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Baby Sleep Schedule

Every parent knows that it is difficult to get your baby to sleep through the night. It is one of the biggest challenges a parent faces with their new born. If you want to avoid those dark circles around your eyes and get a good nights sleep then you need some baby sleep tips. One of the most important things you need to do is to get your baby into a routine and therefore the habit of sleeping on her own. It is natural for a baby to want to sleep with her mother but if you don't quickly set some boundaries and stick to a schedule then neither you nor your child will be getting much sleep. You can get your baby to sleep independently of you by creating sleep associations by following a schedule.

Your baby will eventually make sleep associations, as every child and adult does, but you can make this happen quicker by having a baby sleep schedule. This schedule with enable your child to associate certain activities with sleeping which will help your baby to fall asleep. If your baby has a sleep problem then you need to recognise that this may be caused by her current sleep associations. Your baby will probably be used to sleeping you and while this is fine in the short term it is not what is needed in the long term. You need to change the fact that your baby is associating being in your arms or next to you with sleep. You need to make your child more independent so she will be happy to sleep on her own.

To get your child to sleep on her own you should try to introduce certain items at the same time each evening. Your baby can sleep with these items and they will become part of her sleep schedule. For example, you might use a particular blanket just for sleeping or associate a certain teddy bear for bed time. If you your baby only sees these things at bed time then she will start to associate them with sleep. Then if she wakes up during the night she will be comforted because she has these familiar items around her and she will be able to fall asleep again on her own. You might also want to use these items as transitional items which means you bring out those items which are associated with sleep a little while before going to bed so your child can then take them to bed with her.

To a certain extent you should let your child decide which items will become the sleep association items, in a natural way of course. So if your child wants to take a certain toy to bed with her then let her. Then every night you can get out that toy and she will know that it is time to sleep. Once these associations have developed, your regular schedule will involve bringing out these items and your baby will fall asleep quickly.