Info about baby sleeping habit

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Establishing good sleep habits: 0 to 3 months

Written for BabyCenter Malaysia

Typical sleep at this age

Newborns sleep a lot -- about 17 to 18 hours a day for the first few

weeks and 15 hours a day by month three. However, they almost never sleep for more than three to four hours at a time, day or night. Translation: You won't be getting much uninterrupted sleep, either. At night you'll need to get up to feed and change your baby; during the day, you'll play with him, too.

Many parents worry about the risk of cot death in the first few months of their baby's life. It is recommended that babies sleep at night in a cot next to their parents' bed for the first six months. Other recommendations include:

• Put your baby down on his back to sleep, not his front or his side

.

• Put him with his feet at the end of the cot so he can't wriggle too far down under the blankets.

• Keep your baby's room at a temperature of around 18 degrees C / 64 degrees F.

• For bedding, use a sheet and cellular blankets rather than a duvet.

• Check that your baby isn't getting too hot or too cold by feeling his stomach: if he's too hot, remove a blanket, if he's cold, add one. Don't go by his hands or feet, as it is normal for them to feel cold.

See our article on reducing the risk of cot death for more on safe sleeping.

While some babies sleep through the night as early as eight weeks, many babies don't reach that milestone until they're five or six months old, or even later. If your aim is to get your baby to sleep through the night, you can help him get there sooner by teaching him good sleep habits from the start.

How you can establish good sleep habits

At this age, these are some of the best things you can do to help your child settle to sleep: Learn the signs that mean he's tired. For the first six to eight weeks, your baby won't be able to stay up much more than two hours at a time. If you wait much longer than that to put him down, he'll be overtired and won't be able to fall asleep very easily. Watch your baby for signs that he's sleepy. Is he rubbing his eyes, pulling on his ear, or developing faint dark circles under his eyes? If you spot these or any other signs of sleepiness, try putting him down in his cot or Moses basket. You'll soon develop a sixth sense about your baby's daily r hythms and patterns, and you'll know instinctively when he's ready for a nap. Begin to teach him the difference between day and night. Some infants are night owls (something you may have had a hint of while you were pregnant) and will be wide awake just when you want to drift into dreamland. For the first few days, you won't be able to do much about this. But once your baby is about two weeks old, you can start teaching him to distinguish night from day. When he's alert and awake during the day, play with him as much as you can, keep the house and his room light and bright, and don't worry about keeping down ordinary daytime noises like the phone, TV, or washing machine. If he tends to sleep during a feed, wake him up. At night, try not to play with him when you go into his room for a feed. Keep the li ghts and noise level low, and don't spend too much time talking to him. Before too long he should begin to figure out that nighttime is for sleeping. Give him a chance to fall asleep on his own. When he's six to eight weeks old, you could start giving your baby a chance to fall asleep on his own. The best way to do this is by putting him down when he's sleepy, but still awake. How you settle your baby to sleep is important. You may think that what you do in the early days doesn't have long-lasting consequences, but it does. Babies are le arning how to fall asleep. If you rock your child to sleep every night for the first eight weeks, he will expect the same later on. If you leave him alone to sleep, he will expect that, too. This is the reason why some experts advise against rocking or breastfeeding your baby to sleep, even at this young age. To get a predictable pattern established, you need to adopt the same strategy every night.

Approaches to sleep problems

You gradually need to teach your baby how to sleep through the night. Experts are divided on the best way to do this and there are many conflicting philosophies. Some of the main approaches are outlined below.

Approach 1
Your baby can develop good sleep habits as early as 6 weeks. The key is to establish a consistent bedtime and nap routine and to put your baby down to sleep at night while he is still awake. As long as your child is falling asleep on his own, it's okay to respond to him in the middle of the night and at naptime. Replace any sleep associations that depend on your presence (anything that requires you to be there, such as rocking or breastfeeding) with other ones that will be there when your baby wakes up (such as a favourite blanket).

Approach 2
You want to do what is best for your child, and helping him form good sleep patterns is part of that. Your child doesn't yet understand what's best for him and will cry if he doesn't get what he wants. Your goal is to help him learn to sleep and fall asleep alone.

Approach 3
Train your baby to go to sleep on his own and to comfort himself when he wakes up. You can help him learn to distinguish between night and day right from the start by keeping nighttime feeds subdued and waking him up if he sleeps for longer than a few hours during the day. Eventually he'll learn to save his long sleep for nighttime. When he does wake up, which is inevitable, use your voice to comfort him, but let more and more time pass between intervals. This will help him learn to settle himself to sleep.

Approach 4
Help your baby learn to settle down and comfort himself. Don't let him "cry it out," but don't jump at his first whimper either. Wait a few minutes to see if he's really upset and awake, and then go in, reassure and comfort him without taking him out of his cot or Moses basket. Instead, pat and soothe him with your hand and talk to him. At first, go to him every few minutes, but eventually call to him from out of the room. It's also a good idea to develop a calm, supportive bedtime routine, which can involve a bedtime story, a bath, and so on.

Approach 5
Create a positive sleep attitude in your child by being there for him and providing a comforting, relaxing environment that will allow sleep to overtake him. He'll learn to regard sleep as a pleasant state, one not to be afraid of.

There is no "right" way to encourage your child to settle and sleep through the night. You need to choose an approach that will work for you and your family.