Are you being strategic in who is putting your child to bed at night?
You might be surprised to find out that I actually advice one person to be responsible for bedtime when starting a new sleep routine. And you may be even more surprised to find out WHO and WHY I recommend this!
When I work with families privately, I will go through their entire customized sleep plan, prepare them for all the “what if” scenarios, heavily educate them on what are normal expectations of sleep and so much more.
We also must decide who is going to put baby to bed during the initial days of the plan. This decision has some strategy with it on my part and what I usually suggest may sound unexpected.
Let me set the stage first…
I have yet to meet a family that shares the parenting responsibilities exactly 50/50. One person usually bears a little more of the day-to-day childcare than the other. If you fall into this category, rest assured, you are one of millions of families across the world that share a similar situation.
The reason that this happens can vary. One parent could be staying at home and the other one is working. Or collectively, it was decided that one parent will oversee the feeding and the other will help with diaper changes, burping and bathing. But here is the common thread for most families…the person who handles the feeding, tends to be the one to do the bedtime routine and put them to sleep.
If this is your family, I am going to tell you the same thing that I tell my families that I work with…the person who is NOT doing most of the feedings and/or bedtime, needs to be the person who puts the baby to bed when you are start sleep training.
The reason for the is simple. You may have heard me talk about sleep associations or “sleep props” in the past and what these are, are associations with something that baby needs to fall asleep. These could be rocking, bouncing, using a pacifier (and for the record, I am not anti pacifier but there is a time and place for them!) or the most common association is feeding or nursing to sleep.
So, why would I suggest that the person that is most capable of putting baby to sleep historically, not be the one to put baby to sleep now?
Well, much of the time, the issue that families come to me with is their baby only goes to sleep if fed, rocked, or bounced by one parent. So, to your baby they are expecting you to respond in the same way you always have but when you decide to change things up and start a sleep routine (or training) they will be confused on why you, the normal bedtime parent, is not doing what you typically would do (being fed to sleep, rocking, bouncing, etc…)
Now, when you take that person out of the picture, you are left with a clean slate, where new sleep routines and boundaries can be taught.
Additionally, how confusing would it be for baby to expect to be nursed or fed to sleep from the parent who does bedtime, but this is no longer happening. In my opinion, and the opinion of my families, having the other parent take over bedtime is a much easier and kinder process for baby.
However, if this is not an option for your family, not to worry! I have worked with families that did not have this option (including myself with my youngest child) and sleep training can still work. There may be a few more tears starting out, but it still can be done!
If you are ready to start making a change tonight, here is a sample bedtime routine that may be helpful.
1) Bath time
2) PJ’s
3) Fed (breast or bottle)
4) Book (by parent who is not the typical feeding parent)
5) Into crib awake (by parent who is not the typical feeding parent)
And that’s it! This approach to sleep training works almost every time and makes the process so much smoother for everyone.
Cheers to turning over a New Leaf in Sleep!