Are You Guaranteeing Your Child Gets Great Sleep With These Six Essentials?

There are six essential elements for creating great sleep in young children. If you aren't optimizing each of them, your child is probably not getting all the high-quality sleep she needs. Inadequate hours of sleep, or sleep at the wrong time or in the wrong place or with too many wakings all lead to an overtired child.

Overtired children have trouble falling asleep and staying asleep. Their naps are too short and they wake up too early in the morning. It's a vicious cycle. 

Overtired children also tend to be wound up and hyperactive. They usually are not sleepy. This is because their bodies produce a stress hormone, cortisol, when they don't get enough high-quality sleep. This stress hormone helps them stay awake but makes it hard for them to focus effectively on their play -- their work --  or to fall asleep when naptime rolls around. 

If you optimize these six elements, you can guarantee better sleep for your child. They are as follows:

1. Consistent soothing routine -- doing the same thing at every naptime and bedtime cues his body that it's time to sleep, and makes separation from you easier. It's normal for children to protest separation from their beloved parents, but it gets easier when children know what to expect. Start a bedtime routine at about four months old. It may include a story, a song, putting him in the crib awake, closing the shades and turning on the white noise, then saying, "Sleep well! I love you!" Doing the same thing every single time is reassuring to young children. It teaches them that you go away at predictable intervals but you always come back. This makes them feel safe enough to drift off peacefully. 
   
   
2. Determine his sleep needs and plan accordingly. Some children need more sleep than others. For example, a four-month old I recently worked with could only stay awake for an hour between naps. Most children his age can last at least 90 minutes, but if we tried to stretch Lucas' awake interval that long, he was miserable and took a short nap afterwards. Whatever a "typical" four-month-old needs was irrelevant for him. When Lucas went back to his crib after only one hour awake, he slept ninety minutes and woke up gloriously happy. 
   
   
3. Eliminate sleep debt and prevent overtiredness -- both actually make it harder for a child to sleep, which is totally counterintuitive. Many well-meaning friends and family members will encourage you to keep your child up late to "guarantee" a great night's sleep, but this will backfire in many cases. An extra-early bedtime will help your child catch up on lost sleep and prevent night wakings. Sleeping late in the mornings in actually counter-productive because it interferes with naps and bedtime; for this reason, I don't recommend it. 
   
   
4. Ideal sleep environment -- creating the ideal sleep environment makes it easier for a child to fall asleep and stay asleep. For the best sleep possible, your child should sleep motionless in the dark with white noise. Of course you can't guarantee this ideal sleep setting 100% of the time, but limiting exceptions to this "rule" will help keep your child on track, sleep-wise. 
   
   
5. Self-soothing ability -- children need to be able to put themselves to sleep independently in order to put themselves back to sleep when they wake up between sleep cycles, as we all do (adults typically don't remember these brief awakenings). By putting your child into bed awake every time, she learns how to self-soothe herself to sleep and she can repeat this behavior when she wakes up between sleep cycles. Doing so independently, without needing your help, makes her sleep much more restful. For both of you!
   
   
6. Ideal sleep timing -- appropriate timing of naps and bedtime makes it easier for children to fall asleep, stay asleep until the target wake time, and have more restful sleep. Most children under six need about twelve hours of sleep at night. If your target wake time is 7 am, your child's bedtime should therefore be at about 7 pm. The most restful sleep is before midnight so a 9 pm bedtime with a 9 am wake time is not nearly as restful as a 7-7 schedule. 
   
   Likewise, naps are most restful (after 4+ months) if they are at the appropriate clock times. For most children after 4 months, the earlt afternoon nap should start between 12 and 1 pm. A too-early nap means your child is overtired before bedtime and a too-late naptime means your child isn't sleepy enough at bedtime. 
   
   These times aren't always ideal for parents' schedules but when your child sleeps at biologically ideal times, he sleeps longer and wakes up well-rested, which means he will be more calm and happy than otherwise. This will lead to more time to get your work done, more restful sleep for you, and more opportunities to enjoy each other. 
   
   

It isn't always easy to institute all the changes necessary to incorporate all of these elements into your child's life, but I guarantee doing so will improve your sleep, and your lives, immeasurably. 

I know reading the suggestions here, or in a book, isn't the same as actually putting them into practice. Doing so can be intimidating, especially when your family is already exhausted. Let me help. Schedule a free call and change your family's life forever.