5 tips for better sleep during your baby's 4th month.

So your baby is finally past the third month mark, and yet night sleep is still a major challenge. Whether you are planning to sleep train your baby or not, you need to start getting a little more rest at night or risk you and your baby's safety. Being drowsy and irritable are bad enough, but prolonged periods of sleep deprivation can lead to lowered adrenalin levels, heart-stress, high blood pressure and major impairment of your short-term memory. If you could get your baby to go 5 hours between feeds at night it would be enough to give you some much needed rest. Here are some tips that should help you encourage your baby to adjust to longer periods of night sleep over the next month or so. Also, my tips for better night sleep for 2 and 3 month old babies are mostly still applicable after 3 months.

1. Place your hand on your baby's tummy.
When you hear your baby begin to fuss at night, place your hand on her stomach covering her belly button just below her ribcage. Let your hand get heavy, this will increase the amount of pressure on your delicate little Thumbelina's tummy just enough to relieve the cramping that a gassy or empty belly can cause. If the discomfort is relieved enough, your baby may not wake at all, but slip back into a relaxed and peaceful sleep. When you are sure she is sleeping soundly again, carefully remove your hand.

2. Wear fresh breast pads/don't bring the bottle.
If you share a bed with your baby, or if he sleeps in a separate nursery, whenever you are near him at night wear fresh nursing pads. The smell of milk is often a trigger for babies to wake up and demand to eat. You may have noticed that when you tiptoe in to check on your little snoozer, even though you are as quiet as a mouse, his eyes fly open at your approach. This is because if you are a nursing mother, your pretty much reek of breast milk to your baby's sensitive nose, and even if you are not breastfeeding, you may smell like the formula that you mixed for his next feeding. Try to leave bottles out side the room where your baby sleeps until they are needed, and wear a sleeping bra with fresh pads whenever you are near your baby at night.

3. Wear someone else's T-shirt.
Another great way to prevent the wake-up-I-smell-dinner impulse from disrupting your baby's sleep is to throw on one of your spouses t-shirts for the night. Wearing clothing that is saturated with the body-scent of a non-lactating adult will mask your own appetizing odor. Your baby will be much less likely to wake up when the person who is checking on her, or sleeping next to her doesn't smell like food.

4. Soothe for 15 minutes.
Our bodies have a hunger signal that lasts anywhere from 5 to about 15 minutes at a time. When your baby wakes for a feeding that you are trying to phase out, or delay, try soothing him with a pacifier, dancing, bouncing, light tummy pressure or anything that you can think of for at least 15 minutes. Often your baby will fall back asleep after about 10 minutes and sleep for another 30-45 minutes before waking again with hunger pains. If your baby wakes again after less than 10 minutes, or is not soothed after the 15 minutes, go ahead with the feed. This may seem like a recipe for more night disruptions instead of one to help you get more sleep, but after a few days of pushing your baby's feeding back, she will begin to adjust to the new schedule and sleep right through to the next feeding. If your baby is consistently sleeping for about 5 hours between feeds at night, you might also very slowly begin reducing the amount you offer him at he middle-of-the-night feeding. Within a week of successfully implementing this new schedule, your baby should increase the amount of food he eats during the day. For breastfeeding mothers this means that even if you were pumping at night to keep your production up, once your baby's daytime demand has increased, you can phase out your night pumping without an increased risk of losing your milk supply.

5. Keep the light as low as possible.
Any extra distractions or stimulation you can eliminate from your baby's environment at night will help to sustain long periods of night sleep. Do not flip on the light when you come in to check on your sweet little cloud-rider, and if you share a room with her at night, try to find your way to the restroom by the light of a night-light rather than turning on a lamp. By this age, your baby will have a clear understanding that daytime is when all of the fun happens, and any increase of illumination will trigger their internal clock to fast forward to morning time. Using a flashlight is a good idea, as long as it is not too bright, and you should not shine it directly on your sleeping baby.

Hopefully these tips will help, and before you know it your baby will be only waking up one time at night, for a very small amount of food. This last feeding will be very easy to eliminate, no matter what sleep training system you plan on using. Even if you do not plan to sleep train your baby, he may drop this last feeding on his own as he grows over the next month. The most important thing after your baby no longer physically needs the on-demand feedings is to get yourself back on a good resting schedule. A well rested parent is one of the best things anyone can give their baby. Happy parenting!

5 tips for better sleep during baby's 3rd month.

The first two months of a baby's unpredictable sleep routine can really take a toll on a new parent. The wakeful nights, the crying and gas, it is a constant struggle for parents to get enough sleep of their own at night. Though the magical "end of the third month" when sleep is supposed to even out, is just around the corner, there are a few things you can do in the meantime to help prepare your baby to slip naturally into a long and healthy sleep routine.

If you have followed my baby tips for better night sleep during the first two months, hopefully your baby is only getting up to eat 2 or 3 times during the night. The tips from the second month still apply to babies who are in their third month, as a matter of fact, if you have successfully extended the times between your babies feedings by 15 minutes, for the third month I would suggest that you attempt to extend the time further to 25 or 30 minutes. Your goal in doing this should be to have at least 4 hours between the start of each feed. Here are 5 more things you can do to encourage longer periods of night sleep during your baby's third month.

1. Integrate aromatic associations into bedtime routine.
I know I have mentioned in other posts how smell is our most powerful sense tied to memory, and one of the most fully developed senses that our babies have, but this is a different use for that association. As you begin establishing a bedtime routine, if you integrate a special soothing scent into it, your baby will begin to associate that scent with bedtime. As your baby grows, and sleep disruptions occur, when you need to re-establish the bedtime routine, using the scent will help remind your baby that night is a time for sleep. I used a lightly scented lotion to massage my son as a part of his bedtime routine for his first 8 months after coming home from the hospital, so he has that scent associated with relaxation, mommy and sleeping. When he is sick I will rub a little of the scented lotion on the collar of his pajamas, and it soothes him even now at 2 years old.

2. Try different swaddles.
At different stages of development your baby will resist different types of swaddling. For a few weeks you may need to leave one of your baby's arms free, or use a swaddling technique that folds your love-burrito's arms across his chest instead of straight down to his sides. Nearly all babies will insist on having their feet free after the second month, which is fine. You can return to a full swaddle any time if your baby's sleep begins to suffer.

3. Establish a bedtime routine.
Now is the time to start creating the a routine that will signal to your little snuggle-bug that it is time to bid farewell to the conscious world for awhile. The exact elements of your routine don't particularly matter, as long as they are calming and consistent. Since you will need to perform the exact same routine every night from now on you will probably want to choose elements that are easy and flexible, like reading a story, "brushing teeth", baby massage, singing a song and rocking together. If you want to include a bath in your bedtime routine, try to have it earlier. Baths can be more stimulating than relaxing for babies, and are hard to remain consistent with especially while traveling. Feeding will most likely be a part of the bedtime routine, but I do encourage parents to try NOT to have it be the very last part. It is a good idea to wipe out your babies mouth after eating especially before night sleep to reduce the risk of thrush, and eventually that mouth-wiping out part of the bedtime routine can be replaced with teeth-brushing. Whatever routine you develop be sure that everyone who puts the babies to bed for night sleep maintains a very similar version, since consistency is the real key here. You do not need to use this same routine for naps because of the amount of time involved, but if you find that it works for you, then there is nothing wrong with it either.

4. Reduce your baby's night feeding amount.
Your baby still needs a large amount of food spread over full 24 hour periods. However, in order to begin reducing subliminal expected feedings, try to offer your baby about half an ounce less than you would normally offer at night feedings(for breastfeeding mothers this would translate into reducing the time spent breastfeeding by about 3 or 4 minutes, though you should probably pump afterward to completely empty your breast, in order to preserve your milk production). This will most likely be difficult at first, and if your baby insists that she is still hungry after about 15 minutes of after-meal soothing, bouncing and burping, go ahead and give her a little top-off. In time your wee wiggly giggler will be satisfied with less at night and will instead bulk up by eating more during the days.

5. Soothe your baby while laying down.

Wherever your baby sleeps at night, when he begins to fuss, try to sooth him back to sleep while he is still in bed. If it is obvious that he needs to be picked up, try to pick him up when he is not crying. Of course, this is not always possible, so if your baby is beginning to get really worked up, pick him up immediately. If you can soothe your fluffy little nightingale back to sleep at night, or at least into a calm state before being picked up, it will help to create the expectation in your baby that comfort can be found without being swept up into your arms every few hours or so. This change in expectation lends itself very well to the development of natural self-soothing habits. Quiet long-sleep periods at night are reliant on your baby's ability to develop healthy self-soothing techniques.

Though it may seem like the third month will never end, if you have some things to focus on in the meantime it will help time to pass while laying a useful frame work for any kind of sleep training that you might want to do in the future. Whether you think that a no-cry solution will work best for your family, or if you are leaning toward a quick-but-painful cry-it-out method, the process will be easier and faster overall if your baby has some of the skills she will need to adapt. I do not recommend that parents plan on implementing any sleep-training on the eve of their baby's third month "birthday", it is rare that any baby will develop so exactly as to actually change over night from an infant who needs on-demand-feedings to a baby that is ready to adjust to a whole new sleep schedule. If you watch your baby's schedule closely you will see a subtle shift over the fourth month, and at some point it will be apparent that your baby does not need to wake for food, but is waking more out of habit. This is when you will want to be ready with your sleep training plan already decided upon. What ever your parenting philosophy is, it will be easier once you start being able to get a decent amount of sleep at night again. Chin up, keep your eye on the ball, and keep telling yourself: "It DOES get easier" (for another tip that might help when laying your baby down to sleep check here). Happy parenting!

5 tips for better sleep during baby's 2nd month.

So your baby is in the second month of development now, starting to do things like focus on your face while eating, smiling and sometimes laughing in their sleep. This is a very cute stage, and it's even cuter when they sleep well at night. Babies at this age still need to eat at night, but they should be sleeping longer and eating a bit less over all. This is a great time to begin to lay some very basic groundwork for future sleep training. Whether the sleep-solution you go with has crying, or no crying, the adjustment will be smoother if your baby is already sleeping well with some basic positive associations in place.

1. Warm your baby's crib mattress before you lay baby down.
Whether you use a heating pad or a sack of lentils heated in the oven, warming up your baby's bed mattress will help when transferring him into bed, or even relaxing him when placed there awake. For an adult the feel of crisp cool sheets might feel like the most relaxing and comfortable place in the world, but for your baby, your arms are the most safe and relaxing place and they are warm. So it makes perfect sense that your baby would associate a warm surface with safety. Do not leave the heating pad in you baby's crib for too long (over an hour) or heat it too hot (it should feel about as warm as your baby's forehead) and if you are using an electric heating pad check the cord regularly for any hot-spots or fraying. I really recommend using the lentils since they are not a fire-hazard, if you don't have a good bag, you could use a pillow-case or a large sock.


2. Place a recently worn T-shirt in the crib with your baby.
Your baby's eyes might not work so well, and their hearing largely lacks focus and reference points at the age of two months, but their sense of smell is already working quite well. A mother has certain pheromones in her scent that a baby responds to very powerfully. Preemie babies who are given a "scent doll" that their mother has slept with while she was pregnant are calmer, eat more, and sleep better than preemies who aren't. I've observed that this holds true for older babies as well. When a baby can smell her mommies natural body scent, she will be more relaxed and sleep longer. I think it is best to only use the T-shirt at night, because it will encourage a sense of safety and security that will hopefully become associated with their sleeping area and with night time in general.

3. Extend time between feedings by 15 minutes.
Eventually your baby will need to give up the feedings in the middle of the night, and with a little prep work that should be a lot easier. As soon as you hear your baby begin fussing respond, but instead of offering them the feeding right away, try to soothe them without it first. Use a pacifier (or dummy), bounce, sway, sing, hum and jiggle. Try to put off your baby's feeding as long as you can, to a minimum of 15 minutes and a maximum of 30. If your baby falls back to sleep without eating, then the next time they wake up, go ahead and feed them right then. Your baby still needs about 2-3 feeds a night at this point, so the delay in the feeds only serves to prepare your baby for sleep training by widening the gap between when they expect to be fed. If your baby is not responding well to your attempts to soothe them without food, discontinue the delays for a while, some babies are not ready to try this until the third month.

4. Pull the night cap down over your baby's eyes.
This trick won't work for long, just a month or so. Your baby's eyes are just starting to develop enough that they can see more distinct shapes, and they are fascinated with high-contrast images like black and white mobiles and posters. They are often so intent on looking around it is hard to relax and let their eyes close. However if you just pull down the front of their hat to cover their eyes they are still too young to realize why they can't see and begin resisting. It is a great way to help your baby relax and drift off to sleep, but like I said it won't be long before your baby catches on to what you are doing and starts to turn their head back and forth to wiggle out of the hat.

5. Use a metronome in the nursery at night.
The rhythmic might be reminiscent of your heart beat, though I think the reason this works is because it gives your baby's conscious mind something to focus on and that makes relaxing easier. Years ago mothers used to tuck a pocket watch under their baby's pillow to help sooth them to sleep. It was this old tradition that led me to try the metronome with one of the baby's i was taking care of a few years ago. He had a particularly hard time going to sleep during the day while I was tending him and his mother was at work, but one day I tried the metronome, and he calmed right down and was asleep in his crib before I knew it. I've been a believer ever since. In homes where there is no metronome, I'll some times tap a pencil on the night stand in a steady rhythm, and it seems to help most of the time too.

The second month is usually a bit easier for parents than the first month, whether that is because your baby is finding a more predictable routine, or because the you are getting used to the sleepless nights it's nice to feel it getting easier. Hopefully these tips can help for those times when your baby has forgotten that the second month is supposed to be easier, and help prepare you all for the next few months (One more great sleep tip can be found here: http://www.everythingmom.com). If you find these tips helpful, please refer them to any new or expecting parents. Happy parenting!