Training Your Baby To Sleep

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Training your baby to sleep.

Sleep training is based on teaching your baby to fall asleep on her own a lesson she won t get if you rock her to sleep in your arms before transferring her to the crib. Babies make lots of noises at night including crying and then fall back asleep on their own. This will tell your baby that it s time to sleep not play. If your baby is a night owl or an early bird you might want to adjust routines and schedules based on these natural patterns.

Whatever you choose consistency is key. Here what you need to know before choosing the best sleep training method for your family. Before this point your goal should be to teach them good sleep habits. Keeping a log can help you notice patterns in your baby s sleep schedule.

Respect your baby s preferences. Between four and six months your baby may be ready for sleep training. She knows what it means to be sleep deprived but scared to change anything out of fear that her baby would be abandoned through sleep training. But once baby is a few months old after she s dropped those middle of the night feedings and has established a somewhat predictable sleep wake cycle sleep training her can help your whole family get some much needed nighttime shut eye.

As your baby gets older their sleep cycle will start to change which is the main reason behind the 4 month sleep regression often sending parents searching for sleep training solutions. She wants you to know that you will never be alone on this journey with your. Sleep training is a loaded phrase and one that is often used synonymously with letting your baby self soothe or cry it out but that s not the whole picture says alanna mcginn a certified sleep consultant and the founder of good night sleep site. Yes she s a neonatal nurse and baby sleep expert but she s also a mom of 4.

When your baby needs care or feeding during the night use dim lights a soft voice and calm movements. Delay your response time. However most 3 and 4 month olds aren t developmentally ready to self soothe so sleep training may be difficult. Don t rush into baby s room at the first whimper.

Follow your heart rather than some stranger s sleep training advice and you and your baby will eventually work out the right nighttime parenting style for your family jodi mindell psychologist and author of sleeping through the night the more practice your baby gets putting himself to sleep the quicker the process works. 7 tricks to get baby to sleep through the night 4 5 5 5 months. While all babies are different most babies at this age are capable of sleeping through the night for about eight to 12 hours.