As a new mom, one of the things I really struggled with for a while (and I know I’m not alone here) was figuring out how to help Max get the sleep he needed. His overnight sleep seemed to fall into place nicely. The hours between feeds stretched out until eventually he was only waking up once or twice. Finally he could be settled without a bottle. Since about 3 months old he has slept 11-12 hours a night. His naps, however, have been more challenging.
When Max was born, I had no idea what to expect in terms of sleep. I was told that he would follow a routine of eating, sleeping, eating, sleeping, etc. And that gradually, as he would get older, he would have more time in there for play and “tummy time.” Eat. Play. Sleep. Repeat. And so it goes.
Wake Windows
I looked to bloggers and Instagram moms for advice. Many talk about “awake windows” -- this is the appropriate amount of awake time between naps for your child and it varies by age. When they’re newborn, it’s something like 45 minutes to an hour. They are so tiny, they need as much sleep as possible! I remember, early on, it would be a race against the clock to get Max changed, fed, burped, and ready to be settled for a nap again. His feeding took so long because we were combination feeding and he had trouble burping, it required a lot of breaks and patience.
Sometimes there would be as little as 10 minutes left before he was due to take a nap. A lot of sleep advice websites warn you about letting your baby get overtired. The hormone cortisol surges through their system and they get anxious and stressed. Then they either can’t fall asleep or won’t stay asleep. And it ruins the whole rest of their life, it's the worst thing you could ever let them do, and by the way, you’re a terrible mother.
Obviously, I had read all about awake windows. Steve had not. So he was often trying to push for more time with Max. “Ok, but you’re dealing with it when he won’t go to sleep, or he wakes up too soon!” I would say, frustrated.
Figuring out napping is a tricky game. The websites tell you to find the perfect sweet spot for when they are drowsy enough to fall asleep on their own in bed, instead of in your arms. Otherwise, they associate sleep with your comforting arms and will never sleep in their own bed. You’ll be cradling them forever.
I found myself anxiously observing his every yawn, eye rub, and arm movements. Apparent signs of a tired baby. “Oh, he yawned, it’s nap time” I would say, taking Max back from his grandparents and up to bed. Sometimes feeling guilty that they only had a short snuggle, but worried that if I didn’t get him to bed he would get overtired.
There’s awake windows, the fear of an overtired baby, them waking due to pain from trapped wind, sleep associations, figuring out if you should let them cry it out or not. So much to think about! Never really knowing exactly what’s stopping your baby from sleeping as desired. Oh and by the way, when did you last eat/rest/shower?
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| Watching baby sleep. |
Tracking and App’ing!
When we got to America, Max was about 2.5 months old. I started using an app to track his feeding, diaper changes, and sleep. I would stare intensely at the monitor after putting him down to record the exact moment he fell asleep. A timer would start, and when I first heard his cries I would stop the timer in the app. A blue bar would show up on the calendar, registering a nap. Pink for breastfeeding. Orange for a formula bottle feed. Brown for poops. I tracked it all.
Can I be honest right now? I used two apps. I tracked everything on two apps. Huckleberry and Baby Tracker. Huckleberry predicted nap times. Baby Tracker did not. Why did I do this? I don’t know. Was I a little intense? Maybe. Who really knows?
After a few days the Huckleberry app would start to predict his awake windows so that I could know when Max needed to fall asleep. It was a great complement to looking out for his tired cues.
It worked really well for a couple of days. He would go down around the time they suggested and then he would sleep for a decent amount of time. But then, I don't know what happened, all of a sudden this magical app that was meant to tell me exactly when to put my baby down for a nap stopped finding the sweet spot. But if you really want to know, pay for this expensive exclusive one-on-one session with the app developers!
Max would fall asleep, but he would be awake again after 30-40 minutes, which any mom can tell you is not really what you want! If you’re meant to follow the eat, play, sleep rhythm you can’t really feed them every 2 hours (especially at 3 months, and when he drank a full meal). So then I am questioning, does he stay up and play, then eat and sleep? But that's the wrong order! It's meant to be Eat, Play, Sleep. And if he sleeps too soon after eating he might have a tummy ache or gas problems keeping him awake. Oh great, another bad nap!
This wasn’t ideal. It wasn’t predictable. Especially when you consider that I was meant to “nap when the baby naps”. I remember so many times, rushing to shower, eating something and lying down, only for Max to start crying 5-10 minutes after I got horizontal. Gee, thanks baby!
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| The light blue are his naps. |
Now that he’s sleeping through the night, I am less likely to nap when he does. But it is my time to do what I need to do (still showering and eating). I asked some of the parents from my pregnancy group about their experiences with naps.
One mom said, “Naps are these amazing moments where everything is quiet and you can catch your breath, until you realize you have a million things to do and you can only do one”.
In the same vein, another mom said, “I call naps the mom Olympics. How many things can I get done?”
It’s tricky because babies are not robots, they're not uniform things. I started to realize this more and more. I also kept reminding myself, we’re both new to this. I’m new at caring for a tiny human. And Max is totally new to this world and everything in it. My role here is not “to get him to sleep,” but actually to help him learn how to sleep. Max not only needs to learn the skill of falling asleep, but staying asleep. Learning things takes time and success is not a straight line.
12 Hours by 12 Weeks
Steve and I read a book called 12 Hours Sleep by 12 Weeks Old, by Suzy Giordano. It’s a strategy to get babies to sleep 12 hours through the night. It was a daunting idea, given that Max was so tiny and had issues with eating. We didn’t follow the book exactly step by step. I think it advises to start working toward a 4-feedings per day schedule when they’re around 6 weeks and over 9lb. It took Max a little longer to get to that weight.
Gradually Max reduced his night feeds on his own, especially with the formula. Then I followed the advice of the book and started to offer less formula at night feeds, only breastfeeding. Eventually, I was able to put him back to sleep with just a snuggle. He was sleeping 10-11 hours at night by the time he was 3 months old.
We didn’t get Max onto the napping schedule the book promotes right away, but we did take a lot of lessons and tips from the book around putting the baby down for sleep. I think that helped us build a healthy consciousness around “sleep associations”. I personally don’t think it’s “bad” if a parent lets a baby fall asleep on them, or rocks their baby to sleep. They’re not “bad” behaviors and I’m sure not all babies will struggle to fall asleep once those comforts are removed.
Most sleep advice really tries to move you away from that, towards just swaddling your baby, offering a pacifier if you use one, and placing them in the bed alone (no toys, no blankets). The 12 by 12 book encouraged this, and a sort of cry-it-out approach.
We started letting Max cry for a few minutes when he was really young, like 3 or 4 weeks old. Steve had to lead this charge. At that time Max’s crying would cause me a strange physical pain through my whole body. It was unbearable. Every part of me wanted to sooth him.
“He’s too young for this!” I would plead with Steve, anxious that Max would just get stressed out from the crying. “I got this Mimi, he’s fine,” he would respond, with as much patience as he could muster. Steve was almost always right, after a few minutes Max would calm himself and drift off.
We created a nap routine that involved swaddling him, turning off lights, and singing a few lullabies. Then Max would be put down and I would leave the room. He would cry, and eventually fall asleep. By the time he was 2.5 months we were waiting 5 minutes before going back in.
I could sometimes soothe him with a gentle pat on his tummy (when he was still sleeping on his back), or with a lullaby. But often I had to pick him up to really soothe him. This is a sleep association the experts advise against. I couldn’t help myself! On a good day, he would fall back asleep and nap for an hour longer. On a bad day, I had to hold him in my arms so he could get some sleep.
The songs that soothe baby Max…
Halo - Beyonce
Somewhere - West Side Story
All is Found - Frozen II, Evan Rachel Wood
Scheduled Sleep
Once we were back in Oakland, I had lost my patience for the guess work around awake windows and the perfect nap time. So Steve suggested we try out the full schedule the 12 by 12 book promotes.
It advised a 1-hour nap in the morning from 9am to 10am, and a 2-hour nap in the afternoon from 1pm to 3pm. It basically ignored everything we had read about awake windows.
The first week of using this schedule was a challenge because it meant significantly stretching Max’s awake windows. He was about 3 and a half months old. He didn’t make it to his naps for the first few days, he would fall asleep in our arms.
We couldn’t make it on the two naps. So we did a mixture of this schedule and awake windows. We would keep him up for 2 or 2.5 hours. He also needed a third nap in the day, or else he wouldn’t make it to bedtime.
It wasn’t until about 6 or 7 months old that Max finally got into the groove of two naps a day. These days he is usually a really good sleeper. It’s rare he wakes up from a nap and can’t sleep. Usually around a growth period, or teething. And those days I find myself much more exhausted!
Some parents have active schedules and expect their babies to nap in strollers and car seats as they run errands. Because of the pandemic, I haven't wanted to take Max places. So I wait until the weekend when Steve can watch Max. This means he takes nearly all of his naps in his bed. It has made it tricky to get him to fall asleep on the go! Around my birthday in August, we were in Carlsbad at the beach with a friend. Max managed to take a few naps on the blanket under an umbrella, but on my actual birthday he was too cranky and had to sleep in my arms. I didn't mind it. Except for the dead arm, I was enjoying the close snuggle.
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| beach snooze |
The schedule works great for Steve and me. We know exactly when Max naps and can build our days around that. We know when to invite friends for a backyard hang! In another post, I want to write about our use of a Montessori floor bed. This had a big impact on the nap routine as well because if he wanted to, he could just crawl out of bed. We're not using that anymore, instead Max sleeps in a pack 'n play.
I’m grateful Max’s overnight sleep smoothed out relatively quickly. It took about 5-6 months before his napping routine was perfected. Actually, I'm not sure perfect is the right word yet! If we have a second kid, I really hope we can figure it out sooner.
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