New Mums and Dads and even parents with several kids, often find that their little baby may not be sleeping as well as he or she should.
Many parents look for the underlying cause of the problem, hoping to find a simple answer. This also leaves some parents questioning if feeding could have something to do with the problem.
The intent of this article is to investigate further into the different aspects of feeding your small baby and examine the effects that feeding could perhaps have on a baby's sleeping routine and habits.
First, we should list the particular feeding areas that we will be discussing. These are:
Mixing Breast-feeding and Bottle Feedings
Feeding your baby to sleep
What are YOU eating and can it affect your baby's sleeping pattern?
Can solids help your baby sleep?
Mixing Breast-feeding and Bottle Feedings
It is believed that a mixture of bottle and breast in feedings could potentially lead to sleeping problems. There are a couple of different reasons for this when you are breast-feeding your little baby. With each feeding, the breast is signaling to the brain that more milk needs to be produced for the following feeding. When a bottle is incorporated into feedings, this process could be interfered with. The breast will start to produce less milk due to the less frequent breast feedings.
Also, during the times when you do breast-feed your baby, he or she will not get as full with the breast-feeding because of the lessening of milk supply. Therefore your baby will require feeding more frequently which will mean his or her sleep patterns will be interrupted by the need for feeding.
Feeding your baby to sleep
Feeding your child until he or she goes to sleep may be creating a problem with their sleep patterns. Your baby will soon begin to recognize that you feed him or her at bedtime. This will become something they depend on and expect. Normally, this will be the situation with each waking throughout the night as well.
There are of course, techniques you can use to stop your baby from depending on feedings to fall asleep.
Firstly, change the time or the amount of time you feed your baby when nearing his or her bedtime. Doing so will gradually remove the association of bedtime with feeding.
Another option is to feed your child earlier in the evening instead of as a bedtime routine. When you do these things your baby will not associate feeding with bedtime. This will help your baby to learn to fall asleep on his or her own accord.
What are YOU eating and can it affect your baby's sleeping pattern?
The answer quite simply is yes. As a breast-feeding mom, everything that you drink or eat will affect your breast milk. If you do not eat the correct amount of foods and calories daily, your breast milk is greatly affected. It is important that you eat the recommended three meals daily and maybe a few snacks in between. Your milk needs to have adequate calories in it in order for your baby to feel nicely full and satisfied. If it does not, he or she will continue to feed longer until full.
You need to eat healthier foods and eat them more regularly, as well as having plenty to drink throughout the day. This will help your milk supply, thus helping your baby and his or her sleep patterns. The fuller your baby feels, the better he or she will sleep.
Will solids help your baby to sleep?
Many people believe this will help, but studies have not associated any change in babies who were fed by the breast and / or bottle and those who are fed solids. This has not been proven to help the baby to sleep at all. Generally, Doctors do not recommend adding solid foods prior to six months of age.
Chris Towland
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How to Deal with Your Baby’s Sleeping Problems
Many people would attest how rewarding parenthood can be, but these same people would also say how difficult it is to take care of a baby. Perhaps the most difficult part of having baby is sleep – the baby’s and yours as well. It is thus important to know how to deal with baby’s sleeping problems so that you can keep your sanity throughout your child’s babyhood.
Here are some tips on how to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems:
1. One way to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems is encourage a positive attitude toward sleeping at night – sleeping is an ordeal that cannot be forced into your baby, and in fact, forcing can just create more problems. The most that you can do is to stage a situation that is secure enough for your baby to be taken over by sleep. You should have a long-term goal in mind and that is to encourage your baby to have a positive attitude toward sleeping by instilling that sleep is something good to do, and not something that one has to do out of coercion or fatigue.
2. Help your baby get used to several sleep associations instead of just one; this will help you deal with your baby’s sleeping problems. There are different cues for your baby to sleep, it may be a song you sing, cradling, rocking, the blanket or whatever thing or activity that accompanies sleeping. It may not be a good idea if there is only one thing that your baby associates with sleep – what will happen if that is absent (e.g. you cannot sing for a night, you had to wash the blanket)? The baby should be able to sleep without being dependent on one stimulus.
3. Another way to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems is keep the baby calm during the day – some people recommend tiring the baby during the day so that he or she would sleep throughout the night. This can actually be counterproductive. Being calm and secure during the day helps the baby keep calm at night as well. If your baby is restless at night, make a list of situations that could have made him or her unsettled during the day. Try to eliminate these things and observe if things would improve during sleeping time.
4. Keep startling sounds away – you do not really need to make the nursery sound proof since you baby can actually block out noise. However, sudden episodes of sound can be very startling even if they are just squeaks or small squeals. Be sure to have your hinges and joints oiled, put the dog away, turn off the phone ringer when your baby is sleeping so that there would not be any suddenly disturbing noises around to cause baby’s sleeping problems.
5. Leave a bit of your self – baby’s sleeping problems stem from separation anxiety. You do not really have to be present the entire time your baby sleeps, but you can leave something behind that would remind your little one of you. Record your voice singing your baby’s favorite lullaby and have it playing on a loop. Leave a piece of your clothing or a breast pad so that your baby can smell your presence. These things can help keep secure your baby and a big help to resolve baby’s sleeping problems.
It is indeed important to keep your baby well-rested; otherwise, you yourself would not be able to rest. Knowing how to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems is a very essential part of parenthood.
Did you know that in as little as 35 minutes, you can solve your baby’s sleeping problems? Discover how to get your baby to sleep soundly through the night…every night visit Get Your Baby to Sleep
Here are some tips on how to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems:
1. One way to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems is encourage a positive attitude toward sleeping at night – sleeping is an ordeal that cannot be forced into your baby, and in fact, forcing can just create more problems. The most that you can do is to stage a situation that is secure enough for your baby to be taken over by sleep. You should have a long-term goal in mind and that is to encourage your baby to have a positive attitude toward sleeping by instilling that sleep is something good to do, and not something that one has to do out of coercion or fatigue.
2. Help your baby get used to several sleep associations instead of just one; this will help you deal with your baby’s sleeping problems. There are different cues for your baby to sleep, it may be a song you sing, cradling, rocking, the blanket or whatever thing or activity that accompanies sleeping. It may not be a good idea if there is only one thing that your baby associates with sleep – what will happen if that is absent (e.g. you cannot sing for a night, you had to wash the blanket)? The baby should be able to sleep without being dependent on one stimulus.
3. Another way to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems is keep the baby calm during the day – some people recommend tiring the baby during the day so that he or she would sleep throughout the night. This can actually be counterproductive. Being calm and secure during the day helps the baby keep calm at night as well. If your baby is restless at night, make a list of situations that could have made him or her unsettled during the day. Try to eliminate these things and observe if things would improve during sleeping time.
4. Keep startling sounds away – you do not really need to make the nursery sound proof since you baby can actually block out noise. However, sudden episodes of sound can be very startling even if they are just squeaks or small squeals. Be sure to have your hinges and joints oiled, put the dog away, turn off the phone ringer when your baby is sleeping so that there would not be any suddenly disturbing noises around to cause baby’s sleeping problems.
5. Leave a bit of your self – baby’s sleeping problems stem from separation anxiety. You do not really have to be present the entire time your baby sleeps, but you can leave something behind that would remind your little one of you. Record your voice singing your baby’s favorite lullaby and have it playing on a loop. Leave a piece of your clothing or a breast pad so that your baby can smell your presence. These things can help keep secure your baby and a big help to resolve baby’s sleeping problems.
It is indeed important to keep your baby well-rested; otherwise, you yourself would not be able to rest. Knowing how to deal with your baby’s sleeping problems is a very essential part of parenthood.
Did you know that in as little as 35 minutes, you can solve your baby’s sleeping problems? Discover how to get your baby to sleep soundly through the night…every night visit Get Your Baby to Sleep
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