When playtime is not needed

Every parent wants to sleep well at night. Critical to good night sleep is setting up really good habits in the evening routine. When your baby is newborn until about 6-8 weeks evenings can be really tricky and hard work. This is normal and is just your baby’s immaturity. The effort you put into a consistent, calm evening routine will eventually be rewarded!

 

The witching hour, the arsenic hour, trouble time. Babies are often unsettled in the evening. Theoretically there are a number of things contributing to these unsettled times. Breastmilk supply is lower at this time of the day, everyone is tired at the end of the day (yes, even after all those naps), and it can be a busy time of the day for the family with dinner, baths, homework, planning for next day and dealing with frazzled temperaments from tiredness.

 

Most newborns just want to be held at this time of the day. He or she may want to suckle all the time. Remember sucking is soothing so this is perfectly normal. This is often called ‘cluster feeding’. All this behaviour will pass once baby matures (in weeks and months, not years!).

 

Once your baby matures past needing constant cuddles in the evening, evening routines can be started. Evenings routines that are helpful include dinner, bath, story, milk*, bed. Once you start your evening routine aim for no playtime. This seems like a drag but can make all the difference in the world to your night time . When little ones get into bed on time and know what to expect things usually run much smoother.

 

When the arsenic hour hits remember that your baby is not complaining that they are bored. Make sure that well meaning friends and relatives don’t try and stop the baby from crying by entertaining and playing. Babies do not need play in the evening. They need a calm, predictable bedtime routine and lots of support to work through the stresses of the day, relax and go to sleep.

Our webinar last month was on being with your baby when crying. If you would like to purchase a copy email us here and we will organise it for you. Go here or send an email to leisa@insyncwithinfants.com

* Remember last week I wrote about feed, play, sleep and not using feeding as a sleep cue? Having a feed just before bed as part of the evening routine is okay. Feeding to sleep usually does not interfere with night time settling. The problem is if your baby relies on feeding for sleep at every sleep time. The one for the evening is okay - enjoy that lovely cuddle time together.

Feed-Play-Sleep

Feed-play-sleep is a parenting mantra that is misunderstood by many! This concept came about to give new parents a framework to help manage their baby’s care and to give some sort of routine to their day.

The concept is for those who really need some sort of structure in their lives to help them make sense of their day (the parent I am talking about here).

 

Most new parents arrive home from hospital with their baby, look at each other and ask, “now what?” Feed-play-sleep is the answer.

 

Basically Feed-play-sleep is a way to separate feeding from sleep for newborns so that feeding is not a strong cue that your baby becomes reliant on for sleep. Babies are learning from birth. The order of their day is something that some babies learn quickly, while others are more flexible.

 

Some babies who learn that feeding comes before sleep can have difficulty sleeping. These baby’s parents struggle to help their baby get adequate restful sleep. Because feeding has become a sleep cue their baby wakes frequently with a short sleep cycle and thinks he or she needs to feed to go back to sleep again.

 

Hence Feed-play-sleep came about to help parents manage their routine for better outcomes for all.

 

Baby gets better quality sleep and learns helpful habits for sleep, gets really good feeds at feed time and is happier. Parents are not feeling like they are always turning around to feed or put baby to sleep.

 

Feed-play-sleep is not something that all parents use or resonate with. As with everything we discuss at Insync with Infants- it is another concept that is available to help you make sense of life with a new baby when lots of things just don’t make sense yet.

 

Feed-play-sleep can be confusing because your baby will not always feed every time he or she is awake. This is the bit that often causes confusion and frustration. As your baby grows and matures, the number of feeds a day often reduces. As your baby learns about sleep separately from feeding he or she will also have some times when he or she will have a short sleep, have a short play time and have a another sleep without the need for feeding. In all of these instances just follow your baby’s lead. As you learn their behaviours it will become easier.

 

If you would like some practical assistance, tailored to you, Insync with infants has home visits or skype consults available to help you with this confusing time.

 

Please email us your enquiry at Leisa@insyncwithinfants.com.

 

 

Playing with your Newborn

One of the things that can be confusing and tricky for new parents is all the toys, helpful tools and stuff out there for newborns and toddlers.  One area that can be really confusing for parents is toys and what is appropriate for play.

 

Newborn babies are wired for survival and learning. Their senses are turned on so that they can learn as much as they can from their surroundings as quickly as possible. Their brains are wired for learning. The tricky part of this is that newborns get overstimulated very easily because of this.

 

This is a really confusing thing for a lot of new parents.  Usually you are so in love with this new baby that you just want to shower  him or her with affection and positive vibes and joy and everything else.  Unfortunately your baby can only cope with a short amount of stimulation and quite quickly get over stimulated which looks like an unhappy and cranky baby.

 

Your baby doesn’t need much at all in the way of toys etc. It is probably more for our benefit to think we need to provide all this stuff. The best play thing for your baby is you. Your newborn gets enough stimulation just from the touch, sound of your voice and movement that he or she receives from the care that you give throughout the day and night.

 

Sure as your baby grows and matures toys come into play more. When your baby is moving around the floor, more interested in surroundings, reaching more etc, toys will be more important. However you are still the most important part of your babies toy room.

 

My message is that your baby doesn’t need all those things that marketing makes us believe  are important. Pretty much less is more when it comes to your baby.  You are enough and the perfect plaything for your baby.