How To Get Baby To Sleep Through The Night?
This is probably the number 1 question that most sleep deprived parents would be asking or most new parents would be asking after coping with only 4-5 hours sleep everyday for the first few months of baby’s life.
At what age will my baby be able to sleep through the night?
First of all, if your baby is still a newborn, the answer is your baby is still too young to sleep through the night. Newborns are expected to wake up during the night for feeds because their tummies are simply too small to go without feeds for a long stretch. Once your baby is at least 4 months old, then yes your baby can slowly show signs they can sleep for longer stretches at night maybe even 6-7 hours without feed. Music to your ears I am sure. Especially if you have been so sleep deprived.
Once your baby has started solids usually after 6 months old or so and getting full feeds during the day, then your baby should be able to sleep through the night without waking up for feeds.
Generally experts agreed that once your baby is over 3 months of age and weighing over 6kg, then he or she can be expected to sleep through the night. But this is generally a sweeping statement because every baby is different.
So how do you get your baby to sleep through the night?
Babies don’t sleep through the night just like we adults don’t sleep through the night. We actually go through sleep cycles between light sleep and deep sleep stages and we would wake up in between our sleep cycles before we connect to the next sleep cycle again. Generally we would not remember much about it as we would just toss and turn and then go back to sleep again.
The same thing happens with our babies. Babies would wake up in between their sleep cycles all throughout the night but the key is if your baby is able to self soothe, then he or she can fall back to sleep without needing anyone’s help. So to paint you the picture, if at bedtime you have nursed your baby to sleep, then when your baby wakes up in between sleep cycles, I can guarantee you, your baby would wake up crying in the middle of the night, not necessarily because she’s hungry but because she realized she’s no longer being nursed to sleep and she would like the same thing to be repeated back to her so she can continue her sleep.
Your baby is most likely not waking up crying in the middle of the night because she’s scared or lonely, but she’s waking up because she’s still tired and frustrated that her sleep props are no longer there to help her connect to the next sleep cycle.
So the key to getting your baby to sleep through the night is to teach your baby the art of self settling so that she can just fall asleep independently and resettle on her own when she wakes up in the middle of the night.