Sleep regression

Is it real?

 

Video Transcript:

 

Sleep regression one of my little bugbears of things that mums come in and say that their baby’s having sleep regression. So, definitely, there are some points where the baby changes and there’s some sort of sleep regression. 

 

I feel that at some point a baby, kind of, consciously wakes up and understands that when they’re awake they can give a cry out and get the mum in, okay. When a baby’s very young it’s a bit like they’re pre-programmed to just sleep and, you know, we know they sleep all the time.

 

But there comes a stage where the child can wake up and understand more that they can get the mum in. Having said that, even these one-day-old babies are super, super clever, and they know how to pull on your heartstrings mum, so I get that. 

 

But this story comes from, in one day, I had three mums come in, so I easily remember this Three mums come in, and tell me that their baby was having a sleep regression, but they gave me a different week. Every single mum so, a mum came in and said my baby’s having a four week sleep regression. Next month “oh, my baby’s having a seven weeks regression.” Next month,  my baby’s having a five-week sleep regression.”  Basically, they had googled and they had just Google had provided the answer of that particular week it had a sleep regression. 

 

So, okay there may have been something in there to do with sleep regression, but I remember digging deeper and asking these mums more questions, and finding much better reasons that their baby wasn’t sleeping, and these reasons were ones that we could help. So, for example, a baby might have had antibiotics for some reason, and the antibiotics had upset their tummy, and that’s why they weren’t sleeping very well. 

 

Or, another baby had gone into hospital for, say, bronchiolitis, and had been poked and prodded, and then they were out, but didn’t like that poking and prodding, so then they wanted more cuddles from their mummy over the next, you know, couple of weeks. So, that’s why they weren’t sleeping better. 

 

So, there’s these other reasons – antibiotics. It’s so easy to take – throw a baby out of the routine. Have you been on holiday? Have you gone for a long car journey to go on holiday? Have you then spent a week sleeping in a different room, or one night even with a baby, because it could just throw them off? 

 

So, then there’s these other factors to look at, and why that’s good is that you can help those other factors, rather than just putting it down to a sleep regression, and that goes on and on and you’re thinking: “. Oh, this is a two-week regression a three weeks sleep regression.” and then you’re all super, super tired. So, it could be another reason that can be fixed.