This blog is for all of my twin parents. One baby is a lot to handle in the early months, but multiply that, and you’ve got your hands full. So, what do you do when your darlings start experience split nights? Well, apart from panicking or losing your mind, consider using some of the strategies below.
You’re scratching your head on this one, right? The obvious answer would be pajamas, but the reality is that your baby can overheat quickly if they’re overdressed for bed. So, how do you dress your baby for sleep in the summer? Let’s take a look.
If you watch Saturday Night Live (SNL), you likely remember the brilliant skit from last year, featuring Matt Damon and Cecily Strong, called, “Best Christmas Ever.” The SNL skit features two tired parents sitting down on Christmas night, enjoying a glass of wine and recapping the day’s events. From the early wakeup to hosting family, they recap the day fondly, despite it being hellish and stressful. The skit is funny because so many American parents can relate. Let’s take a look at why parents don’t sleep over the holidays and how to avoid slumber pitfalls.
It’s a well-known fact that those who do imbibe tend to ramp up their alcohol consumption between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve. Unsurprisingly, alcohol.org lists holidays that fall between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve as three of the top ten times of drinking throughout the year, in terms of consumption.
While there’s nothing wrong with enjoying a couple of drinks over the holidays, especially when celebratory get-togethers abound, the real sacrifice is a good night’s sleep. Why some adults may equate consuming alcoholic beverages with socializing and relaxation, the reality is that those beverages aren’t doing them any favors in the sleep department. Simply put, consuming alcohol before bedtime disrupts sleep.
Cookies, pies, stuffing, mashed potatoes, fat-laden dips — from parties to heavy meals, many Americans indulge over the holidays. Just as alcohol consumption before bed disrupts sleep, eating heavy, rich foods — and eating late — can be a GI disaster when it comes time to sleep. In fact, many of the foods commonly served and consumed over the holidays — low in fiber and high in fat and sugar — are the perfect recipe for a disastrous night of sleep.
Think about the number of meals and parties you attend each holiday season — how many of them offer food? What you eat affects how you sleep, and food choices you made at an afternoon get together can come back to haunt you when it’s time to get some zzzzzs. If you want to feel rested over the holidays, try not to overindulge or stray from your normal diet too much.
Parents find themselves juggling to get everything done even outside of the holiday season, so when the holidays come around, stress mounts. Buying gifts, planning dinners, hosting friends and family — there aren’t enough hours to get it all done! And when time runs short for holiday preparations, parents often dip into the overnight hours. Protect your sleep, fellow parents — you need it!
With a reported third of Americans reporting stress levels on the rise over the holidays, it’s no wonder we don’t feel rested! So, instead of succumbing to the stresses of the season, arm yourself with tools to fight holiday stress. Practice the self-care we often speak of, but rarely follow through with — there’s no better time than now.
Instead of staying up all night to assemble that Barbie Dream House, remember that your own sweet dreams are what will help you make it through the craziness of the holidays. Wishing you a wonderfully restful holiday season, fellow parents — you’ve got this!
If you need sleep training for your toddler or infant sleep training, the holidays may not be the best time to start. It’s hard enough keeping up with all the festivities let alone learning how to sleep train a baby. You and your precious one will both be tuckered out and you may be setting yourself up for failure. You’re better off waiting until the celebrations are over and then looking for a sleep coach for your baby.
While you won’t find me frolicking in a dirndl dress in the Alps, I am singing the praises of some of my favorite sleep-related things. Perhaps the number one concern with new parents, and certainly one of the most contentious new parent topics, babies and sleep are big business. From a thousand-dollar bassinet — that boasts the ability to sleep train your baby — to melatonin, desperate parents turn to these gadgets for the promise of help.
Unfortunately, I’m the bearer of bad news. Most of the baby sleep products on the market — including the two above — are gimmicky or promote lousy sleep habits, which you want to avoid. However, there are some sleep products that I swear by and recommend to my clients — take a look:
Today’s blog is a guest blog by Lauren Stevens, a client of mine more than SIX years ago! She recently embarked on a two-week European vacation with her husband and six-year-old son. Lauren’s here today to share how hopping continents and time zones went and how she handled major changes in her son’s typically consistent bedtime routine.
(more…)There is almost nothing more adorable than a conked-out baby, arms splayed around their head, gently snuffling away in slumber, right? The term, “sleep like a baby,” captures the peaceful, relaxed nature of babies sleeping, and it’s the type of sleep that a lot of adults aspire to achieve. However, those cute baby snores–and mouth breathing–can be signs that something else is afoot; something that can be preventing your little one from getting the healthy, restorative sleep they need.
It seems just yesterday that your baby finally learned to sleep through the night, and you were off-the-hook for night-wakings every two hours. Once your baby was sleeping 10-12 hours each night, you started to relax a little more in the evenings, relishing the alone time with your partner, or just taking in the extra hours of calm you now had. And then, just as you’re settling in to watch the latest episode of This Is Us, your toddler materializes at the side of the couch. What are they doing up? Ugh.
While I am a Certified Pediatric Sleep Consultant, specializing in the sleep habits of babies and young children, I also want the parents I work with to get healthy sleep — a well-rested family is a happy family! So, from time to time I like to cover topics addressing self-care for parents, which is as important as healthy sleep for your children.
Did you know that what you eat can affect your sleep?
If you follow any parenting sites or skimmed over headlines last month, you likely saw reports about the massive recall for Fisher-Price’s Rock ‘N Play Sleeper. Enormous in scale, the Sleeper recall includes all models from the product’s inception in 2009. Sadly, the Rock ‘N Play is attributed to more than 30 infant deaths. After much thought, I decided now was as good a time as any to talk about the billion-dollar baby industry that continually markets items to sleep-deprived parents, promising to help their babies sleep…and how you don’t need any of them to have a well-rested baby (and self).
A recent study, presented at the American Physiological Society’s (APS) annual meeting, shows that teens with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) may benefit from more nightly sleep. This finding got me thinking about the young children I work with, and whether a suspected or early diagnosis of ADHD might be premature. Let me explain.
