Sleep Solutions

It’s one thing having broken sleep. It’s another when the night wakes have you up for hours!

Being awake for an extended period overnight is something that we call a split night. Split nights are usually caused by having too much total day sleep or too much of your day sleep (even if it’s the right amount total!) in the early morning or late afternoon. To keep your day well balanced to support night sleep, this is the routine that I recommend to my seven month old clients:

7am 〰️ wake
9:30am 〰️ 30 min nap
12:30pm 〰️ 1.5-2 hour nap
4:30/4:45pm 〰️ MAYBE a 10-20 min cat nap here
Bedtime will then depend on whether or not you had the 3rd nap.
If you did ➡️ 7pm bed
If you didn’t ➡️ 6-6:30pm bed

There’s one more thing to look at when your baby is consistently waking for a long period overnight…What is happening at this wake?

Sometimes us parents can be guilty of doing too much to try to MAKE them go back to sleep. And doing this, sometimes it’s us that is actually keeping them awake! If we do a lot of hands-on settling, picking up, putting down, feeding, walking the hallway, driving in the car (it happens a lot!), it ends up having the opposite effect and keeps them awake. It also quickly becomes a habitual wake when they get used to having that interaction throughout the night. Therefore, trying your best to leave them to it as much as you can during this wake is the best thing you can do! 😴