Every person has a sleep cycle that they go through when they are sleeping. An adult's sleep cycle is much longer than a baby’s is, even during the day. A baby goes through short sleep cycles which help them to feel more refreshed. Unfortunately, if a baby is not linking their sleep cycles then this can cause issues and very short naps. I want to discuss what a sleep cycle looks like during the day for a baby and what you can do to survive this if it’s causing issues in your life.

The Daytime Sleep Cycle 

Ever wonder why after only 30-45 minutes of sleep, your baby wakes? That is due to the sleep pressure being reduced and them feeling more refreshed. It is also because after 30-45 minutes your baby has gone through a full sleep cycle and they can fully wake at this time, especially if they aren’t linking their sleep cycles yet. 

Waking From Being Overtired

Another element to all of this is your baby waking after only 20 minutes of sleeping (this was my son🥲). This can indicate that you have an overtired baby, which nobody wants to have! I have totally been there, done that and it is not fun. It's so hard to see your baby struggling with sleep even though they need it so badly. When a baby is overtired, it is difficult for them to enter into a deep (restorative) stage of sleep due to their cortisol levels being so high. In this case, you will want to do whatever you can to help them to relieve some of that sleep debt they are feeling. As a temporary fix, you can make sure to nap them wherever they will sleep the longest so that they can get some alleviation from the lack of sleep they are having. Once they have caught up on sleep, you will want to start implementing good sleep habits, such as teaching them to fall asleep independently, so that they can continue to get restorative sleep.

Teaching Independent Sleep

Once a baby hits 3-4 months of age, they will start to sleep more as an adult does. What does this mean? It means they will start to wake between sleep cycles and if they haven’t learned how to fall asleep independently yet they will have trouble linking their sleep cycles. In order to help them to start linking their sleep cycles, you will have to teach them to fall asleep independently. When they can fall asleep independently they will know how to put themselves back to sleep when they wake between sleep cycles and won’t need your help to do so. Teaching them to fall asleep independently is pretty straightforward: when their wake window is over and they are ready for sleep, you put them down in their crib awake. It is key to make sure they are awake when you do this. Fluttery eyes usually mean they are in the first stage of sleep and would mean you assisted them to sleep which is precisely what you want to avoid. They will most likely start crying when you lay them down and this is when you can apply a sleep training method to help them to learn to fall asleep on their own. This is a process and takes time, but with consistency and patience, your baby can learn this! Being consistent is definitely a huge aspect of this whole process and whether the sleep training works or not is very dependent on this.

I can assist you with a sleep training method and a 1:1 personalized sleep plan with ongoing support during the entire process (plus more!) if you would like that kind of formative help, just go to my webpage and click on the Services tab to check out the details!

I also have a very helpful, free group on Facebook called Sleep Little One that I would love to have you join. You may be able to find all the answers you need in there! I give advice and tips on sleep training to help parents improve their baby’s sleep so that everyone can start getting the sleep they so desperately need! Come check it out!

Thanks for reading,