Letting your kids sleep in

[Bini]

My 9 month old daughter has naturally adjusted to the routine of waking up at 8AM, napping around noon, and sleeping again at 8PM. Occasionally, she'll have off days where she'll either fight napping/sleeping, or she'll sleep for an extended amount of time. Like today (and she's done this before) when it's after 10AM and she's still sound asleep. I'm a bit of a control freak and I try my hardest to keep her on a schedule, especially since her current schedule works out perfectly. Today I'm letting her sleep in, I usually don't, and get her up within a half hour after 8AM. So far her sleep/awake cycle hasn't been thrown off. Did you find it necessary at this age to keep a strict schedule, or at least, try to keep on track with it? Or did you figure that your child's body will make and adjust their own healthy schedule?

[applepansy]

I didn't keep a "strict" schedule. Babies/children have their own body rhythms. However, I didn't allow too many days of disrupted sleep schedule. There are some rules in life and its best to learn young. :)

Naps are a must at my house. As my kids got older they didn't have to nap but they had to have quiet time. With my grandson we do the same thing. Naps are something we just do.

Early to rise and early to bed, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.

[pam]

Just a slight correction there apple.

Early to bed, early to rise

Makes a man health, wealthy and wise.

It had to rhyme. :)

[applepansy]

the nerves to my brain are short circuiting. LOL

[ClickyClack]

9 months? Your kid is going to go through a LOT of sleep changes over the next two years. It's just what happens as babies grow, their brains change, their sleep patterns change...

the most important thing is just to make sure that they're getting ENOUGH sleep. It's crucial to their well-being, their development, and to YOUR happiness.

[Misshalfway]

I remember being a new mom and second guessing everything.....

My kids weren't good sleepers. So I have no great advice. All I can say is that we survived those early days and that I'm glad it's over. :)

You sound like you are handling things beautifully, Bini.

[Gwen]

I let my kids keep their own sleep schedule at that age. They go through growth spurts and need more sleep than at other times. My motto was "never wake a sleeping baby". lol I didn't even wake mine to nurse.

[MorningStar]

Enjoy the quiet time! Don't wake her up. My daughter slept until almost 11 recently and I read a short novel.

[Bini]

I let my kids keep their own sleep schedule at that age. They go through growth spurts and need more sleep than at other times. My motto was "never wake a sleeping baby". lol I didn't even wake mine to nurse.

OK I admit to having woken mine up to nurse.. I didn't have a breast pump at the time!

Here's my question, how do I setup a good night's sleep for her if I allow her to arrange and rearrange her sleep schedule? For example, she gets up late in the morning and then she doesn't want to nap until around 1PM or 2PM, and then she doesn't want to wake up from that nap until around 4PM-5PM. If I let her over nap, then she'll have a hard time settling down to sleep at night.

[applepansy]

I decided after last night and re-reading this thread that I have no answers. LOL

My 4yo grandson got up at 3:30 a.m. and refused to go back to sleep. Yesterday he was up at 5:30 a.m. an Friday morning he was up at 4:30 a.m. I'm exhausted.

[Vort]

OK I admit to having woken mine up to nurse.. I didn't have a breast pump at the time!

Here's my question, how do I setup a good night's sleep for her if I allow her to arrange and rearrange her sleep schedule? For example, she gets up late in the morning and then she doesn't want to nap until around 1PM or 2PM, and then she doesn't want to wake up from that nap until around 4PM-5PM. If I let her over nap, then she'll have a hard time settling down to sleep at night.

Bini, it sounds like the baby is getting plenty of sleep, and that it's YOUR sleep you're trying to get. And I don't blame you; being sleep-deprived is slow torture.

Consider the following:

• Infants are infants only for a few months. Most children sleep through the night by 6 or 8 months, some much sooner than that.
• If you cosleep, she's right there and easier to nurse.
• Sometimes it's easier to rearrange the adult sleep patterns to fit the infant (i.e. lots of naps) than vice versa.
• This, too, shall pass. It's not forever; it's a few months. (See first bullet point.)

Good luck!

[Guest]

Everybody does it differently.

This is how I did mine - it's the same routine as I'm doing today - and they're already 10 and 8.

I let them decide when to go to sleep. But, I decide when to wake them up. When they were just born, I wake them up to nurse every 2 hours. So, they would sleep, nurse, then play every 2 hour-cycle. I was at the hospital for over 2 weeks when they were born, so it was easy to just have the nurses hand me the baby every 2 hours to nurse. When we got home from the hospital we went on every 4 hours schedule. When they became older that they started the "normal human" sleep pattern, they kept the every 4 hour nursing schedule but they don't nap in between anymore and I didn't nurse at night anymore. They started sleeping through the night at around 3 months or so. But, since I went back to work with my first child, I wake him up every morning to nurse before I went to work. So, it just became a pattern and since it worked out for my first child, I did the same thing for my second child.

So now that they're older - we do the same thing - they go to bed whenever they want, but I wake them up at the same time every morning for school. When school's out - they wake up 2 hours later.

So, what happened 2 days ago... my 2 kids had a friend to sleepover. Both my boys did not sleep until about 4AM! I woke them up at 8AM as usual and they were so groggy all day that they went to bed at 6PM and I woke them up this morning at 8AM again... and they're back to normal... But, they won't be staying up all night anytime soon, I'm sure.

[Bini]

Vort, you're right on bullet number 3, although I'm far from Mum of The Year when I'm groggy from a crappy night's rest.. I understand that this is all temporary though and she'll out grow this phase to something else.

Anatess, I like this notion. I wish my parents did something like this with us. Allow them to pick their own bed time and then wake them up at a certain time every morning. I think this may be especially affective with older kids. A 9 month old bebe not so much, not just yet :]

[Guest]

Vort, you're right on bullet number 3, although I'm far from Mum of The Year when I'm groggy from a crappy night's rest.. I understand that this is all temporary though and she'll out grow this phase to something else.

Anatess, I like this notion. I wish my parents did something like this with us. Allow them to pick their own bed time and then wake them up at a certain time every morning. I think this may be especially affective with older kids. A 9 month old bebe not so much, not just yet :]

Worked with my kids from babehood. My kids would conk out anywhere when they need to sleep... even in the middle of the football stadium with fireworks going every touchdown. If they don't want to sleep, they would fight me. I chose not to fight sleep times. If they don't want to sleep, and I need to rest, I put them in their playpen with a toy and their blanket, I rest next to the play pen and just ignore their bid for attention. They play for a while and they conk out eventually.

Both my kids are like on-off switches. It could be because of this schedule thing we had since they were babies or if they just came with that personality. It's either they are on - where they are like energizer bunnies - or they are off - they're asleep and it takes a good amount of effort to wake them up. They can sleep through anything anywhere - they can sleep on a tile floor with their shoes for their pillow! Yeah, it was New Year's Eve at my brothers' house, it was past 1AM and I was saying our byes to everyone and the kids were supposed to be putting on their shoes, instead I found them sleeping on the tiled foyer with their head on their shoes...

No, it doesn't work with all kids. Different kids have different ways of doing things.

Edited July 9, 2012 by anatess

[Bini]

Well I decided to see how allowing baby to make her own schedule works out. I may regret this BUT this coming weekend (Friday actually) we're visiting grandparents out of town, and they'll be more than happy to entertain baby for a weekend, even if her sleep/nap schedule is all out of whack! Hehe. And hopefully she'll revert back to good habits AFTER the visit.. .. ..

[AnaMarzen]

Well, it's a slippery slope. My sisters are naturally athletic like my parents. They get up at 5:00 am every day to go running!

I fought my parents on it - often waking up around noon - and I still have that bad habit to this day. So yeah...LOL!

[count58]

I wouldnt worry about it too much as my 21mth old wakes up between 7am and 9am sometimes he will have his afternoon sleep around 1-2pm then up around 5-6pm has tea and the normal routine and back in bed between 8-10pm on the days he gets up around 8am sometimes he wont have his afternoon sleep and will go to bed about 8pm and sleep until morning. My 3yr old is different again sometimes he'll wake up the same time as his brother he doesnt have an afternoon sleep and he'll go to bed at 8pm other mornings he's slept until 10-11am so it all depends on the child themselves sometimes they may sleep longer because their little bodies need it and sometimes it could be the sign of them getting sick or they are sick. Id just go with the flow and let the baby sleep for however long they need to as they will let you know when they want to get up or want to go back to sleep :)