Nap Transitions

Questions Asked:
My daughter Ayven is 17 months and has been a great sleeper thanks to you! We are now transitioning to 1 nap – any tips on the best way to do this and is there a best time for that once a day nap? Rises at 6:30 bed at 7pm used to nap 9-945 (we’d wake her) and then in the afternoon going down between 1:30 and 3 depending on our plans for the day and would usually nap 1.5-2 hours. Any tips would be appreciated!
My Answer:
The afternoon nap may lengthen. One way to transition is to drop the am nap and switch it to a cat nap (20-30 min). 1 pm may be a good time for your afternoon nap. The transition period can be long and there are a few ways to do it but this is my favorite one to try first.
If you need sleep help, I do personal consultations.
Tracy Spackman 602-524-7610
Tracy@GetQuietNights.com
www.GetQuietNights.com

"My 2 year old was a great sleeper and now for the past 2 weeks has been having sleep issues. Why?"

Great Question from my Mom’s club talk:
“My 2 year old was a great sleeper and now for the past 2 weeks has been having sleep issues. Why?”
This is a common question. Sometimes, you just get a string of bad luck when you have even just 2 nights in a row of disrupted sleep, from maybe a cold or thunderstorms or summer guests and your response of bringing to bed with your of staying with them while they fall asleep is enough to create a new “conditioned response”. If toddlers, or older children have 2 or more disrupted nights in a row, they may start getting anxious about sleep. After 2 weeks has gone by, you may have forgotten the cause of the sleep stress. A manners chart to help focus on good sleep habits may help a lot. If you need sleep help, call me, Text me.
Tracy Spackman 602-524-7610
Tracy@GetQuietNights.com
www.GetQuietNights.com

Back to School Bedtimes

Have your kids gone back to school? Planning to go soon? Take a good look at their bedtime. Do you know if your child is a 10, 11 or 12 hour sleeper for optimum benefit? If your child has a meltdown about having to write a few sentences about their summer for homework, chances are they are not getting enough sleep. Thinking of ideas to write about when writing is still a challenge for kindergarten-3rd grade kids, getting enough sleep can make all the difference. 11 hours is a common amount of sleep to need for young school aged kids. Teens typically need 9 hours. If you need sleep help, check out my website.
www.GetQuietNights.com

Not ready to commit to a plan or a sleep package?

Get a group together and we can do a group workshop. Minimum 5 people/couples. This would be different than the free talk I give to Mom’s groups. We will talk specifics and methods that you can implement immediately. If you have 5 or more people, the host gets to come free. $50 per family. Runs about 2 hours. Follow up support is available a la crate.
Workshop fee will be deducted from full package price if you choose to get a personal consultation afterwards.
A good sleep makes a world of difference.
Tracy Spackman
www.GetQuietNights.com
 

Reaction of a 5 Year Old

A 5 year old’s morning response to sleep coaching day 6 after lots of resisting last night, “That was the best sleep I’ve had in weeks!” Mom said, “That was the best sleep you have had in your life!”
I know it’s only going to get better for them.  This family has had trouble with sleep for a long time and needed to lay with their child to help her fall asleep and she repeatedly came to their bed in the middle of the night.  Sound familiar?
For sleep help, call me 602-524-7610, email me Tracy@GetQuietNights.com  www.GetQuietNights.com

Radio Guest on Baby & Toddler Instructions Show with Blythe Lipman

Today I made my first radio appearance. I was a little nervous but once I start talking about sleep I just get on a roll.  You can hear the podcast here http://bit.ly/13aaPza .
I was a guest on Blythe Lipman’s show Baby & Toddler Instructions which broadcasts on www.Togenet.com on Wednesdays at 11am EST.  Or 8am Arizona time.  We talked about the common things that keep babies from sleeping, what I do, how I do it.  Who needs me and who doesn’t and funny stories about sleep coaching.  I’m a gentle sleep consultant which means I don’t use Cry It Out.
You can find me at www.GetQuietNights.com
Tracy Spackman

Daylight Savings and Sleep Shifting

Daylight savings changes are around the corner for many families and I’ve been helping families prepare for this change. Your 6:30 wake up is about to become a 5:30 wake up. Yikes!   Or maybe you have a 5:30 wake up and a 5:30-6pm bedtime and want to shift everything forward.  Totally Understandable!
The easiest way to handle the shift is to add a late afternoon nap that is a full sleep cycle that would push the bedtime later and then follow up the next day by pushing the naps and meals the same amount of time later. You may be able to jump a whole hour or you may be doing 15-30 min “baby” steps.

If you can’t get a late afternoon nap, start in the morning by pushing light exposure, breakfast and the first nap of the day 15-30 minutes later. Use a lot of distraction. It’s better to have an overtired morning nap that can get caught up over the day than an overtired bedtime that sabotages the whole night. Then keep that shifted schedule all day.
If your baby has good sleep habits and skills, then you may be able to just jump cold turkey to the new time and they will surprise you by adjusting faster than you do.
If this is not your only issue and you need sleep help, give me a call
-Tracy Spackman 602-524-7610 www.GetQuietNights.com
Follow me on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/QuietNights  to post questions and see how other families are doing with their sleep coaching.

Need Sleep? Tips for Early Rising

I talk to parents about this topic all the time and I know, it’s so hard when you are experiencing early rising.
Rise and Shine: Tips for Early Rising By Kim West, The Sleep Lady
Mornings for some of you, it seems, begin as early as 4 AM as others of you lounge around until 9 AM waiting for your baby to wake up. Both of these scenarios, however, can have their own repercussions. Waking up too early can mean a tired family and earlier naps, throwing off bedtime rituals later. Waking up too late does the opposite, pushing nap time to later in the day and sometimes prolonging bedtime. The solution is to find a schedule that works for you and your family and teach your child to stick to it!
Early risings sometimes have a very simple solution. If too much light is coming into the baby’s room, buy room-darkening blinds (also good for napping). If an external noise – garbage trucks, songbirds, or a dad with a long commute who has turned on the shower-is waking him, you might want to try a white noise machine. Unfortunately, it’s not always so simple.
If your child is awake at 6:00 or 6:30 a.m., cheerful, refreshed, and ready to start his day- even if you aren’t- you’ll probably have to live with it- that’s a common and biologically appropriate wake-up time for a baby or small child (as long as they went to bed at a reasonable hour). Remember to adapt the meal and nap schedule to suit his early hours.
If your healthy baby is under 9 months old and you think he is waking up very early because he is hungry, try waking him for a final feeding about 11:00 p.m. as an interim step, and also work on making sure he takes more food during the day.
When your early bird stirs, go to his room immediately. You want to try to get him back to sleep ASAP, not let him scream himself awake. Give him his lovey and try to soothe him back to sleep without picking him up. Follow the Sleep Lady Shuffle guidelines outlined in Good Night, Sleep Tight. Even if he doesn’t doze off again-and not all babies will at first-do not turn on the lights or get him out of his crib until 6:00 a.m. no matter how much he protests. Getting him up earlier, while it is still dark, sends a confusing message and is another example of intermittent reinforcement. He can’t understand why he can get up in the dark at 5:45 a.m. but not at 2:15 a.m. Also, many parents I’ve worked with have learned the hard way that if they let him get up at 5:45 a.m., the next thing they know it’s 5:30, 5:15, etc.
I usually recommend that the parent stay in the room for this early-morning routine. If, however, you feel your presence is encouraging him to be more awake, as often occurs with older children, you can try leaving his room after a bit of reassurance and see if he falls asleep again on his own. Check on him every ten to fifteen minutes. If you stay in the room, keep the interaction minimal. Try sitting in a chair with your eyes closed. When the clock finally strikes 6:00 a.m. and he’s not falling asleep-and it can seem like it takes a very long time to reach 6:00 a.m.-leave the room for a minute or two. He may cry, but try not to let it bother you, you will be right back in a minute. When you come back in, make a big deal out of “good morning” time. Do your dramatic wake-up. The morning routine is the flip side of the bedtime-routine coin. Your goal is to help him distinguish between day and night, to know when it really is time to get up. Your message must be clear: “I’m getting you out of the crib because it’s morning time-not because you were crying.”
If your child has already transitioned to one nap and still wakes before 6am, don’t let him nap before 12noon. If he naps from 11:00am-1pm he will then be overtired at bedtime which will lead to early rising again-the cycle continues.
If your early riser is over 2 or 2.5 years old and sleeps in a bed, then you will have to return your child to their bed and treat this like a night wakening. Continue with your Shuffle position until the clock strikes 6:00 a.m. Consider using an alarm clock radio to help signal to your child when it is wake up time. If you sometimes let you child get out of bed and start the day before the music comes on then he or she will not take the alarm clock seriously!
Important points about early rising:

  • Nap deprivation, going to bed too drowsy and too late a bedtime cause early rising!
  • Skipping naps and putting your child to bed later will cause early rising-I know it’s not logical- you and I would never do that – but it is true!
  • You can’t assume your child needs less sleep than the average until they are taking decent naps and sleeping through the night for several weeks.
  • Room darkening shades are critical!
  • Early rising takes several weeks of utter consistency to change so stick with it!
  • Rule out underlying medical conditions that can cause early rising.

Patience, consistency, and understanding of both your child and his needs are critical for this process to be successful. Be firm and be loving and good mornings will be right around the corner! I wish you both many happy mornings together!
You can find this article at
 https://fdv89870.infusionsoft.com/app/hostedEmail/1892944/dbf7141c3b9bf44a
For great sleep help call Tracy Spackman 602-524-7610  www.GetQuietNights.com
 

Rise and Shine! Daylight Savings Tips

I wanted to share this great article from Kim West the Sleep Lady
It’s October already! Fall weather, sweaters, pumpkins, crisp air and chilly nights. I love it. This month’s article about early rising should be helpful given the time change we made at the beginning of this month. With the sun rising earlier now room darkening shades are critical!
Mark your calendars: On Sunday November 4th at 2am most of us (outside of Arizona) will set the clocks back an hour (Fall back).
Daylight Saving Time affects us all – young or old. In the fall as darkness descends earlier, it is harder for our bodies and minds to adjust to the lack of extended sunlight. This can sometimes become a precarious time for children on the cusp of developing an established sleep pattern. Hopefully the tips below will help ease you into a cozy routine for fall!
This fall we will change the clocks back an hour at 2:00 am on Sunday, November 4th. The next morning let your child wake up at his natural time- which according to the clock will be an hour earlier (but not before 6am). Schedule your day according to the new clock time. If your child’s bedtime was 7:30 pm the clock will say 6:30 pm. Make sure your child is well napped so they can make it to at least 7:00 pm the new time. If your child is too tired the first day and you fear they will miss their sleep window then put them to bed at 6:30 pm and try to gently push their bedtime later the next day. She may wake up early for a few days but then she’ll adjust. Stay consistent and don’t her start her day before 6:00 am (new time).
Sweet dreams,
Kim West, The Sleep Lady
You can find this article at
 https://fdv89870.infusionsoft.com/app/hostedEmail/1892944/dbf7141c3b9bf44a