falling asleep for the night) around 5:30pm. Now, she might need a feeding 4 or more hours later and a second feeding early in the morning. The earlier bedtime and longer night sleep duration will eventually cause a midmorning and midday nap to increase to 1-2 hours each over the next several weeks.
How does this sound?
Thanks for your reply Dr.Weissbluth!
Should I continue to wake her up for the day at 830am or let her sleep until she wakes herself?
Should I continue to help extend her naps during the day since they are only 45-50 mins?
We actually put her down for the third nap today at 1750. It took us 10-15 mins to get her to sleep and she only slept for 50 mins… and woke up fussy
She was showing sleepy cues beforehand: yawning, glazed eyes, reddened eyelids etc. So I thought we had the timing right but maybe we missed it and were too late?
I am open to trying an earlier bedtime of 530pm to see it it’ll help. Should I try to start bedtime earlier everyday to get to 530pm or do I just right off bat put her down for bed at that time on day 1?
The problem is the time it takes to get her down for the night. As soon as she’s down, she has no issues staying asleep except for one waking to feed….So is the issue the bedtime start ? Is that ultimately affecting day time naps?
You are on the right track.
Do not wake her.
Extending naps at this age helps.
You are confusing fatigue signs with drowsy signs.
Why early bedtimes help naps (and night sleep).
Does this help?
Please read (or make your husband read, if you are too sleep deprived) the first few Chapters of my book to better understand details about my response.
Thank you for your words of encouragement and insight on the matter Dr. Weissbluth
I will let her sleep until she wakes this morning and continue to extend the naps where needed.
Yes I think we might’ve put her down too late now that I think of it.
From your response, I assume bedtime start at 530pm is right off the bat. Should I be doing this temporarily and then adjust based off her cues for bedtime ?
Both my husband and I will read those chapters so we can be on the same page and make the changes necessary for our little girl!
For 3-5 nights, feed her, bathe her, soothe her, put her down drowsy but awake, and leave the room at 5:30 pm. Monitor latency to sleep onset, wake times, night waking, naps, mood and behavior and report back to me.
Okay we will try this and report back to you!
One more thing I have to ask… my baby is still sleeping now (948am) from being put down at 620am after an early morning feed. I usually wake her at 830am but am not waking her to allow her to wake herself as per your recommendation.
How do I tackle trying to get her down for the night at 530pm today if her day is now starting much later? Is that enough day time hours for her to actually settle down for the night? (Day time feedings and day time sleep etc)
Try it.
No new nap starts after 3:00pm. If she is asleep then, let her sleep.
Sorry I should’ve added that she woke up at 545am herself. I changed and fed her then placed her back down after holding her for 5-10 mins (for her reflux). She’s been asleep since being placed down at 620am
So my baby woke up from her second nap of the day at 245pm. She’s typically only able to stay awake for 60-75 mins…. How would I go about keeping her awake until 530pm bedtime? Won’t it result in having an overtired, fussy baby? I’m just unsure how to approach this.
I suggest that you put forth a lot of effort to soothe her and not let her sleep until 5:30pm. The conflicting goals are to not let her get overtired and to have an early bedtime.
Hey Doc, thanks for making this blog and book. It is a great resource and there is so much to learn!
Context:
I have a 7 month old who has been showing fatigue signs (pulling ears, yawning, rubbing eyes) and waking up at 5-530am.
First nap is around 9am and usually lasts 30-1.5hr. If the nap is <1hr, I let the baby fuss/cry and usually they go back to sleep for another 30-60min.
Second nap is around 1pm and usually lasts 30-1.5hr. Similar story to morning nap.
Third nap is around 4-5pm and lasts 30mins (I wake them up to try to not impact night sleep).
The baby has a distinct behaviour that signals whether they want to go back to sleep during a nap or not. The baby usually “sounds tired” and does minimal movement. But when they want to stop their nap, the baby usually rolls on their back and plays with their feet or does a lot of tummy time looking around the room.
The baby never naps for more than 2 hours in total as they wake themself up.
Since rereading part of your book, I stopped the 3rd nap and instead do an early bedtime at 530pm. I made this switch about 9-10 days ago.
Unfortunately, the baby is still waking up at 5-530am. I was really hoping for the wake up time to be 6-7am. Getting kinda desperate, I have implemented a ‘reset’ at 5-530am where I go in, change the diaper, only feed if they are super hungry and put them back to bed. They will take 10-30mins to fall back asleep and then I wake them up at 7am.
Do you see any red flags with what I am doing? I am nervous my 5-530am reset will cause some kind of habit to form where the baby will just always wake up at 5-530am. But if I extinct until 6am, then get the baby, they will definitely not last until 9am. If I let them nap earlier, I worry this will have a cascading effect where their second nap will be earlier and then I have to have an even earlier bedtime (at like 430 or 5?). Who knew sleep training a baby could be so stressful!
What has been the usual falling asleep time at night recently?
Hey Marc, thanks for getting back to me. Recently: 550pm, 555pm, 555pm, 555pm, 545pm, 550pm, 545pm. So around 550pm?
Please describe your child’s mood and behavior when alone (no screens or parental involvement) during the hour before bedtime.
Hey Marc, that is a great question. We are usually pretty busy the hour before and the baby isnt usually alone for an extended amount of time. When the baby is alone (because we are making dinner) they will entertain themself on their play mat but after 15-20 minutes, the baby will want our attention (via louder vocalizations). There isn’t crying during that hour. Sometimes the baby will show fatigue signs (pulls ears, rub eyes).
I’ll try to do more experiments with this and see what happens. Thanks
1. “I was really hoping for the wake up time to be 6-7am. Getting kinda desperate, I have implemented a ‘reset’ at 5-530am where I go in, change the diaper, only feed if they are super hungry and put them back to bed. They will take 10-30mins to fall back asleep and then I wake them up at 7am.” If you fight your baby’s circadian rhythm, you will lose. Go with the flow. Go to bed earlier yourself.
2. “Sometimes the baby will show fatigue signs (pulls ears, rub eyes).” This tells you that the current bedtime is too late and this can cause all the sleep issues you have observed. For the next 5-10 nights, strictly enforce a 5:30 pm lights out (you have bathed, fed, and soothed your baby and are leaving the room, hopefully he is drowsy but awake). In the future, as naps regularize, this super early bedtime might be a little later (based on drowsy signs) or not.
How does this sound?
We can definitely try that. So to recap:
1. If the baby wakes up before 6, just extinct until 6am and then start the day
2. Baby in bed strictly at 530pm for 5-10 days
Sounds great! Thanks again!
1. If the baby wakes up before 6, just extinct until 6am and then start the day. NO! Go with the flow and respect your baby’s developing circadian rhythm.
Hey Marc,
something odd has been happening for the past 6 nights. After a bed time of 530pm, the baby seems to be waking up at 9-930 every evening for a feeding. Then again at 12am and 4am or at 1am and 5am. We’ve tried increasing calories during the day, including adding another solid meal but this still happens. If we don’t respond at 9/9:30 then the baby is usually awake for 1-1.5 hours increasingly upset and still wakes up later at the 12/4 and 1/5 times.
Is your baby breast milk or formula fed?
Please describe your baby’s mood and behavior between 4-5pm.
Please describe a typical nap pattern.
Baby is breast fed.
Baby seems to be getting less fussy but still shows fatigue signs (rubbing eyes) during the 4-5pm but by no means is purely content.
First nap is at 9am or sometimes at 845 if he shows drowsy cues (likely due to waking up closer to 530am). Second nap is between 1245 and 130, 1245 if showing drowsy cues, 1pm normally or 130 if he had a long first nap (like a 2.5hr nap). It is not rule based even though I made it sound like it is.
Do you ever give expressed breast milk in a bottle?
How certain are you that your baby is actually hungry at these times?
Has anything happened recently that might have caused your breast milk production to decrease?
We haven’t given a bottle of expressed milk but could possibly try in the coming days.
Usually baby falls asleep within 15m after being left in his crib after the feed so that was our “clue”. We’ll try tonight to listen for the suck-swallow vs suck-suck-swallow behaviour during each feeding session to confirm hunger.
Lack of sleep for a few months and stress about that could likely have had an impact on milk production but it’s hard to tell without expressing like you suggested.
If we don’t respond at 9/9:30 and the baby is up for 1-1.5 hours, does that basically undo the early bedtime? Just wondering how to navigate that time if we don’t respond.
Sleep fragmentation might be worse than short sleep duration.
Well-fed older babies can easily go at least 4 hours between feedings: bedtime, middle of the night, and early morning.
Just checking: when your baby is up for 1-1.5 hours at night, are you giving any attention at all?
Hey Marc,
Before, we would try to extinct for the 1-1.5hrs. Recently, we had a thought “oh baby might be hungry” and so we tried feeding the baby and they would go to sleep in 15mins unless something else was wrong.
Hi Dr. Weisbluth!
I followed your book for my 18 month old, using the no cry method, and he is the most incredble night time sleeper and napper. I am now trying to install the same methods for my 8 week old but am having trouble with his naps. He is gaining weight well and now sleeps from 7pm-5am wakes to breastfeed and sleeps again 530-830am. His naps are short when in his crib, long when he is held. I am wondering if he is having trouble connecting sleep cycles, or if my expectations are simply too high for his age. I am following his tired cues and he is only awake for one hour at time, including feedings. With a pacifier he falls right to sleep, but the “naps” are very brief, sometimes only 5 minutes. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
What was your baby’s gestational age at birth?
When is a common falling asleep time at night?
He was born at 40 weeks 3 days.
He falls asleep around 730
When does the last nap end and how long is it?
Please describe his mood and behavior (when not being soothed by a parent) between 6-7PM.
His last nap ends around 430/5. He falls asleep immediately for all of his naps, but they last 30 minutes max. I go in to give him his pacifier and he again falls asleep quickly but is up 1-5 minutes later. I do this until his next feed time. It’s quite a cycle we are in.
He is surprisingly calm during that time. Alert but not fussy. He nurses at 630 and then bed shortly after.
At 6 weeks of age, his brain wants an earlier bedtime. An earlier bedtime will allow him to wake up better rested and will eventually allow for longer naps. How do you feel about extinction or graduated extinction with feedings at night?
I am happy to try it. What time do you suggest for bedtime? he is currently sleeping 7pm-5am without a feed. He wakes to feed at 5am and then sleeps again until 830am.
The most common problem with child #2 is that child #1 distracts parents from early evening subtle drowsy signs so the newborn is put to sleep at night too late.
Because his naps are short and he appears drowsy around 5pm, bathe him, feed him, soothe him, and leave the room, drowsy but awake, at 5:30pm. No new nap starts after 3pm so prepare to soothe and distract him in the late afternoon. If he’s asleep at 3pm from an earlier nap, do not awaken him. Prepare to feed him maybe twice overnight, because the last daytime feed is now earlier (for example the middle of the night and early in the morning).Don’t worry about a nap schedule but sleep him during the day based on drowsy signs. Nap rhythms develop between 4-6 months so later, when naps become more regular and longer, the bedtime might be a little later.
How does this sound?
Evenings are always busy, that very well may be true! That sounds like an excellent plan. Thank you so much for your knowledgeable insight and your time!
Hi Dr. W!
It worked!! I paid more attention, and was 100% missing his drowsy signs. Vinny now goes to sleep at 530pm without any fuss, he sleeps until 530am when he wakes to feed and goes back to sleep until 830am. I put him down for a nap after about an hour of awake time, as soon as he shows cues of being tired. His naps are almost two hours, I put him down drowsy but awake and he is able to calm himself when he wakes up. Best of all- he is even happier.
I cannot thank you enough!
You are welcome. Because this is a common situation (Child #1 distracts parents from drowsy cues in baby #2), I would appreciate it if you could write a narrative report of your sleep adventure and post it here. I would then post it as a Blog Post (anonymously, if you wish). Mothers are more likely to respond to your voice, observations, feelings, and experience then to my dry description.
Looking ahead, as naps develop between 4-6 months, the bedtime then might be a little latter. Please don’t rush this.
Excellent, I will pay attention to changes in a few months. Thank you! No need to change names in our journey.
I followed Dr. Wiessbluth’s book for my 18-month-old, using the no-cry method, and he is the most incredible night-time sleeper and napper. It has been nothing short of life-changing for my family. I was determined to instill the same methods with my 8-week-old, Vinny, but was having trouble with his naps. He was gaining weight well and slept from 7 pm-5 am woke to breastfeed and slept again 530-830am. But his naps were short when in his crib, long when he was held. I was following his tired cues, and he was only awake for one hour at time, including feedings. With a pacifier, he fell right to sleep, but the “naps” were very brief, sometimes only 5 minutes. I would soothe him, and he would sleep again for 3-5 minutes. I did this until his next feed time. It was quite a cycle we were in. Dr. Wiessbluth suggested that my toddler may be distracting me from Vinny’s “tired cues” in the evening, and when I paid more attention, I absolutely was! I had been struggling in the evenings to take care of both of them because Vinny was tired and upset and my toddler was frustrated that I could not focus on him. Dr. Wiessbluth suggested a 530pm bedtime for Vinny, and within a week his naps were amazing. He is put down drowsy but awake, falls asleep on his own and when he wakes up 30-45 minutes later, he is able to go back to sleep shortly, making his naps two hours! He is even happier and smiles more, and my toddler is less jealous because I get more time with him. Thank you Dr. Wiessbluth!
THANK YOU!
Hey Marc,
I am back unfortunately haha. I think we solved the hunger issue. But scratching my head about our current situation. 9 month baby is waking up between 5 and 6am. Baby shows fatigue signs when waking up between 5 and 6am so we believe he doesn’t want to be awake.
Oddly witching hour isn’t that bad but now harder to test as we can’t really leave him alone for more than a minute because he is crawling and climbing on everything.
He has been doing this behaviour where he wakes up between 12-1am making little moaning sounds until it turns into “what we think are distress sounds”. So mom goes in to breast feed, change diaper, sing song and put him back to bed. Sometimes he is back asleep on 10mins. More commonly, he is awake for 1 to 2 hours….and we usually have to go back in to do a short soothe and then he falls back asleep within 10mins. The he wakes up between 5-6am 🙁
This is the kicker, we do early bed time (530pm) because we can see the fatigue signs throughout the day (eye rub here and there and yawns).
Naps are at 9am and 1pm. Afternoon nap is usually 1.5hrs but has been going down to 1hr. Morning nap has been around 1-1hr 15min.
Honestly, not sure what else to do.
In a totally breast fed baby, if, and only if, the breast milk supply is adequate, at nine months of age, feeding at night is usually not needed. Please review the chapter on sleep solutions to consider not going to your child in the middle of the night. Please review the sections on maternal symptoms of anxiety and depression to determine whether they may be a contributing factor in interpreting ‘distress’ sounds. Let me know your thoughts.
Thanks for the pointer. I did reread that section and it does indeed sound related.
In the past 4 days, we have been trying to follow the advice in the book – we have made a conscious effort to _wait_ whenever the baby is awake and making sounds. If the sounds are not crying, we wait. In the four days though, the baby eventually starts to sound distressed. If the baby is flat-out non-stop crying, we go in and investigate. If the baby is periodically crying out but not ongoing, we try to wait at least 30 minutes to give the baby a chance to self soothe and go back to sleep. This hasn’t worked yet… If the baby is still crying after that, we go in and investigate. The culprit is usually a dirty diaper and sometimes hunger. However, if we don’t try to feed him after changing his diaper, the baby continues to do the ‘periodic crying’ until we go in again (after another 30mins) and feed the baby. After this point, the baby usually goes to sleep within 30 mins with no crying.
I’m wondering why the baby is even waking up in the first place? It seems like the baby wakes up “for some unknown reason” (usually not due to hunger we think), then soils his diaper after some time, then gets distressed.
I have some data from the past 4 days where we started doing more ‘wait and see’:
Day 1
bedtime 5:55pm following drowsy cues, asleep in 15min. Up at 12:05am for 1hr before fussing, then crying for 30min. Mom changed dirty diaper and did a small feed. Baby took 15min to fall asleep. Total awake time 1hr45min. Up at 5:20am.
Day 2
bedtime 5:40pm following drowsy cues, asleep in 10min. Up at 2:05am for 25min before fussing, then crying for 10min. Mom changed dirty diaper and did a small feed. Baby took 20-30min to fall asleep. Total awake time ~1.5hr. Up at 6:25am.
Day 3
bedtime 5:35pm following drowsy cues. Asleep in 5min. Up at 1:40am for 30min before fussing, then crying for 10min. Mom changed wet diaper and did a feed. Baby took 20-30min to fall asleep. Total awake time ~1.5hr. Up at 5:55am
Day 4
bedtime 6:10pm (soon as we could due to swimming lessons + dinner), asleep in 5min. Up at 1:50am for 30min before fussing for 30min. Mom changed dirty diaper and did a small feed. Baby took 20min to fall asleep. Total time awake 1.5hr. Up at 6:15am
Baby is basically up for 1-2hr every night and waking up between 5 and 6:30 in the morning. And baby looks tired when they wake in the morning even though they are smiling. Is there anything you suggest to improve the overnight sleep?
How old is your baby now?
How sleep deprived are both of you?
Please read the section on extinction and tell me whether you could do this for 5 nights only.
Baby is 9 months old. We are fairly sleep deprived. We re-read the extinction section and we plan to follow your advice. We will only respond to distress sounds and minimize social interaction overnight. Let’s see how it goes! Thanks again.
Extinction will work in 3-4 days if, and only if, the bedtime is very early (based on drowsy signs) and you do not respond at all, unless you think your child is sick. Minimal social contact for minimal soothing will cause extinction to fail.
Back again,
We have done extinction for 11 nights. All 11 nights the baby has been awake for 1.5-2 hours around 1-4am. Bedtimes are at 530-545pm. Baby is now 10months old. Baby wakes up between 520am and 630am for the day and has two naps at 9am and 1pm for 1-2 hours.
Mom’s milk supply is good. Baby has 3 solid meals and multiple breastfeed sessions.
Do you have any other ideas to try?
Thanks!
Please describe his mood and behavior when alone between 4:30-5:30pm.
Please describe in detail what occurs when awake between 1-4am.
Is he put down drowsy but awake for naps and night sleep?
Thanks for the quick response!
Mood between 430-530 is hard to say because we usually do dinner then but he’s definitely happier when entertained by someone. And usually by 515/520 he’s fussy so we start bedtime.
During the 1.5-2 hours awake at night baby usually wakes up and hangs out in his crib (crawling, sitting, standing, etc) for 30-45m then starts to get fussy and lies on his front trying to fall back asleep then eventually cries hard and falls asleep after that. We don’t go in or do anything to assist him back to sleep, just check on the video monitor that he seems ok.
He’s always awake when left in his crib for naps and bedtime.
You wrote: “Bedtimes are at 530-545pm.” To clarify, what times at bedtime is he actually falling asleep?
The past few nights it’s been 5:50-6pm asleep, closer to 6 for 4 nights in a row.
Please look at the newest blog post on presleep arousal and review the Blog Posts on ‘Drowsy Signs’ to fully appreciate why the falling asleep time is too late and causing the persistent night wakings. You wrote,”And usually by 515/520 he’s fussy so we start bedtime.” Do everything you are currently doing, but earlier, in the evening. For the next 4-5 nights, bathe, feed, and soothe him and leave the room, lights out, at 5:30pm. How does this sound?
Ok! Blog post was helpful and we reviewed the drowsy signs too. We’ll try this for 4-5 nights and see if it works! Thanks again
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
I go to your book and your online blogs every time I need some guidance, but I have been having a difficult time lately trying to figure out solutions to my daughter’s sleep and trying to get her on the right track. My daughter is 6 months and 2 days, born 12 days before her due date. At 5 months, she had a period where she was sleeping 11 hours straight (6:47pm-6:23am, 7:20pm-6:30am, etc). She then started waking up between 4:30am and 5:30am. This may be due to her naps still being very irregular, ranging between 30 minutes to two hours. Last night, she woke up at 3:30am – she didn’t have as much formula as she normally does during the day so I went in to feed her thinking she may be hungry. She fed for about a minute before falling back to sleep. I put her back in her crib and she immediately woke and started to cry on and off until 5:34am. She normally sleeps a total of 2.5 hours a day and her wake windows are approximately 2.25/2.25/2.25/3.5, regardless of how long her naps are. I would like to give her a 5:30pm bedtime, but the timing of her naps and wake windows makes it difficult to make that 5:30pm bedtime happen. For instance, today she went down for her last nap at 3:43pm and I will let her sleep for maximum 30 minutes. Her last wake window before bed is normally 3-3.5 hours which I know is a long time but she is always so alert and happy and doesn’t seem ready for bed before then. Do you have any guidance on how I can get my daughter to bed at an earlier bedtime so that she can catch up on her sleep? Should I try shorter wake windows in between nap times and bed times? Thank you in advance.
Around 5 months of age, when her bedtime was around 6:47-7:20pm, please describe in detail her mood and behavior when alone with toys (no screens or parental involvement) during the hour before the bedtime and the timing of her usual last nap of the day.
Currently, describe the common wake-up times, the times that she naps and the durations, whether you wake her or not, her bedtimes, and her latency to sleep onset.
Currently, please describe in detail her mood and behavior when alone with toys (no screens orparetnal involvement) during the hour before the bedtime.
Thank you very much for your quick response!
It’s hard to say how her mood is an hour before bedtime without parental involvement, as when she starts to complain, we would go talk to her or pick her up and she would be happy again. The times that neither of these things worked, I would start getting her ready for bed. She also has an older brother so she is easily distracted with him and loud noises before bed and it makes it difficult to see any sleep cues because she seems entertained.
When she slept for 11 hours, her last nap of the day was 3-3:40pm.
Currently, the common wake up times are 4:30am or 5:30am, and last night was 3:35am. I treated these wakings like middle of the night wakings – I normally try to let her settle herself back to sleep. If this takes a while, I would go in the check her diaper/change her diaper. I nurse her back to sleep if I go in for the diaper change.
Below is an example of a day/night schedule that we currently have. On occasion, she will have a 2 hour first nap or a 2 hour second nap, while the other naps are approximately 30-45 minutes.
Wake up at 4:30am; went in to change her diaper. Nursed for 8 minutes, put her back to bed at 5:23am and she fell asleep at 6:05am. She slept until 7am.
Nap 1: 9:25am-10:05am
Nap 2: 12:43pm-1:30pm
Nap 3: 3:52pm-4:20PM I woke her
Bed 7:15pm
It typically takes her between 10-20 minutes to fall asleep and on rare occasions she either falls asleep right away or takes 30 minutes to fall asleep.
This evening I tried to pay closer attention to her before bed – she began to fuss at 5:44pm. I would talk to her and she’d be happy again for a while. Then she would start to fuss again and then be happy again. After a little while of this, I decided to put her to bed at 6:30pm (her last nap ended at 4:20pm) and she cried until she fell asleep at 7:10pm. She slept 7:10pm-9:45pm and woke up crying really hard. We have been using the extinction method so normally I would leave her and let her settle herself back to sleep but I noticed her last feeding was at 4:30pm, so I went in at 10:15pm to change and feed her 7oz and she finished it in ten minutes. She was back to sleep by 10:30pm and slept until 5:41am.
Please carefully read Blog Post 204 to fully understand drowsy signs, fatigue signs, and presleep arousal and Blog Posts 84-86 to understand cumulative sleepiness.
Here’s my impression. The most common scenario with child number 2 is that child number 1 distracts parents from subtle early evening drowsy signs and child number 1 is kept up too late. Cumulative sleepiness develops slowly if it is just a little too late and naps are in place or quickly if it is way too late and/or naps are not in place. The sleep debt grows and the child hits a wall and then sleep problems emerge such as long latency to sleep onset, bedtime resistance, night wakings, early morning wakings, or nap problems.
At 6 months of age, here are my suggestions:
To repay her sleep debt, for only 3-5 days, the bedtime is 5:30pm (you have bathed, fed, and soothed her and are leaving the room at 5:30pm).
Based on drowsy signs, you provide nap opportunities midmorning and mid-day (read about the nap drill on page 289, if needed). No third nap starts after 3pm. If she has a third nap and is asleep at 3pm, do not wake her but keep the 5:30pm bedtime.
Extinction over night.
Keep a written record of sleep and wake times and latency to sleep onset.
The expectation is that the earlier bedtime will produce first longer and better quality night sleep which will permit second a better quality 1st nap which will later produce third a better quality second nap. The improvement will be sequential, not simultaneous and take a few days. When she is napping better, the bedtime will be a little later, based on drowsy signs, but not as late as before.
How does this sound?
That sounds good, thank you so much! I already started the 5:30pm bedtime last night and it went really well. I will be taking note of sleep and wake times and latency to sleep onset and see how it goes the next few days.
Hi! I’ve read your book and have tried putting my 14 week old’s bedtime earlier by starting her routine at 4:15/5 as it takes so long to get her to sleep and i’m still struggling and wish her bedtime took less time and was less stressful, help!
Her biggest challenges:
short day naps, and bedtime is difficult.
Background:
14 weeks, fed breast milk in a bottle. At 6 weeks there was signs that she had an intolerance to something in my milk. Went dairy free and that fixed some of her symptoms. Started acid reflux medication around 9 weeks due to constant spit up, and arching back- seemed to decrease some spit up. Her bedtime feeds are very difficult, and it takes anywhere from 2-3 hours to get her to finally go to sleep. She screams anywhere from 30 min -1 hour and drinks anywhere from 5-11 ounces over that period just to get her to go to sleep. She gets a bottle and rocked anytime we soothe to sleep. She’s been sleeping pretty consistently 7-8 hours at night from 11-7. Her naps tend to be 30-50 min every day, and she goes down just fine for the first 3. The 5th is usually a struggle and has to be a quick cat nap in her swing before bedtime routine starts at 5. i’ve tried starting it earlier but she still won’t go down to sleep until 7ish and didn’t make a difference. Her naps are in her crib with a quiet environment and not very dark room. At night she sleeps in crib until her dream feed where she then sleeps the rest of the night in our room in her pack n play. When she wakes after being put down ag bedtime she usually doesn’t have a problem soothing her self back to sleep by sucking on her hand or just readjusting her sleep position. I have always put her down for naps based on her drowsy signs (yawning, rubbing eyes) and this is the schedule that has naturally played out. this is just an estimation, there are some days where she takes only 4 naps, and naps range anywhere from 30 min – 2 hours, on average they are 40 min.
schedule:
7 am – wake up (we wake her up) 3.5 ounce bottle
8am – nap 1
8:45 am- wakes naturally. tummy time, play, diaper change, 3.5 ounce bottle, down for nap
10:45 am – nap 2
11:30 am – wakes naturally. tummy time, play, diaper change, 3.5 ounce bottle
1 pm – nap 3
1:40 pm- wakes naturally. tummy time, play, diaper change, 3.5 ounce bottle
3 pm – nap 4
3:40 pm – wakes naturally. tummy time, play, diaper change, 3.5 ounce bottle
4:15 pm- down for quick nap in swing since she fights this nap so hard
4:40 pm – I wake her to give her her acid reflux medication
5 pm- bedtime routine begins with dark room, anywhere from a 5-11 ounce bottle, diaper change, and to sleep. She gets very fussy, arches her back, even after gas meds and acid reflux meds. I alternate how I feed her bc she’s hungry (bc she tries to drink) but is in pain from the reflux the only way i can get her to eat is by feeding her in her swing as she watches a baby einstein toy and feeding her in my arms until she finally calms down and gets drowsy.
7/8 pm- finally down to sleep. Rarely wakes 1 hour after sleeping for more milk then back to sleep.
10 pm – dream feed with 3 oz bottle and goes down easily by
11 pm – down for the night
In your mind, separate feeding issues and sleeping issues.
Give her reflux medication but after talking to her doctor, come up with a schedule that does not require her to be awaken. Assuming her weight gain is following her growth curve, feed her when she’s hungry: in the morning, before or after a morning nap and same for a midday nap and in the evening. About 4-6 hours after her evening feeding, in the middle of the night, if she is hungry, feed her; same for an early morning feed around 4-5 am. Dream feeds are bogus; please stop. At each feeding, after her sucking slows down and it’s not always a suck-slow pattern, end the feeding. Each feeding lasts less than fifteen minutes. Talk this over with her pediatrician and don’t do this if the doctor or you thinks this is not a good idea.
Please stop waking her in the morning. Review Blog Posts 83, 115X, and 226C to fully understand why “rubbing eyes” means she is past drowsy and the pre-sleep arousal is making it difficult for to fall asleep and stay asleep. Shorten the intervals of wakefulness before all her sleep periods for day sleep and before bedtime. For night sleep, choose a sleep solution from the chapter in my book that comports with your values and I will help you implement it.
How does this sound?
Thank you for the quick response. Based on your response, is her wake at 7 am causing the short naps and difficulty putting her to sleep at night? Just curious why it takes 2-3 hours to get her down to sleep at night and why she is so fussy at that time. I thought she was having colic behavior at first but now that she’s older and it’s still occurring I wasn’t sure what I might be doing wrong. It takes an hour for her to finish her bottle at bedtime usually due to the acid reflux so i’m not sure how to fit it into 15 minutes.
Also, if we start the extinction method, is she too young at 13 weeks? We have a hard time determining whether a hard cry means she’s hungry or not.
Please read Blog Posts 159, 171, 172, and 204 to fully understand why pre-sleep arousal (fatigue signs = rubbing the eyes) from a bedtime that is too late is causing her to take 2-3 hours to fall asleep at night.
Please read Blog Post 226D and the section in my book on extinction and I will help you going forward.
“It takes an hour for her to finish her bottle at bedtime usually due to the acid reflux so i’m not sure how to fit it into 15 minutes.” When she sucks with enthusiasm, fed her; when she slows or stops, end the feeding-don’t count ounces. is this ok? When she is sleeping better, this evening feeding will be much easier because there will be no pre-sleep arousal.
Your thoughts?
When do we implement the extinction method? after putting her down for bed and letting her cry if she wakes unless she’s hungry or showing signs of distress? Is a hard cry a cry of distress?
I’ll review those posts thank you.
I will stop waking her at 7 and the dream feed to see how it improves her naps and bedtime. I will also stop counting the ounces and stop the bedtime feed when her sucking slows.
When do we implement the extinction method? after putting her down for bed and letting her cry if she wakes unless she’s hungry or showing signs of distress? Is a hard cry a cry of distress?
“When do we implement the extinction method?” Whenever you wish to.
“after putting her down for bed and letting her cry if she wakes unless she’s hungry or showing signs of distress? Is a hard cry a cry of distress?” Please do not do extinction until you have read the section in my book to fully understand what is involved.
Another question I have- will these changes cause her to wake up multiple times through the night? She’s sleepy nug pretty consistently from 11-7 right now.
I’ll report back regarding the changes we make.
Thank you again for your help above! We implemented your suggested changes:
Not waking her in morning or at 10 pm for a dream feed. Attempting to shorten her wakefulness in daytime.
Currently after implementing these changes for 5 days:
She’s waking 0-1 times at night, never consistent though. She’s waking pretty consistently around 7 am.
Her naps are very inconsistent and unpredictable. Range anywhere from 10-50 min. As soo. as I see her yawn I start soothing (with bottle and rocking, it’s the only thing i’ve found that works quickly) to get her down. I can get her to go nap for the first 2-3 naps in the morning pretty easily. She yawns at about the 40 min mark of wakefulness and i get her down at 1 hr 20 min usually. That’s as fast as I can get her to go to sleep. Most of the time she won’t go down for a nap after 12:30/1pm. I can tell she’s tired bc she yawns and then rubs her eyes but she won’t go to sleep so she stays awake unless I can somehow get her to nap in her swing. It’s rare that i can get her to sleep shortly after yawning she starts showing fatigue signs very quickly after. We have not tried extinction yet since her night sleep is going so well and i read in your book that it won’t work if she’s overtired and i find that she’s overtired almost all day since i can’t get her down for naps fast enough no matter how much I watch for drowsy signs and begin the soothing process. I understand the basics of the extinction method.
I start bedtime anywhere from 4-5 pm depending on if she was able to nap or not in her swing in the late afternoon. Her bedtime takes maybe 1.5-2 hours now instead of 2-3 hours to get her down to sleep so that is an improvement. She did also sleep 1 night this week for 11 hours. And last night she woke up after 8 hours of sleep.
What I need help with:
1. How many naps are “normal” for a 15 week old? I understand one will be in the morning and early afternoon but unclear past that.
2. If her night sleep is going well and she has some self soothing skills (sucking her hand), do I sleep train for her naps? If so, any suggestions? I read in your book to only let her cry for an hour but if she’s overtired and CIO won’t work im that case i’m not sure how i’ll ever be able to try it.
3. If she won’t go down for a nap past 1pm, and your book states she shouldn’t stay awake more than 2 hours and I can’t put her down for bedtime yet, what are your suggestions when this happens? I can’t start her bedtime routine at 2 pm.
4. How do I get out and do anything if she gets tired so quickly upon waking for a nap? I try very hard to protect her naps during the day and work hard to focus on her sleep, yet i see moms getting out with their babies frequently and don’t understand how they do it and don’t have a very cranky baby. my little one doesn’t nap well in a carrier or sling.
5. Do I need to try extinction at night if she wakes once? I always assume she’s hungry when she wakes at night since sits only once usually and she defintely shows signs of hunger.
6. Because she is usually hungry when she wakes, i’m not sure how to differentiate signs of hunger or just non distress cries. This is another hesitation I have starting extinction with her naps. Any tips on how to tell the difference here?
Naps begin to develop around 3-4 months of age and are longer and regular by 6 months of age. At 14 weeks, naps can still be tricky.
Good night sleep is a prerequisite: “Her bedtime takes maybe 1.5-2 hours now instead of 2-3 hours to get her down to sleep so that is an improvement. She did also sleep 1 night this week for 11 hours. And last night she woke up after 8 hours of sleep.” Congratulations!! You are on the right path.
Brief intervals of wakefulness, based on drowsy signs, prevent pre-sleep arousal during the day and enhance naps. Here are two suggestions:
1. During the day, start to keep a record of the intervals of wakefulness before naps. This will vary because of the variability of the duration of the nap. Then, you have a rough sense of how long she is up after a nap of a given length. Don’t worry about exactitude. Now, shorten by 10-15 minutes this interval of wakefulness and see if the naps improve and if naps will occur in the afternoon. Still use the swing because a nap in a swing is better than no nap.
2. This week-end, assign nap duty to your husband and get out and pamper yourself.
I know that you feel ‘nap-trapped’ but please hang in there for 7-10 days and then we will re-evaluate.
How does this sound?
2. If her night sleep is going well and she has some self soothing skills (sucking her hand), do I sleep train for her naps? I think the ‘Nap Drill’ as described in my book makes sense only for older children when naps are better established.
5. Do I need to try extinction at night if she wakes once? If she is hungry, feed her. If she is not hungry, do extinction.
6. Because she is usually hungry when she wakes, i’m not sure how to differentiate signs of hunger or just non distress cries. Any tips on how to tell the difference here? Hungry babies inhale quickly a few ounces and then slow down to a rhythmic suck-swallow pattern and then when not hungry, they might have many sucks for every swallow. Focus on the eagerness and energy of her initial sucking, her suck-swallow pattern, and the volume consumed to determine whether or not she is hungry.
Does this help?
I did also read all of the suggested posts you mentioned.
Thank you very much for your response! I do keep track of her sleep day and night, and will attempt to start soothing even sooner, and try to get ahead of the curve of her yawning signs.
What about the question 2., 5., and 6. that I posted above? Thank you in advance!
Update: After 6 days of not waking her in morning or at night, and shortening her awake time between naps, we started extinction at bedtime tonight. I ensured she was fed and put her down at 5:30. She started crying immediately, and about 25 minutes in she vomited. I went in and quickly and quietly cleaned it up, where I changed her diaper and clothes, and after she threw up on me I left the room. She proceeded to cry hard and vomited again in her crib, and after my husband cleaned her up again and left, she sounded like it was hard for her to breathe. She choked on numerous occasions. We stopped extinction due to this sign of distress (difficulty breathing). In total this was in a 45 minute span. We are worried to continue trying this in the future due to her acid reflux, and because she usually takes about 2 hours to finish 8-11 oz of milk before passing out for the night. Because I put her down at 5:30 she seemed somewhat done with eatting and was rubbing her eyes. She napped well all day, with her last nap ending at 3:35. Is it safe to sleep train a 15 week old that has acid reflux? I need help shortening her bedtime routine from 2-3 hours but so far the only improvement i’ve seen from all the changes is a couple minutes shortened and she’s a little less fussy. Was is wrong for us to intervene? Should we wait until she’s older? Is it safe to do this for a baby with acid reflux? Please help!
Regarding naps: Before: “Her naps are very inconsistent and unpredictable. Range anywhere from 10-50 min.” Now:”She napped well all day.” Have naps improved?
Regarding latency to sleep onset: “Her bedtime takes maybe 1.5-2 hours now instead of 2-3 hours to get her down to sleep so that is an improvement.” Has this improvement continued?
“she usually takes about 2 hours to finish 8-11 oz of milk before passing out for the night”
What time is it when you finish this 2 hour feeding?
How many ounces does she consume during the first 15 minutes of this feeding?
Is her physician worried about her weight gain?
Her bedtime routine takes a little less time now and she is less fussy so yes that is an improvement and it has continued. When I finish her bedtime feeding it’s usually around 6:15/6:30. She consumes probably about 2 ounces in the first 15 minutes. Her doctor is not worried about her weight gain, but told me today I could try capping her nighttime feed at 5ounces and include formula so it fills her up faster to help with the acid reflux, but that continuing what i’m doing what necessarily harm her.
The prolonged night feeding may be part of the problem for two reasons.
1. By 6:30pm, her pre-sleep arousal may be so intense that she will fuss/cry and have difficulty falling asleep and staying asleep.
2. The large volume that she consumes due to your dedicated effort might result in a slight over-feeding, stretching the stomach, and thus making it more likely that she will vomit.
Only if you feel comfortable with this, I suggest for only 1-2 nights that you bathe her, feed her, soothe her, and leave the room , hopefully when she is drowsy but awake at 5:30pm.
Additionally, limit the feeding time to 15 minutes, knowing that the volume that she takes is much less than before. Then do extinction with the understanding that after about 4 hours (9:30pm), if you think she is hungry, feed her (again for not more than 15 minutes) and repeat again if needed, after 4 more hours.
How do you feel about this?
Please clarify why the her doctor suggested capping her nighttime feed.
Hi! That makes sense thank you. The pediatrician recommended that cap for her acid reflux. She’s been successfully sleeping through the night anywhere from 10-12 hours this week. This is wonderful thank you for your help! We decided to wait on trying extinction until we can get a better handle on the acid reflux. One thing that has emerged is that she will go to sleep around 6/6:30 pm and usually does not take a nap after 2pm. She will then wake up about 30-40 min after, and will go down for the night by 7:30/8. How do we prevent this “false start”? It feels like she is treating her bedtime as a nap.
Also, She also is only taking about 30-40 minute naps and starts yawning around the 1 hour mark, is this a normal nap length for her age? I’m getting her to sleep shortly after she yawns to try and shorten her time awake.
You’ve been so helpful thank you in advance!
Congratulations!
Please describe in detail her mood and behavior when alone with toys (no screens or parental involvement) during the 60 minutes before her 6/6:30 falling asleep time.
Is the 6/6:30 the time you are leaving the room?
What time do you begin the bedtime routine?
Please describe in detail her mood and behavior when alone with toys (no screens or parental involvement) during the 60 minutes before you begin the bedtime routine.
When is it common for her naps to start?
She doesn’t play with toys with us or alone within 60 minutes before her bedtime. We typically begin her bedtime routine around 4:30/5pm. If she’s had a nap before that in the late afternoon she’s content but quiet and somewhat engages with her toys in her bouncer before bedtime routine begins. If she didn’t get a nap past 2 she’s still engaged somewhat with toys but gets fussy as we get closer to her bedtime routine start. 6/6:30 is when we are leaving the room and she is asleep.
Her naps usually start at around 9, 10:30, noon, then 1:30. Sometimes she’ll nap around 2:30/3. They last about 30-40 min on average. Rarely when she takes that late afternoon nap (i’ll let her contact nap so i ensure she sleeps for this nap) she’ll sleep for 50-60 min. but again those have been rare. She took an hour long nap from 3-4 yesterday and it took her until 7:30 to go to sleep, then woke back up again around 9:15pm.
Because the falling asleep time is too late, sometimes, she has pre-sleep arousal (“gets fussy as we get closer to her bedtime routine start”, “she starts getting a little fussy with some whimpers as we begin.”) which causes difficulty to fall asleep and stay asleep (“he will then wake up about 30-40 min after, How do we prevent this “false start”?) and the too short night sleep duration means that she wakes up in the morning short on sleep, and that causes more pre-sleep arousal such that naps are too brief.
The solution is for you to leave the room at night at 5:30pm even though there are issues that you have described that make this challenging.
Please try this, somehow, for 3 nights only and report back.
How does this sound?
When she wakes in the morning and from her naps she’s very happy and loves playing with her toys. About 40-60 min upon waking she starts getting a little cranky.
before beginning the bedtime routine she quietly grabs at her toys on her bouncer. then she starts getting a little fussy with some whimpers as we begin.
That sounds great, thank you. Will report back!
Update:
Night 1- asleep by 5:30pm, woke up at 6:12pm, didn’t go to sleep until 11 pm and was very overtired and agitated. woke up at 8:52 am.
Night 2- asleep by 5:40pm, woke up at 6:20. back to sleep by7:40pm. Woke up at 4:27 am and back to sleep at 5:15 until 8:15 am.
Night 3- asleep by 5:50pm, woke back up at 6:53. back to sleep by 7:57pm. woke up twice and cried briefly and went back to sleep on her own. woke up at 7:23 am.
Naps are still only about 40 min, and she’s taking between 3-4 of them a day. Seems to do better at going down if she has a late afternoon nap at 3. The room is dark and quiet and she goes to sleep fairly easily now, just trying to figure out how to stop the treating bedtime as a nap even after applying the above changes. Is it bad that she’s treating bedtime as a nap and going down eventually by 7/8?
After her bedtime, these past 3 nights, are you doing extinction or not? If not, describe exactly what you are doing?
We are not doing extinction as she seems able to put herself to sleep if she wakes up in the middle of the night and the last experience of trying it at 5:30 with minimal
to no soothing made us not feel ready to try it fully yet. We talked to our pediatrician and feel more comfortable waiting untik her acid reflux calms down hopefully in a few weeks or so. At about 4:15/4:30 we begin her bedtime routine which is dimming the lights, swaddling her, changing her, and feeding her. She then gets rocked to sleep and put in her crib. When she wakes up prematurely in about 40-60 min we go back in, change her, rewarded, feed and rock her. She drinks quite a bit at the first bedtime and the second time we go in.
Understood. Let me know how it goes.
she’s not nearly as fussy as she used to be during the initial bedtime routine but can get a little more fussy when she wakes up for that “false start”.
we also wait 10 min when she wakes to see if she will go back to sleep. That second wake after bedtime though she never does without our help. She does at night though
Update: after 1 night of extinction method she fell asleep after an hour and 10 min of crying and slept for 12 hours. We have been waking her at 7:15 am since she started going to bed super late last week at 10 pm. The wake has been successful in pushing her bedtime up. Last night her last nap ended at 4:20 pm, and she was put in her crib at 6:20, asleep by 7:32. Going to continue CIO every night now. She still fights naps somewhat, and sleeps on average 30-40 min each nap, taking 4 per day. I’m following her drowsy signs. Is it safe to apply CIO to her naps at 20 weeks? I know your book mentions to save the nap drill until she’s 6 months but i can’t help but wonder if it would help her naps. Lmk! I’ll also keep you updated with extinction at night over the next week or so.
How old is she now?
How would you describe her reflux problem currently?
Please describe a common nap pattern: times and durations.
She’s about to be 20 weeks in a few days. Her reflux problem seems much better now and she’s far less fussy. Here is her current nap pattern (typically):
8:30 am
11 am
1 pm
3 pm
on average she takes 30-40 min naps. If one nap is 20 minutes she usually takes a longer nap later on. She starts yawning at the 50-70 min mark usually and at that point I begin soothing to get her to sleep, but she fights it for about 20ish minutes, meaning she’s awake for about 1.5-2 hours between naps. I’ll usually stop when she starts fussing and let her play with a toy, then restart soothing until she finally falls asleep and I transfer her to her crib.
What is the common duration of the 3pm nap?
When do you usually begin soothing her for bedtime and when does she usually initially fall asleep at night?
what is confusing is that she will sometimes yawn a few minutes after waking up from a nap at first too…
after checking my log it’s either super short at 20 min or 1.5 hrs, and sometimes starts as early as 2:30pm.
I begin soothing bedtime around 5:30 pm I think? Before extinction last night she would fall asleep between 7:45-9 pm. With extinction I set her down at 6:20 and she was asleep by 7:32.
“With extinction I set her down at 6:20 and she was asleep by 7:32.”
Now that she is older and her reflux is better, please try for 3-4 days a trial:
1. Extinction at night with a temporary super early bedtime: She is bathed, fed, and soothed and you are leaving the room at 5:30pm. Do not wake her in the morning.
2. Nap drill during the day at midmorning and mid afternoon. No new nap begins after 3pm. If she is asleep at 3pm, do not wake her. Do not cap naps.
Don’t do this if you and your husband cannot commit to a 3-4 day trial.
Your expectation is that better night sleep will produce a better morning nap which will produce a better mdidday nap which will later allow you to have a later bedtime based on drowsy signs.
Your thoughts?
Got it, thank you so much! To clarify, in that case she’d be taking 3 naps and I would do the nap drill on the last 2? and after an hour if she’s still awake I do whatever I can to save the nap?
As you read, the ‘Nap Drill’ requires you to decide how to best apply it.
You do the Nap Drill to attempt to get only a midmorning and midday nap. There is no 3rd nap because a super early bedtime is essential for success.
If the 2 naps are brief, she will require extra soothing and distraction in the late afternoon but do not allow a third nap to occur.
Is this clear?
Also, when you say “better night sleep will
hopefully improve the naps”, she’s currently sleeping between 11-12 hours a night and waking half the time on her own before 7 am. Does it get better than that? I guess i’m wondering if her naps could also be developmentally normal right now, since her night sleep seems to be going so well in terms of length of sleep.
Sleep quality is based on timing, duration, and consolidation; not just duration.
All is clear thank you for the clarification. Will report back, thanks again!
Hi Dr. Weissbluth!
Our son is almost six months of age, and we have had incredible success with your sleep training method. He is currently still taking three naps a day and will normally go to bed around 6/6:30. He falls asleep independently for each nap and bedtime and wakes once during the night to feed. He will sleep until around 7/8:30 each morning. Every now and then if he went to bed late for a special occasion, the next night we will put him down early at 5:30 to make up for sleep debt. My two questions are:
1. Is 6/6:30 still an appropriate bedtime for him?
2. When do we begin to eliminate the third nap?
Thank you so much!
In my nap study, 16% of infants take 3 naps a day at 6 months and 5% at 9 months. So expect the 3rd nap to disappear soon. As long as he continues to sleep well, there is no need to make any dramatic changes.
If you see long latency to sleep onset or fatigue symptoms, the bedtime will have to be moved earlier and the 3rd nap eliminated.
How does this sound?
That sounds great; thank you so much!
Hello! Thanks for all your help. Update after doing extinction at night for almost 3 weeks now. This is where we are at now:
Wakes usually around 6:45-7ish on her own. Starts showing drowsy signs around 8:15 or so.
Falls asleep through a contact nap at about 9/10am. I’ve tried setting her down while she’s asleep, drowsy but awake etc but becomes wide awake and will cry for quite some time.
Wakes after about 1.5-2 hours. Drinks her bottle, plays, etc
Starts showing drowsy signs around noonish.
Goes to sleep for second nap around 1/1:30 pm through contact nap.
Awake after 2-2.5 hours.
Start bedtime routine around 4:30.
In crib and i’m leaving her room around 5:30. Cries for 30-50 minutes usually, sometimes more sometimes less.
Today I started trying the nap drill upon realizing it’s no longer sustainable for me to be contact napping with her for 4 hours every day.
Set her down at 8:35 am, cried for over an hour. Tried again at 11am and cried for an hour. Tried putting her down again but more drowsy this time at 1pm, and she fell asleep in 2 minutes but woke up after 10 minutes and cried hard for awhile. in an effort to save the nap and maximize sleep before bedtime she contact napped with the me for 2 hours.
1. With the nap drill- would it be advised to start first with only the first mid morning nap and still proceed per usual (contact nap) with the second nap to prevent overtiredness going into bedtime?
2. Is it normal for her to still take 30-50 min of crying at bedtime before falling asleep on her own? This is a significant improvement to it taking us hours to get her to sleep with our help but i figured she’d be farther along by now.
3. with nap and sleep training, if we travel is it advised to conduct routines per usual or give full support if she struggles? what if she has a fever, do we go about the training per usual or abandon and give full support?
4. is it okay to extend a nap with a contact nap? i know your book says light soothing, or patting but knowing my baby that won’t work for her. She’s 5 months now.
If you cannot consistently commit to the the nap drill and completely avoid contact naps for several days (“Today I started trying the nap drill upon realizing it’s no longer sustainable for me to be contact napping with her for 4 hours every day..in an effort to save the nap and maximize sleep before bedtime she contact napped with the me…” don’t try the nap drill because your inconsistency will prevent her from learning self soothing. Her lack of self-soothing skills is contributing to the “30-50 min of crying at bedtime before falling asleep on her own”.
Do you agree?
My book is clear about what to do if your child has a fever.
What are your specific travel plans?
That makes sense. I’ll start that today. The only reason I hesitated yesterday was because based on yesterdays history she likely would not have napped at all, and that would have let her to be overtired. If that continues won’t I get stuck in an overtiredness loop with her? Or is that just how it has to happen?
We plan to visit family in a few months and I was curious how changing environments for her for a night or two would affect her sleep training routines and how we should or should not intervene.
Please continue with a consistent nap drill.
Success!!! We have been doing the nap drill for 4-5 days now. She’s made progress! She cries maybe 5 min or less when she goes down for both the 9 am and 1 pm nap. Both times she’s only sleeping about 20-30 minutes though, and does not go back to sleep despite me leaving her in her crib for another 30 minutes. She’s falls asleep at 5:30 almost as soon as I leave the room being totally exhausted. She shows signs of drowsiness at about 8am after waking on her own between 6:30-6:45am. Should I offer more opportunities for naps like a third one? or keep soothing her till 9 am and 1 pm until I allow her to nap then like i’ve been doing? I worry she’s so overtired she’s not napping long during those 2 nap opportunities.
For a few days, try putting her down a little earlier for naps (for example, 8:30am and 12:00-12:30pm) to see if the nap duration increases.
To encourage other parents, please consider writing, and posting here, a narrative report of your sleep adventure (please include the role of the father) that I would use as a Blog Post or perhaps an Amazon book review.
I wish you sweet dreams for your child.
Dr. Weissbluth has completely transformed our child’s sleep. I first read his book while I was pregnant and felt strongly about building healthy sleep habits for our baby from the start.
Around the 8-week mark, we hit a few bumps. His guidance helped us understand that offering a “dream feed” was actually contributing to issues like frequent night wakings and disrupted sleep. Once we stopped the dream feed and started waking her at a consistent time each morning, she seemed noticeably happier.
She also displayed colic-like behavior and had acid reflux making her sleep a bit challenging, but subsided around four months. At that point, Dr. Weissbluth’s approach helped us begin the sleep training process. She didn’t tolerate being put down “drowsy but awake,” so in those early months, we focused on keeping her wake windows short and watching for her drowsy signs—not overtired signs. This made a big difference in helping her get solid naps during the day and fall asleep earlier at night.
We started the “cry it out” method around 18 to 19 weeks. It was tough at first, and although she began sleeping through the night (12+ hours!), she still cried for 30+ minutes at bedtime. I wanted to help her improve even more.
Then, around 5 months, we hit another challenge—she refused to nap in her crib and would only contact nap. It wasn’t sustainable. I felt completely lost and isolated with how much time I was spending trying to get her to sleep and being locked away in her nursery for 4+ hours a day. That’s when we tried the nap drill, as recommended by Dr. Weissbluth. It was a total game changer. After a few challenging days, she got the hang of self soothing. Hallelujah!
Now she naps independently and goes to sleep at night on her own. I’m no longer spending hours rocking her or co-sleeping just to get her down. I have my life back—and more importantly, my baby is so much happier.
Where it used to take forever to get her to sleep, she now does it on her own with minimal fuss. I’m incredibly grateful to Dr. Weissbluth and his book for changing both of our lives. We’ll carry these lessons with us for all of our future children.
Thank you, Dr. Weissbluth!
Thank you.
Hi Marc
They applied daylight saving and now my 15 month old son is waking up at 5-530am, which is his previous 6-630am wake-up time, and goes to sleep at 530pm instead of 630pm.
How do I shift him back to his old schedule bearing in mind we’re also transitioning to one nap?
Thanks!
Continue to use the (new) clock time: Bedtime at 6:30pm. In addition to light (day) and dark (night) cues, the brain is sensitive to social cues such as rest/active times, mealtimes, bath times, etc.
Hi Dr Weissbluth
Love your book. We sleep trained my son using it and he has slept great since 4 months old.
He’s now 14 months old, almost 15. He has been waking up between 5-5:30am for almost two weeks. He will just lay there, not crying, for almost an hour sometimes. Other times he will cry and I’ll go in with a warm bottle and try to get him back to sleep. Sometimes this works, but as soon as I lay him down he wakes and won’t go back to sleep.
My question is – what would be causing this early wake up time?
We are trying to transition to one nap, so some days he will have one nap and some days two. For example, yesterday he woke up at 5:40am. He was ready for a nap at 9:00am so I laid him down and he slept until 10:30. He took another 1 hour nap from 2:00-3:00. I laid him down for bed at 7:30 and he was asleep by 8:00.
There are also days where he has an earlier bedtime (6:30-7) but it’s hard to keep a schedule with his naps being kind of unpredictable right now. We try to keep him up until 11:00 on the days he sleeps in until at least 6:00am so he can have a 1 nap day. He will normally sleep better that night and sleep in until around 6:15. He will hardly ever sleep past that.
I would love to get him on a 7pm-7am schedule, but I just don’t know if thats in the cards for us.
Transitioning from 2 naps to 1 nap is highly variable. Have you read that section in my book?
Perhaps on the days when he takes only one nap, temporarily, he will need a much earlier bedtime (which might cause the wake-up time to be the same or even later!). When older, the single nap might allow the bedtime to be a little later, but perhaps not as late as when he was younger and taking 2 naps every day.
Focus on drowsy signs in the late afternoon and early evening to guide you regarding his bedtime.
Does this help?
Hi Dr. Weissbluth!
I am back for help, now for my third baby. She is 9 weeks old, born at 41 weeks. Her naps are good, 1-2.5 hrs throughout the day. She can only tolerate being awake for 45 minutes at a time throughout the day. Her bedtime is atrocious. I’ve tried to use your previous advice- no new naps after 3pm, bedtime of 530pm- but I can not keep her up past 4pm, she falls aleep briefly, no matter the enviroment, and then 530pm bedtime turns into an 1.5 hour sleep battle. I’ve also tried sliding the “no new naps” past 4pm with a 630 bedtime, but have failed miserably, she was up until 9pm.
Thank you in advance!
Here is a suggestion to consider but do reply because it may be inappropriate. It is possible that the two older children distract you sometimes from her drowsy signs during the day so that although her naps appear fine, they might not be optimal. So dedicate 2-3 days to shortening the interval of wakefulness before her naps to see if anything changes, e.g., longer naps.
That is very possible. I am currently putting her down after 45 min of being awake. Can I put her down any sooner than that?
Try it.
I think your right, her naps are not great. By 5pm she is so exhausted that she can not even make it through a feed. She then falls asleep quickly, but treats it as a nap, and wakes up about an hour after. I will work on optimizing her naps.
Hi Dr. Weissbluth,
I am currently trying to sleep train my 6 week old. We had a rough start as part of my placenta was retained for 12 days and my milk wasn’t coming in and I had to have emergent surgery to remove the retained pieces, we thought she was a fussy baby but turns out she was hungry that whole time.) so she cries a lot and I can only get her to take contact naps during the day. I’m trying to keep a watchful eye for drowsy signs once she starts yawning or looks disinterested in us. I’m probably not putting her down right in the drowsy but awake state because I’m soothing her til her eyes are closed and then I try and sneak out. She will take solid contact naps during the day but tonight I tried the early bedtime with a routing of bath, feed, diaper change, massage and soothing and she cried for 45 min and then now she is in and out of sleep. We are bed sharing and she actually does really well. Has given me 4-5 hour stretches and waking up once for a feed but it’s not consistent. I do want to get out of the practice of bed sharing but we all honestly get more sleep that way. I appreciate any advice.
“I’m trying to keep a watchful eye for drowsy signs once she starts yawning or looks disinterested in us. I’m probably not putting her down right in the drowsy but awake state because I’m soothing her til her eyes are closed and then I try and sneak out.”
It appears that Moly Mckenna and Molly Echevarria are the same person and you posted comments on two different Blog Posts. Correct? If so, let’s stick with one thread to avoid confusion.
Oh gosh yes I did. I’m so sorry. So basically I can only get her to do contact naps through the day which I have to bounce on the ball with her in the carrier in a dark room with a sound machine to soothe her. And then I sleep with her in the bed at night. I tried over the weekend and this morning to put her down by herself. This morning after the morning feed she cried some but eventually appeared to be sleeping but not too much longer she was crying again for several minutes at which point I picked her up and got her to sleep in the carrier. I know she is still young and I’m just trying to protect her sleep and mine I just don’t want to form any bad habits. At nighttime I tried putting her to sleep early but she cried until I tried again at 9:30pm and she fell asleep. She will usually settle down for bedtime between 9:30pm-10:30pm. She is 6 weeks today so I know she’s still young but just trying to see if there’s anything I should be doing to try and get her to nap independently and be in a bassinet at night.
Read, or have your husband read, the section in my book on ‘colic’ or ‘extreme fussiness’ and tell me whether you think this is present.
For now, because she is six weeks old, do whatever you can to maximize sleep and minimize crying and don’t worry about habit formation.
Keep the intervals of wakefulness very brief.
What was her gestational age at birth?
She was 40 weeks and 1 day old at birth. I did read that section and I’m still not sure if she is a colicky or extremely fussy baby. Some days are better than others and she barely makes a peep but she does still fight against taking a nap. other days she’s extremely fussy and fights naps unless I bounce on the ball all day long. Do I attempt the early bedtime starting next week? Or keep with minimizing crying and maximizing sleep? Sometimes by the end of the day she is just unhappy no matter what and that’s when my husband and I just put her down and let her cry for a bit because we can’t get her settled. Those are days when I think she is extremely fussy. I don’t know it’s hard to tell for me. But I will say she always has periods during the day where she seems happy and content and interacts with us and smiles.
Extreme fussiness/crying (colic): >3 hours a day of crying/fussiness; >3 days per week: > 3 weeks. At 6 weeks of age, fussiness/crying is highly focused in the evening hours. Resolves in 50% by 2 months; 80% by 3 months, 100% by 4 months.
Ordinary fussiness/crying: peaks at 6 weeks of age and then decreases.
For now: focus on brief intervals of wakefulness before naps and night sleep and super early bedtimes (start now). Forget ‘drowsy but awake’ if it doesn’t work.
I know this is a very difficult and stressful time but please be optimistic and patient.
Let me know how it goes over the next 2-3 days.
And I will say in general if I do allll the soothing things I can eventually get her to take a nap and she will sleep anywhere from 1-3hours. Sometimes she needs me to bounce on the ball again to get her to go back to sleep but she will settle.
Ok I guess how early should I be trying to put her down? The other night I tried at 6:30/7 after a bath, feed, massage and soothe and she cried for 45 min until I held her. So then at 9:30 I fed her in bed and she went to sleep. She only wants to be held for sleep until around 9:30/10pm
For 3 nights only, attempt a 5:30pm expected falling asleep time (she is bathed, dressed for sleep, fed, soothed, and you are leaving the room at 5:30pm), keep a written record of day and night sleep and send me a progress report after day 3.
Do this only if you feel comfortable and can commit to a 3-day trial and see that you can do this for three consecutive nights.
Maybe consider low-intensity rocking and walking with her for daytime sooting instead of the bouncing ball during the day.
Ok I will try and will keep a record. How long should I let her cry for when I put her down for sleep at 5:30? Thank you so much for your responses.
For context, read Blog Posts 105-107; but I want you to do what best comports with your values. Have your husband read these Blog Posts and get him on board with whatever plan the two of you decide.
Day 1
I’m sorry I know this is long. I just wasn’t sure how much information I should provide. I know you said for 3 days and I will continue just didn’t know if you had any pointers from the first day.
6:20am napped independently after morning feed. Cried on and off (til 6:50am) then napped til 7:30am (cried again on and off) or she at least stopped crying. I was too nervous to check on her and accidentally wake her up if she was sleeping. Cried again at 7:55am picked up and fed at this time
8:40am attempted to place her down for nap (since she was yawning) after soothing but she immediately started screaming. Placed in carrier and tried low intensity soothing to sleep but ultimately couldn’t get her settled until I bounced gently on the ball in a dark room with sound machine and making shushing sound myself. Attempted to walk around the house but she woke up and had to go back on the ball (this is the norm). 9:07 came off the ball and she stayed asleep until 11:15am
11:50- noticed 2 yawns after feeding and burping and playing with her. Soothed her and set her down for nap. She cried until
12:10pm at which point I put her in the carrier and bounced on the ball to soothe bc low intensity wasn’t working. Came off the ball at 12:30pm back on the ball at 12:40pm bc she woke up and once I’m on the ball she’s back to sleep. Slept til 1:45pm
2:45pm soothed and placed in bassinet. Cried til 3pm picked her up and put her in carrier and used ball to settle. On and off ball for 30 min then deep asleep until I woke her up at 4:30pm (should I not have woken her up?)
5:33pm after a bath, feed, diaper change and soothe set her down but she was still crying even while I was trying to soothe her. Cried until 7:15pm seemingly fell asleep but crying again at 7:24pm
7:30pm went into feed and couldn’t get her settled until 7:52pm and started feeding. Didn’t take at first because was crying and freaking out. Dad swaddled her and bounced then she chilled out and fed.
8:20pm fed, burped, changed, soothed and placed back down. Cried until 9:10pm and then fell asleep.
10:15pm cried again and at this point I caved and just fed her in the bed and we both went to sleep. My child is a screamer and so at this point I felt like I had reached my max of her screaming for the better part of 5hours.
2am fed her and back to sleep
3:30am diaper explosion so changed, tried to soothe back to sleep and she wasn’t having it so fed her again
6:30am awake. Fed and tried to have her gap independently after feed but cried til 7:20 so carrier and ball again.
I don’t know. I started to wonder if she was too young. I know I saw some people start even earlier than her but the one story I came across at 6 weeks using full on extinction the baby went to sleep after being fed and crying for 2 hours and my child did not seem like she was going to give up. She was maybe starting to but I don’t know. I’ll try again tonight.
It appears that she lacks self-soothing skills for day and night sleep and has accumulated a sleep debt so in this aroused state, she has difficulty falling asleep and staying asleep. PLease read again and have your husband read again the section on extinction and give me your thoughts. I think extinction at night and a continuation of contact naps temporarily might solve her sleep issue but do not go forward if you both cannot commit to 3-4 consecutive stressful nights; especially night 1 and 2.
Ok, thank you so much. We will read them again. Would we restart with tonight being night 1 since I caved and had her sleep in bed with me last night?
I think so.
The plan is to do whatever you can to maximize day sleep and minimize crying (e.g., contact naps) but do your best to have no new nap start after 3PM. If she is asleep then, do not wake her.
She is bathed, dressed for sleep, fed, soothed 10-15 minutes and put down whether awake, drowsy, or asleep and you will not go to her unless you think she is hungry (5 or more hours after her last feeding) so she might be fed once in the middle of the night and perhaps again early in the morning. Do not go to her until about 6am. Do not try to “cap” the crying duration.
Because you and your husband are sleep-deprived and stressed, the added stress of extinction might be unbearable, so do not try this if you cannot commit to 3-4 days. Some mothers leave the house for Night #1 to better cope and let fathers do the night duty. Just a thought. Keep a written record.
Ok thank you so much. I greatly appreciate you taking the time to respond and help us. God bless you.
Day 1:
6:30am awake. Fed and tried to have her nap independently after feed but cried til 7:20 so carrier and ball again. Asleep until 8:50am
9:50am down again for nap in carrier and soothed by ball. Slept til 12:45pm
1:30pm tried to get her to nap but she was in and out of sleep (I had an apt at 2pm and my mother in law watched her at this point and said she only slept for 30min before she was up and wouldn’t go back down before 3pm so I kept her up and fed her at 3:35pm when I got back from my apt)
5:30pm down for bedtime after bath, feed, soothe cried til 7:10pm
Fell asleep at 7:10pm for 20 min
Cried until 9:30pm then fed
10:10pm asleep? We went to bed and I thought our monitor would playback but it doesn’t but we didn’t hear her and fell asleep.
1:20am heard her crying loudly so went in and fed her. Laid her back down at 1:50am she cried intermittently (not as loudly) on and off until 2:02am when she looked like she had chilled out on the monitor and I went to bed
4:30am checked the monitor and she’s sleeping
4:50am awake and crying on and off (sometimes she had brief periods of sleep it appeared on the monitor)
Day 2:
6:00am crying loudly so went in to feed her
6:50am nap in the carrier until 9:30am (we had a couple of morning appointments one was a weighted feed at 10am)
11:30am home and tried to get her to take a contact nap. She napped on and off until 1230 when I decided to feed her again.
1pm back down for nap but she’s been fighting a nap since this mornings nap. Napped on and off until fully awake at 3:15pm and fed again
5:15pm down for bed after bath, massage, feed and soothe (it was a little early bc I didn’t have a clock on me and didn’t see that I was a little ahead), cried until 9:30pm went in to feed (at this point I changed up how I had placed her in the bed and wondered if that was why she wouldn’t settle). Can a 6 week old have anxiety? Because it looked like she had chewed on her fingers til they were bleeding. I had been putting her on her stomach per her chiropractors recommendation. My husband wanted me to put this in here.
9:30pm fed and placed down for bed again. Didn’t hear anything until 1am but I fell asleep.
1am fed and placed down for bed again at 1:30am. Cried for a bit. I went back to sleep and didn’t hear her on the monitor really.
4am awake and crying until 5:50am when I went in to feed her
Day 3:
6:30am nap in carrier woke up on and off until soothed to deep sleep in carrier and on ball around 7:30am. Solid nap until 9:45am
10:30am back for nap (very easy to get her to sleep I will say). Solid nap (with no need to get back on the ball and soothe her back to sleep) until 1:30pm.
2:30pm napped in and out until 3:15pm
5:30pm down for bed after bath, and feed and soothed. Immediately started crying.
6:50pm at this point our resolve is dwindling, and my husband went in to soothe her because she’s still been crying hysterically for an hour straight. We also tried changing the sound machine and placing her on her back in a swaddle tonight instead of what we were doing the past two nights.
7:30pm relaxed and maybe slept 20 min but then awake, seemed content though but not asleep
9:45pm fed, diaper changed and put back down for bed. Didn’t really make a fuss and went to sleep.
12:50am crying so fed her then placed back in the bassinet at 1:20am. On the monitor she was moving around and fussed a little bit on and off til 1:40am when I stopped watching the monitor and went to bed.
4:50am awake and crying. I did go to her to feed her and m change her diaper bc last night when she cried at this hour and didn’t stop stil I fed her at 6am she had a huge poopy diaper and probably why she would not go back to sleep. So fed at 5am and back down at 5:30am. She cried initially and then fussed and then went back to sleep until 6:30am
I feel like we finally figured out what made her comfortable enough after trying different things the past few nights but we finally see a glimmer of hope after tonight. She was able to sleep from 10pm to 1am and 1am to 5am with barely any fussing and no crying. And overall she does seem a very happy baby during the day the past few days up until about 4:30pm when she starts crying.
“Can a 6 week old have anxiety?” There is no way to answer that question because there is no way to define anxiety at this age.
“I had been putting her on her stomach per her chiropractors recommendation. My husband wanted me to put this in here.” You are increasing the risk for SIDS.
Please write a brief narrative account so I can better see the forest for the trees. How old is she now?
It appears that none of my suggestions have helped so far.
How about following your husband’s suggestion for a much later bedtime for 2-3 nights only, keep a written record, and then make him look at the data and make him conclude whether it helped or not.
I forgot to put this in here but my husband kept asking me why the super early bedtime st 5:30om and I kept trying to answer per your book but it just seems she wouldn’t settle til about 7:30pm anyway. So he’s wanting to put her to bed at 7:30pm but I’m guessing we should keep with the 5:30pm? Thank you.
I actually am curious about putting her to bed even earlier than 5:30pm since she doesn’t seem to want to stay asleep and take a solid afternoon nap before 3pm so by the 4 o clock hour she has been very fussy.
Sorry just saw your response. A brief narrative account? I think overall she is improving with her self soothing skills or at least last night it seemed it was working. We did see improvement on the third night at least. She didn’t fuss that much when I laid her back in the bed after feeding her and was able to sleep 4 hour chunks. She is almost 7 weeks now. I do think the retained placenta and my milk not coming in did set us behind a little bit. She’s still not quite 8lbs when I last had her weighed this past Thursday. We appreciate you taking the time to respond and help us. We will try a later bedtime.
Just to be clear, I think a later bedtime is not a good idea but it is important to test it to get you and your husband on the same page.
We’ve actually seen a huge improvement the last two days and nights and have been putting her to bed between 5pm and 6pm. She seems to be a much happier baby during the day and night and is easier to soothe for naps during the day and the last two nights has barely made a peep aside from when she wants to feed. She is very easy to put down for bed and even if she cries for a little bit (maybe 20 min) she is still able to go to sleep for 4-5 hour chunks. I have still been doing contact naps for her through the day to minimize crying and maximize her naps. Thank you so much for your help. We have several friends who are expecting or having babies and have been telling them to get your book. We are so grateful.
What wonderful news — thank you for sharing this update. Hearing that your child is sleeping better means the whole family is doing better, and that is exactly what this work is for.
My sincere goal is to raise awareness of accurate, research-based information about children’s sleep, so that more families can find their way to restful nights and calmer days. You are now on the right path, and I am confident your child’s sleep will continue to improve. Please read Blog Posts 247A-C to understand how you are helping her build a better brain; more than a million new nerve connections are made during every second of healthy sleep!
To help encourage other parents who may be struggling with the same challenges you faced, would you consider writing a narrative account of your sleep journey and posting it here as a comment? I would use it as a Blog Post. Parents often find it most meaningful to hear from other parents — what the problem looked like, what you tried, what worked, and how your family came through it. If you are willing, please include the role the father played, as father involvement is one of the most important and underappreciated factors in helping children sleep well.
If you feel comfortable doing so, an honest Amazon book review would also be a tremendous help to families who are searching for guidance and trying to decide whether this approach is right for them.
I wish you and your child sweet dreams.
That is exactly what I’ve been telling people. That you not only help the child but the WHOLE family sleep better. I am doing so much better mentally, physically, emotionally and spiritually. While I was nervous to start at 6 weeks I knew I had to make a change for my own sake and the sake of my marriage. As my cousin who bought your book for me said, “Everything is worse when you aren’t sleeping.” It was so hard but ultimately you can teach your child to do hard things starting this young and prove to your own self that you can do hard things. And she’s our first so we really have no idea what we are doing and she and I had a difficult start. Yes, I will absolutely write up a narrative for you it might just take me a little time to write a concise one. And I will absolutely leave a review. Thank you again Dr. Weissbluth! I will post the narrative here and will include what you asked me to include.
Thank you. It does not have to be concise; actually, more detailed information is often better because a parent reading your report might see details that resonate with her own situation or the opposite; either way, context matters.
My daughter and I got off to a rough start. She’s our first baby, and I had retained some of the placenta for 12 days. My milk wasn’t coming in, but we didn’t know that until I eventually had to go to the ER and have surgery.
We thought she was just a fussy baby. She was our first child, so we had no idea what was normal. But looking back, she was probably hungry that whole time. I believe this is where her sleep debt started. She would cry for hours because she was hungry, and she wasn’t sleeping very well.
I did what I had to do to cope, and for us, that meant holding her all day and bouncing on the birth ball to soothe her to sleep for naps, and bed-sharing at night. We were both sleeping more than we would have been if I had put her in the bassinet after rocking her to sleep every time during the night, only for her to wake up 10 minutes later and for me to have to start all over again.
However, just before six weeks, I felt like I was starting down a path that was ultimately taking a huge toll on me. She was still crying for lengthy periods of time, and at that point I knew I needed to make a change.
I picked up Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child and began a deep dive into how I could help my daughter sleep better overall. I reached out to Dr. Weissbluth through the blog, and after I sent him a detailed report of her sleeping habits, he responded with a plan for us.
I agreed with him that she did not seem to have any self-soothing skills, and at 6.5 weeks we started with full-on extinction at night for 3–4 nights.
We followed his plan of putting her to bed in the bassinet earlier, around 5:30 p.m., after her bedtime routine—bath, dressed for bed, feed, soothe—and then leaving the room.
It was incredibly hard the first two nights, which he told me it would be. She cried for lengthy periods of time, sometimes a couple of hours. But I kept telling myself that she would already be doing this in my arms.
I will say that it also took some trial and error to figure out what made her most comfortable at night. After a lot of experimenting and lots of prayer, by the third night we saw a huge improvement.
My husband finally figured out the best way to swaddle her and get her comfortable for bed, and she had started to learn how to self-soothe. While she did cry some on the third night, it was significantly less, and we were all sleeping better.
On the fourth night, we decided to try having my husband give her a bottle and do the entire bedtime routine himself. To be honest, that night was the best night we’ve had by far.
She barely made a peep, according to my husband. I left the house to get a massage and came home to a sleeping baby. I was able to completely relax, get a good night’s rest, and she was amazing all night.
She now sleeps 4–5 hour stretches and even made it seven hours one night. She sleeps in her own room in the bassinet after going to bed somewhere between 5:30–6:30 p.m., depending on whether she takes a long afternoon nap starting before 3 p.m.
And I am sleeping so much better in my own bed. I feel so much better myself.
I’ve even noticed that she is easier to soothe to sleep during the day for her contact naps, and there has been significantly less crying. She is a very sweet and happy baby and now primarily fusses when she’s hungry, needs to be changed, or is ready for a nap or bedtime.
Ultimately, I have peace about everything I did from the beginning. We didn’t have an easy first go-around, and I did what I had to do to get through it. But with Dr. Weissbluth’s help, we are on track for a much more restful and happy household.
I know people would say 6 weeks is young to do full-on extinction, but it really did work for us.
My advice would be: Mom should leave the house for at least the first part of the night during those first couple of nights, and get Dad on board with bedtime duty. Dr. Weissbluth actually suggested this to me as something we could possibly try when he responded with our plan, and it made a huge difference for me.
Also, don’t tell people you’re doing extinction at 6 weeks. This caused a lot of stress and doubt for me when members of my family, aside from my cousin who gave me the book, told me what I was doing was wrong.
And finally, give yourself grace. It’s going to take some trial and error, and you are not a bad parent if you don’t get it right away.
We are so grateful that Dr. Weissbluth took the time to respond to me on the blog and for his dedication to helping the whole family sleep better. He will likely continue to see me in the comment section of the blog!
Thank you!
Me again….I just had a couple questions or just wanted to ask if there’s something I could be doing better. While we have noticed a huge improvement, she still cries periodically for lengthy periods of time when we put her down for bed. We’ve been putting her to bed between 5:15pm- 6:30pm and she will cry on and off anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour and a half (on and off crying) still. Ive noticed she cries less if I put her to bed at 6pm but then she seems so tired and fussy the entire time leading up to 6pm thus why I try putting her to bed earlier than 6pm but then she cries longer. I’m not sure if that makes sense. And should I still be maximizing naps during the day and minimizing crying? She isn’t in the bassinet for naps yet and I was going to try and tackle that next week when she is 9 weeks old and we don’t have company visiting that will want to hold the baby. I’ve been reading in the book and if I understand correctly I should start with the first nap after she first wakes up for the day and try to keep that wake window within an hr. I’ve noticed that she likes to wake up at 6:30am every morning.
I suspect that her lack of self-soothing skills for naps is the cause of her crying when you put her down at night.
Please read the Nap Drill section in my book and consider doing this for the first nap of the day only for just 3-4 days. The rest of the day, either continue as you have been doing or only if you feel comfortable, consider the Nap Drill.
“…we don’t have company visiting that will want to hold the baby. I’ve been reading in the book and if I understand correctly I should start with the first nap after she first wakes up for the day and try to keep that wake window within an hr.” YES.
Ok so the issue I’m having is whether or not to put her down for a nap before 9am. Most mornings she wakes up at 6:30am, she’s 11 weeks old and I have been feeding her every 2 hours during the day because her weight is behind. Should I keep her up until 9am for her nap or put her down for a nap beforehand? Some mornings she wakes up at 4am and has trouble going back to sleep but we leave her in her room after we’ve fed her, checked her diaper etc and don’t go back in until 6:30am. This morning I fed her at 6:30am had dad put her down for nap at 7:30am to keep within that hr window of when she wakes up. She took a 30min nap after crying for a little bit then I fed her at 8:30am and dad put her back down for a nap at 9:30am and she cried a little but did sleep for about 45 min. This is definitely an improvement but I wasn’t sure if I should keep with the short nap before 9am or cut it out?
Watch your baby, not the clock. Soothe her to sleep her when sh shows drowsy signs.