When your baby is waking overnight, everyone is tired.
You're tired.
Dad's tired.
Your partner's tired.
Other kids might be getting woken as well.
The baby is tired
and it just makes things really hard
to then function the next day.
Today I'm going to answer the question,
why can my baby self settle during the day
but wakes every two hours at night to be fed?
Hi, I'm Amanda,
founder and co-creator of Little Ones Sleep program.
At Little Ones,
we have a comprehensive online
all portable, in your pocket sleep program
for you to follow with your baby.
We have schedules.
We have nutrition.
We have an amazing village
all with inside our app
which can all be stored in your pocket.
The village has our amazing sleep consultants
that work all day night to answer any questions
that you may have.
We also have our automated sleep consultant, Lee
who will answer any question
that you might have any time of the day.
If you are having trouble getting your little one to sleep
at any time of the day or night
make sure you visit us at
www.littleones.com.
So back to today's question,
why will my little one self settle during the day
but will wake every two hours at night to be fed.
So, this is actually a relatively easy, quick fix.
I would hope.
There are many reasons
that babies will wake every two hours at night.
And the most common reason is that
they can't self settle during the day.
And the reason that they're waking every two hours at night
is our sleep cycles at nighttime are two hours.
And every time your baby goes to sleep
they'll rouse and wake up after two hours.
If the sleep association that they're used to,
say they're been getting rocks to sleep
or if they're being fed to sleep
that sleep association isn't there anymore.
So they require that to then go back to sleep
and fall into that next sleep cycle.
But in your question, you mentioned
that your baby can self settle during the day.
So fantastic.
As long as your baby is self settling during the day,
this one could be a quick fix.
The first thing that I would look at would be
the day sleep.
And even though your baby is self settling,
how long are they sleeping for during the day?
If they are sleeping large chunks
and they're doing multiple sleeps
of all sort of roughly the same length
and more over an hour or so each,
I would say that your baby is actually sleeping too much
during the day.
This is an easy one.
You can look at our sleep programs to give you a guide
to be able to cut down that day sleep.
Now what's actually happening is
your baby is getting so much sleep during the day
that they are just genuinely not tired at night.
So they are waking in between sleep cycles
because they actually just need some awake time.
The other thing that can be happening
when a baby is sleeping too much during the day,
is that actually missing out on feeding
that you would usually do during the day.
So, when your baby is awake longer during the day
you'll feed them more often
and you'll have more opportunity to give them good feeds.
This then allows the baby to stock up on food during the day
and sleep nicely and solidly overnight.
Obviously this is all dependent
on if your baby can self settle,
what you said they can.
So I would say,
as long as you tweak and look at those day sleeps,
make sure that they're right for your baby's age.
You know, don't cut them down dramatically
if your baby is only three weeks old, you know.
Make sure you get some guidance on
what your baby should be sleeping for their age group.
There's a slim chance
that your baby is waking every two hours at night
because they're actually uncomfortable.
Check their room environment.
Their room might be too hot or too cold
or it might not be dark enough
or maybe you need to pop some white noise on
and actually get your baby to tune in
and have that sleep association to fall back asleep
if they're waking during their sleep cycles.
The room environment is really key
to making sure that everything is nice
and conducive of sleep
to be able to get a decent sleep in overnight.
Check that temperature.
Make sure your baby is not getting too hot.
Check what they are wearing.
Make sure that they aren't getting too cold,
it might be that.
Pop on some white noise.
Honestly, it is the easiest thing that you can do
to help your baby sleep.
Even I need some white noise every now and again
when my brain is over stimulated
and just working too hard
that I just need something to be able to,
for my brain to think about and do
other than thinking about I'm trying to go to sleep.
So white noise, we do have our white noise tracks
on any of your streaming services
which I can also link in the comments down below.
If you also need any other advice,
make sure you head to our YouTube channel.
We also have a similar video
which is about a three week old,
who is sleeping really well during the day but not at night,
which I'll link up here on our YouTube channel.
And make sure you head to our website.
Even if you just read a couple of blogs,
we have loads of free information
that you'll be able to check out on our website.
And if you need further help,
please download our sleep programs.
We have a seven day free trial
that you're more than welcome to try out for free
and get your baby sleeping better.
If you liked this video,
make sure you please give us a big thumbs up.
And if you have any comments,
pop them in the box below,
we'll try and answer as many as we can
if you have any questions about your little one's sleep.