Struggle to get my baby to sleep

Conquering your baby’s sleep can often seem like a never ending struggle.

The first step is to evaluate the overall daily routine of your baby.

Sometimes it may be small triggers that can impact the sleep routine and affect your baby’s easy of falling asleep.

Understanding your baby’s sleepy cues is key. A baby who is over tired or over stimulated can struggle to go to sleep and often pose a sleep battle.

Prepare your baby for sleep is important whether it be for day or night sleep.

The best way to prepare a baby for sleep is to have a consistent sleep routine such as winding down, talking quietly, not exciting them, stopping play before you attempt to calm them for sleep, darkening the room, etc.

This all helps in achieving a baby easily falling asleep as they can then predict that sleep is coming through the routine behaviours that are done prior to sleep.

A good routine to prepare your baby for sleep is something like…..bath, book, bottle, bed.

All calm and quiet, one on one activities.

Being alert to tired baby signs.

All babies show some signs of tiredness and with your baby you will generally be able to pick up on the signs rather quickly.

It is important to be alert for them so that they don’t become over tired as this will hinder your ability to get them to sleep as they will be harder to settle.

It is common to often miss or misinterpret a babies signs of tiredness, for many reasons, and then have a struggle getting their baby to sleep.

Common signs of tiredness

• Crying
• Yawning
• Frowning
• Grizzling
• Wriggling
• Clenching their fists
• Lack of attention or interest in doing anything
• Sucking, to name the most common.

Change your tactics

If you find that you are becoming exhausted yourself trying to get your baby to sleep then perhaps you need to change your current approach as it seems like it isn’t working.

If it takes longer than 30-40 minutes to get your baby to sleep then we would suggest changing, or at least altering your method.

Effective responding to your baby and their cues and the establishment of a sleep routine establishes a successful style.

Bedtime is for sleeping

Providing a sleep friendly setting goes a long way to establishing a good sleep routine.

It will enable your child to settle easier, sleep better and perhaps longer.

The best way to achieve this is by placing your baby in their bed; of course, this is whenever possible, in a warm room-not too hot or cold, limited distractions, the same way, etc.

Consistency is the key.

Well fed

There is a lot of debate on whether a baby that is well fed sleeps longer or not.

The opinions are still very mixed and the theories for each are concrete and convincing.

It is worth experimenting with your baby if they are constantly waking up and you need or they need to sleep longer. It may or may not help.