fact, adults’ biological clocks are set to run on a 25-hour clock and not the 24 into which we squeeze ourselves. This is why we find it easier to stay up late at night than to go to bed earlier than usual.
Your baby’s internal clock is set to the same rhythm. If you let him he could gradually work his way round to an increasingly late bedtime and late morning wakening.
Bedtime Routines
If you want your baby to go to sleep at a regular time, the best way to complete a well-organized day is with a bedtime routine. When you look into your baby’s eyes around the time of the six-week check-up there finally seems to be someone home – or almost. So this is a good time to introduce a bedtime routine if you haven’t already done so. In fact, many babies begin to sleep a lot better from this point without much prompting and many have developed a definite pattern of their own making by the time they are three or four months old.
A bedtime routine will probably include some or all of the following: bath, feed, story or quiet play, cuddle and a kiss. And it will end with your baby in his place for sleep on his own or with you. A bedtime routine can be as long or as short as you like. Many people find saying goodbye difficult. A bedtime routine can be a good way of preparing you and your baby for the separation of sleep.
‘It took me a couple of weeks to get myself organized and then we decided to organize Thomas. Lots of people had given us advice. So we decided to have a set bedtime to have the evening to ourselves. We started with a bath, and then into the bedroom with a very dim light so that we could just see, for his last feed. He slept through the night at six weeks.’
Sue, mother of Thomas, aged two
The main points to consider when developing a routine are:
• Is it peaceful? Waiting for a partner to come home from work for half an hour of rough-and-tumble play can be counterproductive. Save it for the weekend.
• Do all the elements always come in the same order? Babies feel more relaxed when they can predict what’s coming next.
• Is it practical? Sometimes a family will develop a routine that is useful at times and difficult at others – such as letting the baby fall asleep in front of the television or while driving round in the car. It is worth persevering with a more practical alternative if you can find one.
• Is it possible to do all these things within the time you’ve set? Starting a lengthy routine at 6.30pm for a bedtime of 7pm is doomed to failure. Experts now recommend a daily 20-minute dose of book sharing even with the youngest of babies, so it may be worth winding things down a little earlier than you had planned.
• Is anything else going to interfere with the routine? This should be a relaxing and close time for both of you. So, record that soap opera for later and ask your mum to call after your baby is asleep. You and your baby both need to give and receive full attention, so that you can both feel secure enough to say goodnight.
• Is there an end to the routine? Cycling through the last couple of elements again and again can be exhausting and frustrating for you and suggests that your baby has not made the association between the end of the routine and sleep. Many parents find that whenever they put their child down to sleep he cries out, so they sing another song, or give another cuddle or drink only to find that the baby cries again when he is put down. A good routine ends with the baby falling asleep without you performing any encores.
Sally, mother of Emily, four, and lack, 18 months, remembers that Jack used to be afraid when the lights were suddenly turned off. Now she ends their routine by getting lack to ‘blow’ the light out himself with a little help from his bedtime friends, Piglet and Pooh.
Inevitably, there will be times when your routine has to go by the board – holidays, illness, visitors staying overnight. But the sooner you can reinstate the familiar routine, the more easily you will both rediscover your pattern of sleep. Alternatively, some parents find that where sleeping problems have already developed, a break in the usual routine can mean a chance to create a new pattern.
Kathy, mother of Lily, six, Robert, four, and Alice, two, delayed going away because Alice woke nightly and would only accept her:
‘A friend was getting married 200 miles away and we’d said we would go but I really didn’t want to because I was concerned about Alice not settling with my mother-in-law. I went looking for sympathy from my neighbour, but I got none. She just said that I should remember that life isn’t just about children but about husbands as well. So I was really upset, but I went. When I rang up the next morning my mother-in-law told me that Alice hadn’t woken in the night as usual. She’d slept better than usual so I needn’t have worried.’
Sleep Associations
As the name suggests, ‘sleep associations’ are the things your baby associates with going to sleep. The fact is that, whatever your baby is used to when he falls asleep in the evening, he may need again to get himself back to sleep if he wakes in the night.
Babies are incredibly adaptable – if you always sheared sheep in your baby’s bedroom whenever you wanted him to sleep, he would still sleep – he would just learn to associate sleep with the sound of bleating and sheep clippers. And you’d have to be ready to fleece another from your flock each time he woke at night. Most parents find that a teddy and a goodnight kiss work just as well.
After the first few months of life, a baby who routinely falls asleep on his own in a room that is fairly dark and quiet will recognize the same conditions when he wakes for the average five times a night – and so be able to return himself to sleep without needing you. Some parents start a routine earlier than others:
‘James and Richard have both slept well from the beginning. I put it down to some advice I had at the start. The first night home with James I didn’t get a bit of sleep, and then there was a knock at the door and it was the midwife. “Stick him on,” she said. “Hmm, he’s just using you as a dummy. Put him down. Go and play some music that you like.” We were a bit hesitant but did as we were told. It was the best advice I’ve ever had. He cried for ten minutes and then went to sleep. The midwife said, “When he’s fed and you know he’s satisfied, put him down.” He slept through the night by the time he was six weeks old. It was the same with Richard.’
Frances and Stuart
On the other hand, a baby who routinely falls asleep in your arms or at your breast will need to find a nipple and someone to hold him at night to do the same. Many parents who prefer this way of saying goodnight to their baby are also happy to share their beds with them, so that they can easily recreate the evening’s sleeping conditions:
‘In the evening I undress Sophie, sometimes she has a shower or a bath and then we lie down in bed, read a story and then she holds my breast and falls asleep. I’ve had her in bed with me since birth. I did the same with Sam and Rosie when they were smaller too.’
Clare, mother of Sam, eight, Rosie, five, and Sophie, two-and-a-half
But if you like your bed to yourself, it’s counterproductive to lull your baby to sleep in the evening with a feed or a cuddle – because you’ll probably spend a lot of the night in his bedroom doing the same thing again. If you want to spend your nights in your own bed with only adult company, sooner or later you’ll have to get your baby to go into his cot awake and alone in the evening.
Sleep associations can take a while to learn. Especially in the early days, it may be difficult to identify a strategy that works. Sometimes, putting him in his cot and leaving him to it makes him nod off and at other times he can remain determinedly awake through all 25 verses of ‘Oh my darling, Clementine’. Still, it is worth persisting with a structured bedtime formula that you like because eventually your baby will find the predictability of the formula reassuring and relaxing.
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