We recommend always following the safe sleep guidelines.
In the spirit of reconciliation, Dr Fallon and Dr Law acknowledged the traditional custodians of country throughout Australia and the continuation of cultural, spiritual and educational practices of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
They pay respect to their elders past and present and recognise that sovereignty was never ceded.
Have you ever been so tired you could cry, but the moment your head hits the pillow, your brain decides to run a full audit of your child's sleep.
Your thoughts might sound a little bit like, okay, it's 2.17 a.m.
She's just fallen back to sleep.
So if she wakes at 6 a.m., then maybe her first nap's around 9 a.m.
But then I've got to go to the shops and I need to wash the sheets.
And if she naps in the car, then do I let her have a full nap?
Do I wake her up?
And on and on and on.
Then suddenly you look at the clock, it's 3 a.m., and your baby's been asleep during that time, but you've been wide awake.
Well, that is the mental load of sleep.
It's that invisible second shift that happens often a long time after bedtime.
Right.
And for so many parents, it's the reason you're not resting, even when your little one finally is.
Well, today we're naming it, we're unpacking it and, most importantly, we're talking about how to share it so you can finally get the sleep that you deserve.
Welcome back to Brand New Little People, the podcast companion to the Sunbelt Pediatric Sleep Clinic programs created by us.
I'm Dr Fallon Cook and I'm here with Dr Laura Conway and we're the directors of Infant Sleep Australia.
Laura, what actually is the mental load of sleep?
Well, it's the invisible labor to do with your little one's sleep.
And there's a few components.
So one of the components is the tracking of their sleep.
That means thinking about nap lengths, time spent awake, total sleep time.
What are their tired signs?
How's that changing?
Then there's the planning.
Is it time to drop a nap?
When should we best time outings around sleep?
And then how will we support our child's sleep when they start childcare or they're being looked after by grandma?
And then there's the worrying.
Is it teething that's making their sleep go wobbly?
Are they hungry?
Is that why they're waking?
Is it a sleep association?
What is that sleep association?
How can I improve things?
Will this pass naturally or should I do something about it?
How long should I wait before seeking help?
And then the coordinating, keeping all of the caregivers on the same page.
So your co-parent, your grandparents childcare, any other caregivers checking to see what they're doing to settle your little one and thinking about is that a problem in itself, or should they all be doing what I'm doing?
And you know, sometimes I think about, if sleep were a project at work, there'd actually be a project manager with a clear brief.
But at home, there's typically just one parent carrying all the load, which is invisible.
And they are usually pretty exhausted.
Yes.
Oh, it's so true.
It's often the tiredest parent who is carrying the mental load of sleep, aren't they?
Yeah, yeah.
And Fallon, why does one parent tend to become the default sleep manager?
Yeah, it's such a great question because it's so rare that I would see a family in clinic where there isn't like a default sleep manager in the family.
They're always on the call.
But even if there are a couple of parents joining in or a couple of caregivers, there's always one that you can just tell is the one that's carrying that load.
But look, I would say, in the early days.
So often the management of sleep tends to fall to the breastfeeding parent, if there is one.
Often they're just having to feed overnight, so then they start to manage the overnight sleep as well.
Or it can be the parent who just has the most parental leave, so the one who you're intending to stay home with the baby the longest.
And what can tend to happen is this parent tends to be the one that starts to develop more expertise in sleep because they're just thinking about it more.
They're having to manage it more.
And over time, that kind of expertise gap between two parents or caregivers really starts to widen.
Um, so you've got that parent who's doing most of the settling.
They're starting to consume more information about sleep.
Um, and I can almost guarantee you, the sleep manager of a whole bunch of families is going to be the one who's listening to this podcast.
Oh yeah.
Um, yeah, they're all the sleep managers that tune in.
Um, But, you know, this further embeds you as the expert.
The more you're learning to try and get a handle on sleep, the more you're becoming the kind of default sleep manager in your family.
And then I think, for a lot of parents it's really, you know, this natural progression into this.
Just tell me what to do trap.
Because often we see this there's a you know, generally well-meaning co-parent, but one who's less informed about sleep, who will be offering to help with sleep and but actually wants to be directed by the co-parent who carries more of the expertise.
And whilst in some ways that's helpful, great.
You know you want to help.
You want to help to carry the load, but you're still needing that default sleep manager to carry the mental load.
You know, you're now expecting them to be the teacher.
So you know, just keep in mind that if you are the one who's making the list, who's doing the planning, who's reading about sleep, kind of directing things, then you're still carrying the mental load.
Even if you've got a co-partner who does exactly what they're told you know they might.
You might be able to say go do this and they do it.
And that's great.
But you still feel like you're the default sleep manager.
And for some families not all, but for some families that starts to not work so well, because that one kind of the one who's carrying most of that mental load of sleep can start to feel like it's quite a big burden, that they're not really sharing the responsibility they're carrying the load of it.
And that's where it can start to.
You know, parents early on can start to set off on a really uneven footing in terms of sharing that responsibility.
And it's definitely really hard to kind of pull that back into balance.
But Laura, can you kind of unpack how carrying that mental load of sleep can actually end up impacting parents' sleep?
Because I think this is a really interesting thing.
We're so busy managing our baby or toddler's sleep that often we don't realize the impact it's actually having on our own sleep.
Yeah, I love that term, sleep manager.
And it is the sleep manager who tends to have their sleep impacted the most, because by the time they've settled their baby to sleep and they've got into bed themselves And they are playing over in their mind everything that happened that day, whether it went to plan.
Their brain just simply can't switch off.
And they're playing over scenarios for tomorrow, replaying what happened yesterday, the day before yesterday, when they had that long nap, when they only had the short naps, theorizing.
Is there a reason that happened?
And they're searching for clues and then they're googling, is this normal?
What did I do on that day to make sleep better?
And all of that constant thinking and theorizing is stopping that process of letting go and drifting off to sleep.
So that means that they, although they might be in bed for five hours or six hours overnight, I don't want to say seven to ten hours because most parents' little ones are not, they're not falling asleep for quite a long time because they're worrying.
And then they may be woken in the night by their little one.
And they're not getting all that rest that they need.
And because of that, because they know that their little one is likely to be waking in the night, they're hypervigilant.
They're sleeping with one ear open, if you like.
And that means that they're just staying in lighter stages of sleep.
They're not getting that deep restorative sleep that they really need.
So when they wake up in the morning, they can still feel really fatigued, even if their child slept okay.
So it's just this never ending, if it can feel, relentless cycle of supporting your child's sleep but your own sleep suffering.
And then you're trying to make decisions about sleep when you yourself are exhausted.
I don't know about parents listening, but if I'm absolutely knackered I don't make great decisions about anything.
No.
Yeah.
What a horrible cycle to be in.
That's right.
And the way that your mind works is that you remember.
When you're sleep deprived, you tend to remember negative events rather than positive events.
And so, when you're trying to make those judgment calls, your mind is simply focusing more on what went poorly rather than the things that went well, which is then going to impact you the accuracy of your decision making.
So really, really hard for those sleep managers of the family.
So we've talked about everything that is difficult about being the sleep manager Fallon.
So let's talk about how parents can share that load.
First, starting with the parent who currently carries the load.
Yeah, I feel like the first step has got to be making that invisible mental load actually visible, both to yourself, so you really understand what it is you're carrying, but also for your co-parent or other caregivers.
So that might mean doing a bit of an audit of your mental load and writing down everything you do for sleep during a few days to a week or so.
So it does become this visible thing, it can be a really good idea to think about creating a bit of a sleep Bible or a sleep plan, a kind of one pager that's got things like your child's daily rhythm, the tired signs.
You might be on the lookout for the settling technique you're using.
And the aim of that is not to, you know, provide one.
You know this strict thing that everybody has to follow.
It's not to control everything, but it's actually just to really empower other caregivers so they can refer to it instead of you.
They can refer to it and kind of get a sense of what needs to be done and how it's done.
I also try and encourage families to hand over entire domains, not just individual specific tasks.
So that could mean, instead of saying oh, can you put her down for a nap at 1230 pm, you might go.
Okay, from now on, weekend naps are yours to manage.
And then you give them that sleep plan or your sleep Bible, so that they've got what they need, and you're letting them take that.
That's their domain and they then handle that from now on can be a really great way to work on.
You know, sharing that load.
And I think also don't be afraid to name exactly what it is you need and be really specific.
So it could be saying things like, I need you to get up with her at 6am so I can catch up on sleep.
I need you to take the monitor every second night, or I need you to practice giving her a bottle so you can start to do some night shifts.
So it's trying to be really specific about exactly what it is you need.
And in some ways I think, oh, the person carrying the mental load shouldn't even have to do that.
Yeah.
Having to be specific and give tasks is part of the mental load.
But I think if parents can approach it, as these are some steps to take so that that mental load will start to feel like it's reduced its burden on you.
And if it ultimately results in two parents more equally sharing that burden, then ultimately it's going to work out best for the family.
But I think very importantly, Laura, let's talk through what the co-parent can do.
So the one who isn't carrying the mental load, what should they be doing?
Yes, I think it's really important to think about avoiding asking your co-parent what needs doing, because that puts the mental load right back on your partner, and instead observe what your partner is doing and take ownership of one thing entirely, like you were just talking about Fallon.
And learning the language of sleep, you know, study that sleep Bible.
Watch your child to learn their tired signs.
Don't wait to be briefed.
Get yourself informed.
Do they tend to yawn when they're bored as well as when they're tired?
So is that a sleep sign that you understand or a sign that you don't pay a great deal of attention to?
But are they rubbing their eyes or pulling their ears and looking off into the distance?
And are those the tired signs that you can see and you can go?
Okay, I want to wait until I can see three of those things before I put them down.
And I'm not going to say to my partner, should I put them down now?
You can say, oh, well, I know that they've got three tired signs.
It's now time to pop them down.
Think about taking leadership for at least one full night per week.
And that's sort of minimum where your parents can then feel safe in the knowledge that they don't have to carry that load 24-7.
You know, even knowing just one night a week, they can rest uninterrupted.
Breastfeeds overnight, of course will still need to happen if your baby doesn't take express breast milk.
But that is likely to make a really big difference to how your partner feels.
They'll begin to feel supported and know that they can just have one night a week where they can catch up on their own sleep debt, if you like.
What else would I say?
I think noticing the invisible.
Noticing and stating what you noticed, such as I heard that you got up at three in the morning, So I'm going to get up with our baby in the morning so that you can rest.
There is nothing more irritating and I speak from experience of a parent waking up in the morning and going that was a great night.
The sleep manager's eyes are falling out of their head.
It was not a great night.
Oh my God, that reminds me.
Little segue here to the discussion.
But one of my kids has been unwell and running a fever.
And when they run a fever, they sleep talk all night.
And I'd love to say it was talking, but it's more like screaming their head off.
Most of the night.
And so a few nights ago my husband and I were just awake half the night because it was just constant screaming and tossing and turning in his sleep.
He didn't need us for anything.
Just, yeah, really disrupted sleep.
We got up in the morning and like our eyes were just hanging out of our heads.
And I was like, mate, how did you sleep?
And he's like, yeah, great.
Yeah, I feel really good today.
And I was like, oh, good.
Your dad and I are a bit tired.
He's like, why?
It's like you were screaming all night.
Oh, my God.
Yeah, so infuriating.
Is he better now, Fallon?
Yeah.
Are you getting better now?
He's better now.
Sleeping peacefully.
So yeah, final thing that the co-parent could do that would be really, really helpful is to acknowledge the sleep manager's expertise.
Don't tell your co-parent that you admire the hard work they do to understand and manage your child's sleep.
Explain that you also want to become the expert in your child's sleep and make it clear that you're engaged and ready to take responsibility.
Your co-parent wasn't born with this knowledge.
They have actively sought it out.
And it's not something that comes by osmosis.
So really avoid minimizing the effort that they have put in and really strive to become as expert as them.
That altogether is going to really help your sleep manager co-parent feel supported and understood and will just tend to break down any chance of resentment building between the two of you.
Yeah, and it's so important.
There was an amazing study gosh probably about a decade ago now showing that one of the factors associated with better baby sleep is when both parents are taking an active role in the settling and responding to baby overnight.
It really makes a difference to the actual baby's sleep quality as well.
And I'm sure those parents just feel better, you know a lot more refreshed when they're able to share that load.
So it really can be important for protecting family functioning, I think as well.
Amazing.
Yeah, look, I think the mental load is real.
It's very heavy.
And if you're not coping, maybe your co-parent just isn't wanting to engage in starting to share that load with you.
You know, as you wish, that they would.
Or maybe you're listening in and you don't have a co-parent, so you just have to carry that load.
If you need support, please seek support.
I'm constantly saying to parents just pick up the phone to Panda if you're having a really rough day.
Panda, the experts in perinatal anxiety and depression.
You don't have to be not coping before you go and get help either.
I think that's something I really want to try and get more parents aware of.
Don't wait until you're broken.
Yeah, it's a lot harder to repair someone who broke.
Like if there's cracks starting to appear, you're feeling a little wobbly.
That's when you reach out and you don't need to know what you want to say on the phone.
Just pick up the phone, dial that number, and an angel will be on the end of that line ready to just – you know, talk you through things, give you some support, maybe point you in the direction of some some extra support.
And, of course, we're here to help with the sleep and settling side of things.
We're not always able to get both parents engaged though, are we, Laura?
Sometimes we have appointments where we realize okay, this parent is really quite isolated and they're not going to have that support from a co-parent, but we help to carry some of that mental load.
We make the decisions, and I had a parent the other week who said we're just so sick of making decisions.
We just want you to just make all the decisions and we will just do what we're told.
It's a great way of just handing over the mental load.
I hadn't really thought about our services in that way.
But I think for a lot of parents, getting help from us is part of managing that mental load.
Yes, I had someone who said the same thing actually, Fallon, last week in clinic.
Because we take a very collegiate approach to working out what a good plan is going to be for your child.
And when you come and see us in the clinic, there's a lot of discussion.
Do you like this idea?
Do you like that idea?
And this one family said to me, can you just stop?
I just want you to make the decision for me.
What do you think is going to work best for the family?
Yeah.
Because they were just so exhausted.
They had no resources left in the tank.
And that's you know.
That's great to acknowledge that, realize that that's the situation that your family is in.
And I'm very happy at that point to be more directive in my approach.
Yeah, it's great, isn't it?
Yeah.
A nice way to work when you just be like, fine, this is exactly how I'm going to do it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So if you're tuning in, just have a think about whether this is the time for you to start a conversation with your co-parent about how you're managing the mental load of sleep, but also the mental load of lots of things, because it is easier to work on these things in the early stages of becoming a parent than it is when you've got three teenagers.
Yeah uh, i think that's a really good discussion.
I hope there's lots of helpful stuff in there for parents.
But um, maybe we should move on to parent questions, because we've got some really good, meaty ones to dive into this week, haven't we?
Yeah, we have and um, a lot of them were um really long, detailed emails that we received and we simply can't um read such long emails out, so we have summarized them.
Um, We have said this before, but if you are sending an email to us with a question and you realize that by the time you press send or you sign off, it's actually a thesis, there's a good chance that you would benefit from a coaching call or an initial appointment if there's that much information to unpack.
So, yeah, we are here to help, but there's only so much that we can cover in a podcast format.
So I'm sure all our members understand that.
All right, let's kick off.
We have Billy, who has a four and a half month old baby boy with an approximate 12 hour sleep need.
He's usually getting 10 to 10 and a half hours overnight and two hours of day, sleep across three naps.
Bedtime's between 7.30 and 8, although it takes him 30 minutes to fall asleep.
And wake up is between 6 and 7.
He always has a false start at the start of the night before sleeping for a three or four hour stretch.
And he's recently begun to wake at around 4.30.
They're using a modified version of supported accelerated approach using one minute intervals.
What advice do we have to stop the false starts and early rising?
Oh, excellent question.
I would tighten things a little bit.
So if you've got 12 hours to work with and you know your baby's taking so that yeah, two hours a day sleep, you've got about a 10 hour window overnight.
I would be thinking, if they're taking 30 minutes to fall asleep, make that bedtime closer to 8pm and then make the wake up time 6am, because you're allowing a lot of wiggle room either way.
And that's often when false starts will start.
You end up with a bit of low sleep pressure overnight.
Yeah.
So I'd tighten up that daily rhythm.
And then using one-minute intervals with supported accelerated.
I'd really encourage you to start stretching those out.
So often when we're trying to work towards self-settling in the cot.
You know, when we give a baby a chance, we're like we're going to watch them, we're going to see what they do during this interval.
So often for the first minute or two, they're a bit cranky.
They're like, come on, you used to cuddle me, feed me, whatever.
I don't really want to be in here.
And then often it's at about that two-minute mark that they start to go.
Well, mum's there, you know, getting reassurance, but it's really boring, really repetitive.
Mm-hmm.
And that's when they start to go.
Oh well, there's that thing I really like to do that helps me get to sleep.
I like to maybe it's, you know, bringing the thumb up to the mouth.
Maybe it's nuzzling the head into the hands or could be the dummy, something like that.
It's often after a couple of minutes.
They start to draw on their natural self-soothing skills, and then they put themselves off to sleep, sleep.
So by keeping intervals to just one minute you might not be quite allowing enough time for your baby to start trying to use those skills.
So I would start to stretch out those intervals and yeah, just tighten up that daily rhythm.
And I think you'll be on track in no time, Billie.
It sounds like you've made great progress.
You've really got the core things in place.
And so often it's just a bit of tightening and tweaking and then things really start to come together.
So yeah, that's where I would be starting for that one.
Amazing.
We have a question from Bianca.
He has an 11 and a half month old boy whose sleep has improved since joining SOMBEL.
Yay.
Yay.
He is now waking just once or twice a night and having a good first nap for one to one and a half hours.
However, the second nap is distressing, regardless of how long the first nap is.
He's obviously tired, but screams and cries and bangs his head.
Bianca does not think he's ready to drop to one nap as he falls asleep so easily for the morning one.
What would we suggest?
Okay Bianca, you're really at a tricky crossroads where he's close to dropping to one nap because, you know, often that does happen from around 12 months and, with babies that have a lower sleep need, they may drop to one nap even before they turn 12 months.
What I would be doing at this point is looking at that daily rhythm and, for a whole week, just capping that first nap at an hour rather than an hour and a half.
I'm not sure how long you are aiming for for the second nap, but but it might just be one sleep cycle and you know, potentially that's half an hour, and then making sure that he has a good long stretch before going into the bed at the start of the night.
So don't think about um uh, giving your son maybe half an hour to fall asleep at the start of the night.
If he's not falling asleep until say, 8 pm, in general, don't put him into the cot until just before 8 pm.
Sometimes parents fall into a trap where they think well, he must be asleep by 8 and I need to give him lots of time to fall asleep.
And then for little ones, they can find that really frustrating.
And it sounds like your little one is a bit frustrated.
Absolutely.
And we do know that some babies do bang their heads as a self-soothing behavior.
It's very rare that they hurt themselves.
If you are at all concerned, then speak to your GP or nurse about that, just to rule out anything else going on.
So if you want to try to keep him on two naps for the time being the first nap capped at one hour, second nap, just one sleep cycle and not putting him into bed until very, very close to when he's naturally falling asleep, and keeping that wake up steady And of course, then thinking about how he's falling asleep.
I suspect that because his sleep has improved since you've joined Sunbelt.
You've been using a settling approach.
Just make sure that you're using that really consistently when he wakes up overnight.
And you should be on track for a very short period of time Bianca, because then, once it resolves, it will resolve maybe for a month at most, I'm suspecting, and then you're going to need him to move to the one nap.
And that will probably be the two laps combined in the middle of the day.
Then you should be pretty steady for the next quite a few months, if not a year or so.
Yeah, I think that's a great answer.
So often they just need to go to two short naps as part of that transition to just one nap.
It is quite common.
Yeah.
So Laura and Morgan have written in.
They have a 16 month old son and are struggling to change from having their little baby to now having a toddler.
Oh, we all know that feeling.
Yeah.
So he has a low sleep need, just 11 and a half hours.
He's having one nap that varies between 40 minutes and two hours and a variable bedtime which depends on that nap length.
So it's somewhere between half past eight and 9.45.
They keep wake up steady at 7.15.
So recently they've had a lot going on with teething, supporting him to sleep in the cot rather than just in the car or the pram.
And they've slipped back into feeding to sleep.
When they try to settle or resettle him without the feed, he escalates straight into intense crying, with kicking and flailing around.
They're also moving house next week.
They're pretty busy.
They want to know if there are major differences in baby and toddler sleep and how long after a big transition like moving house they should wait before making big changes to sleep, like night weaning and moving him to a toddler bed.
Oh, there's a lot of questions in there, Fallon.
There's a lot to unpack in there.
But to start with yeah, toddler and baby sleep is different because toddlers really start understanding how the world works.
They are very upset.
They almost feel betrayed if they're fed to sleep and then wake up and you've put them in their cot.
They can be pretty mad about it.
And also that can create a lot of anxiety as well.
If I'm falling asleep one place, waking up somewhere else and There's going to be a house move.
There's going to be a lot of unsettling things going on.
I would start with the daily rhythm because, as it sounds at the moment, there's a lot of variability in bedtime and toddlers rarely do well with variable bedtimes.
Bedtime and wake up time are the signposts for the circadian rhythm.
So I would start by trimming that day nap back. keeping it consistently a little bit shorter.
So if it's sometimes 40 minutes, maybe you're actually just going to start with a 40 minute nap in the middle of the day.
I haven't sort of done all the maths for working out the 11 and a half hours sleep schedule, but keep the nap short, decide on what the bedtime needs to be so that overnight oh look, I'll just work it out.
It's been a What are we working with?
Well, I guess if it's 11 hours, maybe a bit under 11.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So if you're going to do an 830 pm bedtime, then you'd be waking them by 730 am if they had 30 minutes a day sleep.
So kind of work on it. in that way.
So you might think, no, 40 minutes is too little.
I want to do an hour 20 minute total day nap, in which case you're going to be left with around about 10 slightly over 10 hours of sleep left overnight.
So in that case, it'd be 8.30 PM bedtime and a 6.30 AM wake up.
Decide what that needs to look like for your family and stick to it.
And that is all I would do while you're moving house is just maintain this really predictable daily rhythm.
That's enough for now.
Once you're moved in, you're feeling like you've settled in.
Your toddler has settled in, made that transition.
Then start to work on weaning the night feeds.
Maybe just get rid of the night feeds first.
Then work on moving to a toddler bed if he's outgrown the cot.
But that's how I would work on it, because it's going to be too hard to work on the settling too much when you're moving house at the moment.
I just really nail that daily rhythm.
And that will hopefully bring about a lot of predictability.
That's going to mean quicker, easier settling.
And it will just make sure that he's really ready when you do go to make those toddler bed settling changes.
That sleep pressure will be high enough that we're less likely to see him really push back a lot, because he will just be so tired and so ready for sleep.
And that's what toddlers really need.
You know, they really know what they want.
So we need that sleep pressure to be really high so that they're thinking, gosh, I'm really tired.
Maybe I should go to sleep.
And then if you're the consistent parent doing the same thing over and over and they realize okay, it doesn't matter how wild I get.
Mom and dad are rock solid.
They're calming.
They're repetitive.
They're reassuring.
Then your toddler is going to get on board pretty quickly.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You'll get those, the better nights, the better days.
Yeah.
And keep using the same bedtime routine that you currently use when you move house.
Now, having just moved house recently myself, I know, even as an adult, how destructive it is, and let alone for little ones.
So if you can try and keep those signposts for the circadian rhythm, as Fallon has said, but also use those same cues for bedtime, the same activities in the run-up to bedtime, in the same order at the same time, that's all going to be really familiar and reassuring to your toddler as they navigate that transition with you.
Yes yeah, when everything's gone all topsy-turvy, they can rely on bedtime being the same.
It's so important.
All right.
Emma wrote in, she has a nine-month-old boy with a 13-hour sleep need.
They've had a rough time recently with teething and starting.
Daycare and night sleep, including night weaning, went out the window.
She says he has two one-hour naps and sleeps from 7pm to 6am.
He self-settles for his naps and at bedtime after Emma used the advanced accelerated approach.
However, he wakes multiple times overnight and needs to be fed or cuddled back to sleep.
He also now wakes from 4 to 4.30 a.m. and Emma is feeding him and holding him until 6 a.m.
Oh my gosh, Emma, that's so hard.
Emma's feeling stuck and wonders how to manage the nighttime wakes, especially with teething.
Emma, that sounds really hard.
Whenever I hear that a parent is holding their child to sleep for that last part of the night, it really paints a picture of how much the family is struggling and how invested you are in supporting your little one's sleep.
It also just makes me feel a little worried for you because that can be a dangerous sleep situation.
You're probably exhausted yourself at that time of the night and if you're holding or exhausted baby in your arms, that can be a recipe for disaster.
So i'm really delighted that you've joined some bell and that you've reached out for help so that we can help you move away from that scenario.
Um, I would be.
There's a couple of things that I'm thinking about.
One is first of all with teething.
If the teething is still happening, if you just wait for teething to end, in a sense, you'll just never get on top of sleep.
There's a lot of teeth to come through.
There's so many teeth.
So I'd be using pain relief products.
During the day and also at nighttime and when your little one wakes up in the night.
If enough time has elapsed, then give them another dose of the pain relief.
What are your daycare plans does, and in terms of how they settle their little one?
I wouldn't worry too much about um, so put that out of your mind.
Um, i would be thinking first of all does your nine-month-old still have a 13-hour sleep need?
Um, They're waking so much overnight.
I just wonder if it's worth just logging the sleep again just to check it hasn't dropped to like 12 and a half hours, for example, and adjust the daily rhythm accordingly.
And then next I would be thinking you know that he can self-settle for his naps and at the start of the night,
But overnight, that's not happening.
So have a think about beginning to use that same settling approach when he wakes up overnight and isn't due a feed, so that you're really consistent when he wakes up in the night.
If sometimes he has this menu, this scroll of things that could happen overnight, like I could be cuddled to sleep, I could be fed to sleep, I could be held on mum's chest to go back to sleep, then there's a lot of things on that menu for your nine-month-old to choose from when they wake in the night.
And he may well complain until he gets the one that he wants for that particular wake-up.
So if you start to just use one consistent approach to settle him overnight – and I would be using the advanced accelerated or supported accelerated approach for a nine-month-old – until um, he just learns that this is just the one boring, predictable thing that happens overnight.
He's less likely to wake up thinking I want this particular thing of that off that menu in the middle of the night.
Um, now that he's through the teething or you have the teething under control with the pain management he's settled in daycare.
Um, this would be the time to say, right, pick a day.
And from that night onwards, be really consistent with that settling overnight and help him learn that this is the only thing that happens.
And it's really, really boring.
You'll have a couple of rough nights, Emma, but then you should be out the other side.
Would you have anything else to add there, Fallon?
Because that's a bit of a tricky case.
No, I think you're on the money there.
I think that that baby would wake up at night and just think well, at some point I get to have this lovely sleepy cuddle with mum.
And so often it's the same when babies sometimes bed share from 4 or 5 a.m.
Almost without fail, they'll start bringing that earlier and earlier and earlier.
Because they can't tell the time.
They just wake up at 11 p.m. one day and go, no, I'm only going to fall asleep one month.
So it does tend to get worse, which is a terrible thing to tell a parent.
But I just think, you know, you know what you need to do.
We need to make the settling overnight really consistent and it's going to benefit everybody's well-being and you absolutely, you know, can work on that.
It's going to be good for your baby. little boy, it's going to be really good for you too, Emma.
And I would definitely be enlisting support.
If you've got a co-parent, They can be doing a lot of – there's no reason why they can't use the advanced accelerated approach or the supported accelerated approach so that you're sharing the load and you're getting that chance for rest as well.
Yeah.
Good.
Okay.
Helen has a two-year and three-month-old toddler who has been on the same routine for the last year.
7 a.m. wake up, a nap from 12.45 to 2.45 and an 8 p.m. bedtime.
Okay.
They've always woken him up from his nap and in the morning.
As in the past, if they let him sleep any longer, he'd start fighting bedtime.
And he'd usually only sleep for an extra 20 minutes anyway.
However, recently he started daycare where he sometimes does not nap for long.
So they've let him sleep in.
They've found he's sleeping for much longer to 8.15 or 8.45 in the morning.
They are wondering if he is just playing catch up on lost sleep at daycare or whether he may need more sleep.
How should they go about testing this out?
Great question.
Probably not a case that he's actually getting more sleep overall, or if he is.
If you've tracked it over time, it would probably average out at about the same anyway.
What he's doing though, is he's transferring sleep from his daytime to his nighttime, and So have a think about whether that works for your family, because you know, at almost two and a half having a two-hour nap, not all toddlers need a full two hours.
So say, for example, if at daycare he only tends to nap for one hour, then give him a one-hour nap at home and add an hour to his night, because it sounds like it's.
You know, it's working well, he's getting some extra sleep.
So have a think about it. what daily rhythm will work best for your family and then stick to it.
And, of course, at any time, if you think okay, everything's going beautifully, we've got this daily rhythm, we're sticking to it strictly, and the nights are amazing.
But you're thinking gosh, maybe they do need a little bit more sleep.
Just test adding it back in.
So it might be that you go okay, we're going to add an extra 30 minutes of opportunity for sleep for a full week, at the same time each day.
Maybe it's a longer sleeping in the morning.
And over that week, you're tracking their sleep and you're just going to see, does it work?
Do they actually take that sleep or do they start to take 20, 30 minutes to fall asleep at night?
Or do they wake overnight more or do they wake earlier?
So they're not actually taking that opportunity.
They're just being more wakeful at other times.
So you can always, you know, test that out.
And I definitely encourage all parents to do that.
So, yeah, it sounds like Helen's got a little bit of tinkering to do with that daily rhythm.
And I think just try and match whatever happens at daycare, match it at home and adapt the bedtime and wake up time to suit it.
That's how I would approach it.
Yeah, great advice.
Melissa has a four-month-old baby boy as well as a toddler.
He has begun feeding five times a night.
I think it's supposed to say five times a night, up from two.
So Melissa is very tired.
Oh, you poor thing.
Her question is when doing any of the Sambal approaches, does she need to wake him after he's fed to sleep in the night for it to really work, even if the cot settling is going well in the day?
She keeps him upright after a feed for at least five minutes so he's well and truly sleeping.
There are also times she just can't cot settle due to her toddler.
So should she wait for a weekend to get really stuck in or just cot settle as often as possible while parenting two babies?
Okay.
So Melissa, he is entering that dangerous zone of being much more aware of what's going on around him.
And I suspect that's why the number of wakes overnight have increased.
And I'm not surprised you're tired because you really are in the trenches at the moment.
In answer to your question, yes.
If you were using the slower approaches.
So our tapered or fade approaches.
The first couple of steps are usually introducing new associations whilst you're feeding or whilst you're settling your baby in whichever way they prefer.
So when you're on the earlier steps, you don't need to wait them after a feed, since your one is feeding to sleep.
But once you move on to the subsequent steps, where you're unlatching them and just patting them to sleep in your arms then yes, you would need to finish the feed in order to work on whichever step you're up to.
And so sometimes what can happen as babies get older is that if you are, if they are falling asleep in that one way, feeding or being bounced on a football or whatever is happening, cuddled in your arms, and then they are put down in their cot, they just come up into light sleep later at the end of a cycle and go oh, something's changed since I went to sleep.
And now I'm fully awake, because this is a bit of a surprise and they need you to come back and resettle them again, which is why we do say that it is important to unlatch your little one and make sure that they are awake when they're going into their cot, particularly as you get further down those slower, more gradual approaches.
So yes, is the quick answer to do they need to be awake when they're going into the cot, when you're doing cot settling overnight.
It's going to be tricky whilst your little one is being held upright for five minutes.
I would double check the daily rhythm is correct because sleep changes a lot around this time to try and bring down some of those wakings that might be happening just because of low sleep pressure.
And, given that you are up to your eyeballs with a toddler and a baby, I would think about having a weekend where you've got extra support around you and consider using one of the quicker approaches so that you could start on the Friday night and by the Sunday night your little one will be having much more predictable sleep overnight, rather than going with a really, really gradual approach, which is going to be a little bit tricky when you're also parenting a toddler.
So I hope that's helpful, Melissa.
Just know it is hard when you do have a toddler and a baby.
But that doesn't mean it's not possible to get your sleep back on track and to get their sleep back on track.
There are all good reasons why things are a bit wobbly at the moment.
But this is your path out of that little quagmire that you're in for now.
It's a very classic four-month-old baby, isn't it?
They're only waking up twice per night and then they suddenly realize, hang on a minute yeah, their sleep matures and then they're like no actually, if you fed me to sleep, i'm going to expect that five, six times per night now.
Yeah yeah yeah, it's so much easier if we just make it crystal clear sometimes just a quick nappy change or something after the feed so they're aware they're going into their cot.
It makes a huge difference.
Even though it feels torturous to do um really quickly they're settling in their cot and sleeping really well and it's worth that bit of hard work.
Yeah, good luck, melissa.
So Kim has a 16-month-old son with an 11 and a half hour sleep need, whose sleep has become unsettled after teething this last month.
He previously slept through the night, but now he's waking twice most nights.
Sometimes he self-settles himself.
Other times he sits up and needs Kim to lay him down and goes back to sleep.
His usual routine is bedtime at 745, waking somewhere between 6 and 620 in the morning, and a midday nap for an hour to an hour 20.
Kim is wondering whether to cap his nap to one hour and move bedtime to 8pm, but is worried that a one hour day nap is too little for his age.
What do we think will help with those night wakings?
Hmm.
Yeah, some parents are often thinking about this, like do I trim a bit off the day's sleep to you know, and trying to sort of fiddle with the night a little bit?
But you know how's it going to work in terms of what's too little day's sleep.
I'm just curious if Kim has chosen to have, you know, the midday nap go for up to an hour 20, because that's two sleep cycles.
I mean, at that age, sleep cycles are around 40 minutes.
So if you suddenly start waking him up at an hour, you could definitely try it out.
Absolutely try out what you've suggested, Kim.
But if you're finding waking him at an hour he's really tired, really cranky, then he hasn't finished his sleep cycle.
And, you know, often that crankiness is just too hard to deal with.
So you might be better off keeping it to an hour, 20 minutes total.
And then just making sure the overnight really matches the actual sleep need that he has.
So just doing maths on the fly again, if it's an hour 20 nap, you've got about 10 hours sleep.
10 minutes.
Yes.
10 hours, 10 minutes overnight.
So yeah, it could be an 8 pm bedtime and a 6 10 am wake up.
Just as an example of how you might split that.
Or if you dial back the day sleep yeah, add that bit more to the night and whatever it is, you decide.
And I just want every parent listening to hear this bit.
If you make a change to the daily rhythm, it's not going to work on the first day or the second day, maybe not even the third day.
It can take a week to actually see the change.
So don't just do it for a day and go, well, that was hopeless.
It didn't work.
Do it for a full week and then reassess.
Did it actually help?
What changes came about because of it?
And then with the overnight wake-ups um, i would be, you know, waiting a few minutes when he wakes at night.
So you're definitely giving him that opportunity to try to resettle himself, because sometimes he can do it.
You say other times he needs to be laid down again and then he goes back to sleep.
He's 16 months old, so he should be able to lay himself back down again.
Often they just need a bit of practice.
So, even if he's sitting up or standing, try not to rush in and fix that problem for him by laying him down.
Just take your time, give him a few minutes so he gets that chance to feel a bit frustrated that he's not in his sleep position and he'll actually have a go at doing the work of getting back down to sleep again.
Sometimes they just need to practice a little bit.
I'd say you're nearly there, Kim.
Yeah.
Well done.
You're nearly there.
Yeah, very close.
Yeah.
All right.
Angela's toddler had been sleeping through the night since about four months, but for the past two months has been calling out overnight.
They've started using the spare bed modification and after two nights there's been no screaming overnight, which feels like progress.
Oh, it is.
That's great progress.
As someone who recently had a child screaming all night, that's definitely progress and I'm happy for you, Angela.
So Angela asks, how long should her husband continue doing this?
They don't want to create a new habit.
I guess, yeah, the new habit being that the dad is in there on the spare bed nearby.
And also, have they made things worse by always going in when he calls out and then leaving again?
So I guess Angela's wanting a bit of advice around.
You know, how do we make sure we don't form a new habit and how do we, you know, build a toddler's confidence so that they can just sleep right through the night again?
Yeah.
Yeah.
So Angela, I think it sounds like you and your husband have done a great job bringing down your toddler's anxiety in the night by sleeping in the room with him.
I would probably give it at least a full week, if not two, for your toddler to relax nervous system, to settle and to feel confident in what's happening overnight.
And then I'd consider using the parental feeding approach at bedtime, where your husband starts to leave the room just once as your toddler is falling asleep, and continue to sleep in the bedroom overnight until you get to the point where your toddler falls asleep whilst your husband is out of the room.
And then at that point, your husband can come back to sleeping in your bed, because when your toddler wakes up in the night they'll think oh, dad's not here, but he's just about to come back.
And it's unlikely to then wake up screaming.
I love the parental fading approach.
It's such a beautiful way of just gradually building their confidence.
You're letting your toddler see.
Oh, if dad or mom leaves briefly, they always come back like promised.
They're never gone too long and they're building their confidence.
They're realizing, I'm actually okay waiting here for a minute.
But it's such a gentle, gradual process and it is a lovely one.
So, yeah, if you're not in a hurry, I always, yeah, love parental fading.
It's a lovely way to go.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Good luck.
So Sarah has a five-month-old baby boy.
Gosh, I feel like we've had lots of baby boys on this episode, don't you?
We have.
The girls are all behaving themselves.
Yeah, they are.
So Sarah's little boy has been transitioning from breastfeeding to sleep to cot settling.
For naps.
She feeds him in the lounge, then carries him into his darkened room with white noise, and he usually falls asleep in the cot with tummy rubs and shushing within a few minutes.
Well done, Sarah.
She said it's been a great improvement and her partner can settle him this way too for naps.
However, nights aren't going as smoothly.
If he's recently fed, her partner tries tummy rubs and shushing, but he tends to escalate quickly.
Sarah is wondering how to tell when he genuinely needs a breastfeed overnight versus when they should try settling with tummy rubs and shushing, and whether it might help to feed him in a dimly lit lounge room, like they do for naps, and then carry him back to the cot in the night, or if that might wake him up too much.
It's an interesting one.
I wouldn't.
Yeah, I wouldn't feed in the lounge room.
I would aim to keep him in his room.
Sometimes when they take him out of their room, they're like, great, what are we going to do?
Are we studying the day?
So yeah, I would definitely keep him in his room.
And I totally get why you were thinking it might be helpful to leave.
In terms of how to know when does he genuinely need a feed?
When should they try with the tummy rubs and shushing instead?
At five months of age, most babies can get through the night with just one feed.
Some of them will go for two feeds.
So let that give you some strength because I don't recall how many times she's feeding overnight.
I don't think it's in there.
But if he's feeding five times per night, definitely there are some of those feeds he's not really needing.
But he's just got a preference.
He's thinking, why can't I have a feed now?
So what I would suggest in these cases is to just gradually stretch out that interval between feeds.
So, for example, if he's averaging three feeds per night, you might say okay, we're going to aim for two feeds overnight from now on.
And I'm going to do them at roughly 11 PM or later and maybe 3 AM or later.
So you've just got this timeframe in mind or you can pick whatever excuse me whatever times you want to.
But it then means it's really clear okay, if they wake at this time, there's not a feed on offer and we just persist with resettling in the cot.
And you can, or you can just pick an interval.
It could be okay we're only feeding if it's been three and a half hours or more since the last feed.
Excuse me.
And then you're just gradually stretching that out.
And that's just encouraging more calories to move to the daytime and it's gradually reducing the overnight calories.
So both of those options are fine.
At five months of age, yeah, one or two feeds overnight is fine.
Some of them will even just go and move all their calories to the daytime and they're quite fine.
So you've really just got to wait and see what your baby does.
But I think it just really helps when parents have a really clear timeframe for yes, we feed before this time or at this time or later.
And you know it just means.
When you wake up, you look at the clock, there's no second guessing, and you just resettle.
So I hope that helps, Sarah.
It just.
Yeah, hopefully that gives you a bit of clear guidance, because it's that second guessing in the middle of the night where you know no one makes great decisions in the middle of the night.
It can be really hard to make a call on these things.
And have a clear plan.
You and your partner have a clear plan for what to do when your little one is not settling, when they're not due a feed.
Because what we don't want is for your little one to learn that they have to cry for half an hour and then they'll get a feed.
We want them to learn that when they're due a feed overnight, they get fed straight away, but all other times dad, in this instance, does the settling um.
So think about taking breaks um, having circuit breakers and resets um during the settling that do not involve a feed um, just so that your partner knows what to do in the night, rather than anyone panicking and go ah, let's just pop them on the boob instead.
Yeah, i think that's great advice.
All right, lucky.
Last Brianna has a nine-month-old with a 12-hour, 20-minute sleep need.
After tightening the daily rhythm following advice from us, sleep has improved a lot.
Bedtime is 7 pm and she usually sleeps until 4 am or sometimes 530 am.
She often stays awake until 6am, which is their preferred wake-up time.
When they use a supported accelerated approach.
She may only go back to sleep for 10 minutes and then wakes again.
When they feed her at 6am, she falls back asleep.
She's wondering whether they should keep supporting her back to sleep until 6am or adjust their approach or daily rhythm, since she's able to fall asleep again after that feed.
Hmm.
Okay.
I think um adjusting the daily rhythm is in order Brianna, because it sounds like she really wants to start the day quite early.
Um, and she's waking up at four and then managing to stay awake until six.
It's almost like that 6am sleep is the first nap of the day.
Um, so I would be taking a close look at that daily rhythm.
Um, I'm just looking to see if there's any notes on how many naps she's on.
I'm imagining at nine months she's on two naps a day.
And I'll just be double checking how long those naps are for and making those really consistent.
And then working on a bedtime that is in line with her sleep needs.
So it might be that you know, if it's two naps for an hour each, that leaves her um 10 hours 20 minutes overnight, so then we might be looking at 7 40 bedtime for a 6 am wake up.
So moving bedtime a little bit later.
Rihanna, so it was my turn to do a bit of maths on the fly there.
Felon, um and uh, so moving bedtime a bit later is just going to help with getting um, to helping your little one get a little bit closer to 6 am, And then I'll be thinking about kind of what we were just discussing with Sarah's question about the feeds overnight.
At nine months of age, how is your little one going with feeds and solids during the day?
Do they need to have that feed overnight?
Is there any... issues with their weight gain?
Have you got advice that they need to continue feeding overnight?
If not, if their weight gain is fine, there's no issues with solid intake and there's no medical advice to feed her overnight, then I'd be holding out until that 6am.
Wake up before offering her the feed.
If Because otherwise she might just wait going, is it time yet?
Is it time yet?
What about now?
And that can be a motivating factor.
Yeah.
I read it as her only feeding at 6 a.m., but maybe I have.
Yeah.
Read that wrong.
I'd be thinking too, like this time of year, a lot of parents do start to say, oh, they kind of wake full at 4am, 5am, somewhere around there.
I'm not sure where Brianna lives.
She might be in a hotter climate, but definitely in Victoria it's getting really cold at that time of night.
Sometimes what we dress them in at bedtime, like last night's perfect example here it was about 23 degrees still at 8pm.
Like it was beautiful and warm.
But in the morning actually I didn't check, but it felt like it was maybe nine degrees or something.
So we get these balmy warm evenings.
We dress them for bed and then by morning it's like freezing cold.
Have a think about that.
Have a think about noise and things like that as well at that early time of day.
Is there anything that signals that it might be time to start the day?
And it might be a case of just maybe when they wake at 4 am, you do pop on an extra layer just to help them get back to sleep in the morning.
Yeah, just something to think about.
Sometimes those environmental factors really come into play at 4am.
Yeah, I think that's a really good reminder there Fallon, where going back to basics is really important.
And sometimes, like I did just then, we jump straight into thinking about do we need to change settling?
Do we need to change the daily rhythm?
But actually just thinking about the environment and whether it's the temperatures, noises outside is a really good place to start for those early risings.
Yeah, because I still marvel over how there are so many sleeping bags for babies and toddlers that don't have arms.
I know you can get them with arms, you know, built into them.
But I just think myself, if all I had on my arms was my pajama top and my arm was always outside of my doona, my arm would get really cold.
We'll wake up in the night and kind of go, oh, a bit cold, pull your arm back in under your doona.
Yes.
Yes.
So I often think about with these babies and toddlers, especially this time of year.
It's getting cold at 4 am.
They're probably waking up a lot of them with really cold arms thinking oh, this isn't very pleasant.
And I think that is what causes a lot of wakes is that for some reason we're dressing them quite warmly on their whole body except their arms.
So I know, with my own little ones I ended up only buying sleeping bags that had the full length arms, so their whole body could stay warm enough.
But, of course, we don't want to overheat babies.
So if the evenings are still really warm, you might need to dress them in the sleeping bag that doesn't have the arms.
But at 4 am it might be – I mean, some sleeping bags even come with little cardigan-type attachments that you can wrap over the top of them.
It could just be a change in layers or a change in sleeping bags, and then they're getting through to morning again.
So, yeah, definitely one to think about.
And if you happen to be a manufacturer –
I love baby sleep bags.
My absolute favorite brand does the fully padded long sleeves, which I love, but some of them still don't.
It's odd.
No.
Anyway, well, what a great episode.
Thank you so much to all the parents who sent in these fantastic questions and for your patience in waiting for us to reply to them as well.
It's so great hearing from SOMBAL members and hearing about what your journey is like through the program and the things that work really well and the things that trip you up.
It really helps us to shape what that program looks like, and we're constantly adding to it and editing it along the way.
If you are needing help with sleep and settling, go and check out Sunbell, if you're not already a member.
Particularly given the topic of today's episode Sunbell, is a great way of ensuring both you and your co-parent if you've got one are both on the same page because you're going to go and create something a sleep and settling action plan.
You can sit down together to do that.
Make those decisions together, so you are both absolutely engaged and on the same page right from the beginning.
It's going to mean a much quicker improvement to sleep when all caregivers are on the same page.
Laura, you're available in the clinic.
You do both the Malvern Clinic at the Victorian Children's Clinic and telehealth appointments as well.
We also have our practitioner team offering appointments.
Bring your co-parent.
Yes.
You know, when you come to an appointment, especially if you, you know, even if you are in Melbourne, you've got your co-parent working during the day and they can't make it see Laura via telehealth or one of our team via telehealth, because we so often have other parents, you know, calling in from work.
Sometimes they're, you know, doing the telehealth from heavy machinery.
Yeah. you know, in the outback, all sorts of places.
Sometimes they're a surgeon and they're just like taking their gown off, joining the call.
It's really interesting to get a bit of insight into what everyone's up to during the day.
But yeah, whether it's the clinic or SOMVAL, we really encourage both parents to get on board and often in an appointment we're working out who's going to do what and how are we going to share this?
So, yeah, if you need that support, we're absolutely here for it.
Please leave us a review, give us a five-star rating, hit that subscribe button.
It really helps us to get out there to all the other tired parents who need us.
And if you can, buy us a cuppa.
We would love it.
We'll pop the link in the bio.
But that's all from us this week.
Thanks, everybody.
Thanks, everyone.
Bye-bye.
If you need help with your baby or toddler's sleep or settling, you need Sombell.
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It contains all the best resources from the sleep clinics at Infant Sleep Australia so you can rest easy and soak in your child.
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