TEACHING PATIENCE (1 of 3)

TEACHING PATIENCE (1 of 3)

How to cope when nothing seems to be working!

Something I get asked often by new parents is how to cope with  a new baby when everyone is exhausted and crying. This is a normal situation for most new parents at some stage. 

 The good news is it doesn’t last long and soon you will have things down pat.

Take comfort in the knowledge that it is almost a rite of passage as a new parent.  You are not the only one to have felt like this. 

 It’s a fact- most new parents feel overwhelmed and lost when going home for the first time with their new baby.

And to make matters worse, they feel an overwhelming pressure to be perfect parents and get it “right”. This pressure will more than likely come up for you a number of times at different times as your baby grows. Remember it is all normal and working out what works for you is the key. Here is our first tips to help you stay calm and cope with those really difficult times. The next ones will follow over the next few weeks.

Here is the first tip to help you when things just don’t seem to be going your way.

1. Remember your self care- have time out just for you.

This is my number one rule – not even a tip, for new parents particularly but important no matter who you are.

Remember that you are a person too. Before you became a parent you had interests and hobbies. You did things just for yourself. It is healthy for everyone if you continue to do something for just yourself regularly. A baby is a 24 hour a day job. Imagine if you had to perform in your job 24 hours a day , 7 days a week, year in , year out. You would be exhausted and probably not very effective at your job. 

You will be a better parent if you take time out for yourself regularly. It may not be the same activities or the same amount of time that you spend on your activities  as before you became a parent.  

It is still important however that you do it. Even if it is only 5 mins a day, half an hour a week or once a month. It may be going for a walk around the block, going window shopping, having a coffee with a friend, reading a book from the library for 15 mins or just having a relaxing bath.

You will be a better more effective parent if you have time out from your baby and get some me time. You will probably enjoy your baby even more too and be able to think more clearly about what your baby needs from you and respond more calmly and appropriately. 

For more tips visit our website here insyncwithinfants.com.

Sleep builds sleep: how the ‘tucker them out’ myth is keeping you awake at night!

Sleep builds sleep

Sleep builds sleep: how the ‘tucker them out’ myth is keeping you awake at night! 

I’ve helped several families this week to get their baby to sleep.  I start out by talking with each family to work what is happening and get a feel for their parenting approach and unique family situation. This then guides what steps I take in the baby sleep training process. In these discussions that the fact that sleep builds sleep often takes people by surprise.

The ‘tucker them out’ myth

To get good quality sleep, you need to be relaxed.  When any of us are overtired, we tend to have more difficulty going off to sleep. The same is true for your baby and toddler.When this idea is new to you, it can take a little while to get your head around.  For a lot of us it doesn’t seem to make sense.  Most people think that we are over tired we will just go to sleep because we are exhausted. This is the ‘tucker them out myth’. How often has someone suggested to make baby sleep by keeping them up or wearing them out?

Why the myth prevails

At times the ‘tucker them out’ myth may appear true. Certainly there are many, many babies who are so beyond overtired that they just crash, often after being awake for hours on end, beyond what they can cope with.  Most times, they are cranky and not  happy when awake. Their behaviour, personality and development can suffer.

Overtired babies fight sleep

An overtired baby fights sleep not because they need to stay up longer and crash out when it all becomes too much, but because they feel ‘yucky’. When I am talking about babies and sleep  remember  that we need to feel relaxed to go to sleep. When your baby is not feeling relaxed  they feel yucky, they need you to help them feel better so they can go to sleep. When your baby has not had quality sleep for an extended period of time, it can be harder for him or her to go to sleep easily because of feeling yucky.

The solution is to build good quality sleep first and then work through any other challenges with sleep and your baby.  Catching up on sleep is often the first step for baby sleep training. Sleep builds sleep and has a positive effect on your baby as a result.  For all of us, we are much happier and calmer when we are feeling relaxed and well rested.

For more ideas to get your baby to be happy go to leisabreed.com.
ps View the replay of our free webinar for "Realistic Settling- What it really takes " https://app.webinarjeo.com/node/webinar/view/12045-realistic-settling-what-it-really-takes

© 2016 Leisa Breed

www.leisabreed.com.au

All Rights Reserved

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.

When over tired

In previous weeks, we’ve talked about the importance of catching early tired signs and that there are early and late tired signs. We have also touched on how your baby is affected by too little sleep or missing early tired signs.

 

Today I’d like to talk a little about what happens when your baby is overtired. Usually this is when most people think it is normal to put your baby to sleep. And yes, you will have to put your baby to sleep when he or she is overtired.

 

When you have caught the early tired signs you can give your baby the opportunity to self settle. When your baby is over tired that is probably not realistic to expect. At least not with young babies. Older babies who know about sleep may be able to go off to sleep for themselves when over tired if they know how.

 

When your baby is over tired he or she is so wound up and over stimulated and overwhelmed that he or she just can’t unwind enough to relax for sleep. Your baby doesn’t know that he or she is overtired, they just know they feel crappy and need you to help him or her feel better.

 

It may take up to half an hour or so for your baby to unwind. It may take longer. Generally we expect at least 20 minutes, then another 10-15 minutes to relax and then another 10 minutes or so to get to sleep. That is a normal expectation when your baby is over tired. It may even be a little longer.

 

When you are helping your baby to sleep be prepared to have to last the distance. Expecting your baby to be asleep after 5 or 10 minutes when over tired is usually unrealistic. If you calmly persevere in helping your baby you will usually achieve sleep of some sort however be prepared for it to be a short one and to have to repeat what you have just done to help build more sleep.

 

We’re here to help if your baby’s sleep is confusing you, if it's “hard work” all the time or if it could use some tweaking


And make sure to follow Insync with Infants on Facebook for more tips and hints on great baby sleep. (click here)

What’s all the fuss about early tired signs?

Early tired signs are now well known to be one of the important points to your baby settling more easily for sleep.

 

Why is it important to catch early tired signs?

 

At the stage of early tired signs your baby is still happy and relaxed. Once late tired signs kick in usually your baby is less relaxed, feels more uptight and as a result needs more from you to help him or her relax again in readiness for sleep.

 

When you see early tired signs your baby will still look happy and relaxed. This usually trips people up because they think “ oh he (or she) isn’t tired yet, he’s still smiling and happy”.

 

It is also important to know that there is only a short window of time between early tired signs and late tired signs. When you see late tired signs your baby is actually over tired. When your baby is over tired he or she usually needs some form of help to get to sleep.

 

The important part about early tired signs is that your baby has a better chance of going to sleep on his or her own and not needing any help. This is really important for that easy sleep we are all after in little ones. It is easier to go to sleep when you are relaxed than when you are over tired. So yes it is important to catch early tired signs.

How do sleep cycles affect your baby's sleep?

Most of us are aware of sleep cycles. As adults we have learned to sleep from one cycle to the next
without any fuss or trouble.

 

The exception may be if it is raining heavily outside or storming, a dog is barking or there is something very different to normal happening at night. this is when we may wake up between sleep cycles and check out what is going on. As adults we usually can go back to sleep easily.

 

Your baby also has sleep cycles. Newborns have quite short cycles- as short as 20 minutes. As your baby grows the sleep cycles lengthen gradually. Babies often wake up between cycles and this is a normal part of newborns. It doesn’t always mean they have to be entertained when he or she wakes, just that it is the break form one cycle to the next.

 

The waking that you see between short cycles is not always actual waking. With newborns, that waking may just be a light sleep between cycles. This is the bit that often trips people up:

 

New parents are so in love with their baby and so committed to be the best parent they can, not harming their baby and ensuring their baby gets everything they could possibly need, parents often inadvertently misinterpret light sleep for wake and wake up their baby when they probably needed to go back to sleep and weren’t really awake at all.

 

This can be really tricky and can be quite confounding to begin with. As time goes on it will be easier to work out when your baby needs to go back to sleep and when he or she is ok to stay awake for some play or talk time.