Is your baby ready for sleep training & how to stop a baby from waking up so often

You can, however, decrease the number of times your baby wakes up during the night. There is no need for a parent to be up every hour, but a mom might still have to get up between one and three times a night for a feed, depending on baby’s age, etc.

“YOU NEVER HAVE TO LEAVE YOUR CHILD’S SIDE AND YOU NEVER HAVE TO DO ANYTHING YOU’RE NOT COMFORTABLE WITH WHEN YOU EMBARK ON SLEEP TRAINING.”

There are numerous sleep training methods available on the internet and in baby-related books, and all these tools have the same end-goal in mind, which is to teach your child to fall asleep independently.

5 factors to consider BEFORE attempting to apply sleep training methods

1. You need to break any negative sleep associations and focus on building positive sleep associations.
2. The amount of food and the type of food your child eats plays a crucial role in sleep. For example, babies under one year of age still need a certain amount of milk during the day, and a parent should not remove night feeds if the child is not getting the appropriate amount during the daytime.
3. You need to look at your child’s sleep environment. In some cases, the room might be too light or the environment might be too noisy. If that’s the case, you then need to consider block-out curtains, switching off the hallway light or maybe introducing white noise into your baby’s room. Safe sleep is extremely important, especially under the age of one year and then again for toddlers who are able to get out of bed and walk around in the house.
4. Babies and toddlers need a specific amount of sleep during the day and you need to keep to your child’s age-appropriate awake time. You cannot expect an overtired or under-tired child to fall asleep independently and soundly.
5. A fixed, age-appropriate routine and schedule will cue your child’s brain about when sleep is coming and that makes it so much easier for them to fall asleep.

All of these factors must be taken into consideration before attempting any sleep training method, otherwise we are not setting the stage for our children to fall asleep independently.

Another important thing to keep in mind is that you never have to leave your child’s side and you never have to do anything you’re not comfortable with when you embark on sleep training. We can teach our children the very valuable skill of sleep in a very gradual, gentle manner.