Sleep routine for a 6 week old...

bl021807 · November 2009

Hello all-

I am the proud mother of a 6 week old and my husband and I are ready to start a formal sleep routine (or at the very leasy begin to get the plans in place). Any ideas for what has worked for you? Is 6 weeks too early to start?

Right now, we start around 630p (her cranky time) but she doesn't really go down until closer to 9p.

All advice would be much appreciated!

Thanks much!

Brandan

Fairfax, VA

vtmezzo · November 2009

6 weeks is way too young for a sleep SCHEDULE, IMHO, but there's nothing wrong with a routine. We've had our bedtime routine in place since about that time (ie, bath, story, bottle, bed, etc). Don't expect your child to sleep with any sort of regularity until about 3-4 months (and even that is early)! At 6 weeks, my son was still sleeping off and on around the clock. By 4 months, he was going down for the night by 8 and only waking one to feed in the middle of the night. By 6 months, he was down by 7 PM and sleeping straight through. It will come! Good luck!

Karenbird · November 2009

I agree with PP that it's too early for a schedule. I have an 18 mo and a 7 week old. We started the 18 mo on Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child at about 4 months. I would recommend looking into a couple different books now and seeing what makes sense to you so that you are pready to go when she is. For us right now we are just concentrating on getting to know our baby and to lay some foundations for later: we try to put him to sleep in his own bassinet; we're learning to read his "signals" for when he's ready to sleep, and learning what tricks work for him to get him to sleep, etc.

katiek414 · November 2009

We are trying to get in a "routine" as well - especially because maternity leave is half over and we're attempting to get him to sleep in his crib. Right now he gets a bath around 7:30 and then a bottle. He usually gets sleepy and will sleep on our laps for the rest of the night. At 10:00 we'll give him his last bottle in his room with the lights off and the sound machine on. The past few nights - he wakes up once (we change his diaper and give him another bottle) and then he wakes up for good between 5:30 and 6:00 AM.

I definitely think it's okay for a routine around 6 weeks... whether or not they follow it is a completely different story! Our hope is that he at least starts to know the difference between days and nights.

tomandcourt · November 2009

vtmezzo:
6 weeks is way too young for a sleep SCHEDULE, IMHO, but there's nothing wrong with a routine.

Agree with pp - it's too early for a schedule, but we did the E.A.S.Y. routine (I used the info from this blog, but it's from the book The Baby Whisperer). We started when DS was about 4-5 weeks old. It helped to know what to expect, and the key was making sure he was never up more than two hours at a time.

Now that's he's older, we've been reading Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. DS goes to bed about 7:00 and is up to eat at 2:00 and 5:00, then up for the day between 7:00-8:00. I'm hoping that we can get him to sleep through the night using these techniques, but don't think it will happen until he's 5 or 6 months old.

Sofka · November 2009

we started a routine at 1 mo old, but DD did not "get" it till many many MANY months later. Every baby is different, mine is very difficult. Go ahead and start a routine but remember that you cannot expect a baby this young to understand anything or to form any habits for months yet.

LMH1209 · November 2009

We started a bedtime routine around that age (maybe a couple of weeks later), but we thought of it more as training us than training the baby

At that age, DS would usually be ready for his longest sleep period (around four hours - sometimes) starting at around 10:00, so we would do the bedtime routine somewhere between 9:30-10:00. We gradually moved back his bedtime over the next few months. By about four months, he was going to bed at 8:00 (and seemed to be getting the idea of the bedtime thing), and now he goes to bed at about 7:00.

eeclem · November 2009

i think we were lucky because at about 4 weeks, C started conking out at 7 or 8 for the day. So we just followed his cues and would start to put him to bed - nursing, swaddle, rocking and story, as soon as he first started to show signs of being tired.

it worked well for us - he slept really well until 10 weeks. he still goes down really easily, but we're dealing with a lot of nighttime wake ups (the latest theory is teething. yikes!)

Sleep routine for a 6 week old...

Re: Sleep routine for a 6 week old...

Choose Another Board

Search Boards