Ways to get your baby to sleep through the night

THE SCARY TALE Regina's eight-month-old baby boy, Jamie, just would not go to sleep in his cot. His parents resorted to various measures, including rocking him in their arms.  Still, he would wake up at least five times a night. Regina and her hubby would end up with Jamie in bed with them, so they could get some sleep themselves. Even then, the couple would have a fitful sleep to avoid crushing Jamie. As a result, they often start their day bleary-eyed and exhausted.  "My husband couldn't concentrate at work," says Regina, a full-time homemaker. "And he'd be all irritable and sullen when he comes home. That would make me mad because I'm not the only one having a bad day. We would snap at each other over the tiniest detail."  The vicious cycle continued and so did their sleep problems. The couple’s relationship became increasingly strained.  Note: The names have been changed to protect the identity of the poor frazzled parents.

UNDERSTANDING INFANT SLEEP
Sleep is a necessity and a vital function for all living things. Adults need adequate sleep to help their body recuperate from stress and fatigue. Sleep energises one for daily challenges. The amount of sleep a child gets is directly related to intelligence and impacts growth, alertness and learning power, says Dr James B Maas, a psychologist from Cornell University who wrote the bestseller Power Sleep. 

Newborns need about 16½ hours a day. Unlike adults, this sleep is broken into parts, with the longest stretch at night lasting five hours in the first four weeks. 

During the first month, infants can’t discriminate between day and night. Parents are usually advised to just go with the baby’s flow for the first four to six weeks. 

"The hormone melatonin is more likely to influence a baby's sleeping pattern," says paediatrician Dr Marc Weissbluth, author of Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. "It is produced by the baby's brain at about three to four months old. It surges at night and is capable of inducing drowsiness and relaxing the smooth muscles encircling the gut." 

So around that time, day-night confusion and apparent abdominal cramps begin to disappear. 

"You can't stop babies from waking up frequently during the night," says Jenny Hewitt, midwife, childbirth educator and centre manager of Birth & Beyond. 

"What we look at is to minimise any disruption this has and to maximise sleep. 

"But many babies, either due to personality or some judicial use of sleep training methods, will wake up and put themselves back to sleep," she adds.
Experts say there are various sleep-training methods, including a baby-led approach (nature), or a parent-led approach (nurture). 

LEAD ME ON, BABY
A baby-led approach is when parents focus on the needs of the baby. As in the case of breastfeeding mums, who often find their babies waking up in the middle of the night, sometimes for food, other times for comfort. If parents are happy with this and continue breastfeeding at night, the baby may continue waking intermittently, for up two years.  

Likewise with co-sleeping, where mums and babes sleep in the same room or in the same bed. It leads to frequent waking through the night. There is a fast response to the essential needs of the baby who is dependent totally on the caregiver for love, nurture, food and warmth. However, it could also lead to separation anxiety in later years. 

WHEN PARENTS TAKE OVER
A parent-led approach focuses on what parents want. Some parents believe that babies should cry it out and be left alone to toughen them up.
On the contrary, studies have shown such babies to be highly stressed and they may experience a sense of abandonment when nobody responds to their signal. This is considered a negative way of dealing with little babies and could lead to stress disorders in adulthood. 

"The first three months of a baby's life should really be seen as the fourth trimester of pregnancy. We should try to recreate what they had inside the womb to keep them calm and help them reach a point where they can mature without us changing the process too much," explains Hewitt. 

The ideal approach is to strike a balance. For the first six weeks, be led by the baby. From nine weeks on, put good sleep training habits into place.  However some babies still might not stick to schedules and this could be due to other disruptions: Growth spurts. These occur quite frequently, at six weeks, 10 days, three weeks, six weeks and 12 weeks. Babies need more food so they wake up more often. Travelling. Babies suffer from jet lag too and will need two weeks to recover. Visitors in the house. Mum's routine is changed which could affect feeding times. Developmental patterns. When mum goes back to work and baby is used to being breastfed, older ones may not adapt to bottle feeds. So babies want to feed more at night when mum is at home. Fussy patch. Usually in the evening or early morning when all they want is to be consoled or to suckle. When these fussy patches get more severe and regular and baby keeps crying despite the parents going through their check list, it could be a case of colic.

Most first-time parents may not exactly know what their parenting style or personality is, a good idea is to read a few different baby care books for different viewpoints and see which works for you. Remember all babies are different; they have unique temperaments and respond differently. Keep an open mind and a normal expectation. That's half the battle won. 
 
If you have any comments or practical suggestions, write to us at editor@family.sg

- Mother & Baby
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