My buddy Kari over at Mommy to Elodie recently posted about her experience with sleep coach Lauren Boston and I must say that she gives me hope!
If you’ve experienced any of these items listed you may be interested in talking with Lauren more in depth to help change you child’s sleep for the better!
1. Too late of a bedtime
Children need on average 10-11 hours of sleep at night for the first 9 years of their lives!Watch for your child’s sleepy cues in the evening (between 6-8pm, depending on their age). When they are rubbing their eyes, yawning or increasingly cranky these are good indications that it’s time for bed.
2. Nap deprivation
Too late of a bedtime and skipped short naps will create more night wakings and poor quality sleep – not to mention an overtired child! It might not be logical but its true! Sleep begets sleep. Make sure your child is having age appropriate naps so that they don’t get over-tired.
3. Your child was put down in his crib or bed already asleep
If you put your child to sleep by rocking, nursing, walking, bottle feeding or lying down with them, they become dependent on you to put them to sleep. When your child wakes during the night (we all do) they will expect the same thing from you in order to go back to sleep. Putting your child into their crib awake will help them learn how to fall asleep on their own.
4. Inconsistency is how you respond to your child during the night
If you are inconsistent in how you put your child to sleep and how you respond to them when they wake up, you may inadvertently create more crying! Consistency in sleep coaching is your key to success!
5. Underlying medical conditions
Such as: asthma, allergies, reflux and sleep apnea. If you suspect your child is suffering from any of these conditions, talk to your pediatrician.
Lauren Boston is a Certified Gentle Sleep Coach and Postpartum Doula. She offers her sleep coaching services to tired parents all over the world.
Lauren was born in Los Angeles, raised in Canada, and now lives in San Diego with daughter Charlie, 2, and husband Jordan. When she’s not helping tired families you can find her enjoying time with her family, at the park, beach or enjoying other ‘San Diegan’ activities.
These are great tips, I struggled on this with my first child.. but you live and learn, my son does pretty well with bedtime and sleep…most of the time
What a great blog post! I just published a sleep post on my blog today too! 🙂
Kids and sleep? Man oh man!
This could not have come at a better time! Thank you! For the past 2 months, my daughter has been waking at 5 am ! It is nuts!
Great information! I think sticking to a set bedtime routine helps a lot.
Those are really good things to know! Great informative post, thanks for sharing. Luckily for me my kids never had any issues sleeping, in fact we just recently stopped nap time last year when they were 7 and 9 🙂
Great post! I know how important it is to put your child down awake but he screams and screams. He never used to do this so it’s a phase or something.
I could use some advice on how to get my 15 month old nurser to sleep through the night. They don’t need to nurse 3 times during the night at that age.