“A two-year old is kind of like having a blender, but you don’t have a top for it.”
Jerry Seinfeld
Babies are malleable creatures that thrive on routine. This will not be obvious during their first week of life. They will eat, sleep and poop randomly and without any consistency. You will be running around, on an endless loop, wondering what day it is and if that 3 on the clock is A.M. or P.M.
However, as the weeks go by, you will establish a slight rhythm. Things will begin to make a little sense. Suddenly, your baby may seem to nap at roughly the same time each day, or at least with the same amount of hours between each sleep. You may be able to leave the house for a brisk walk; you may be able to drive around your neighborhood and taste that sweet, sweet freedom through a crack in the window.
Don’t be fooled, this isn’t a period to be enjoyed. This is your window. This is when you begin to train your baby to fit your schedule, so you can get your schoolwork done when the semester starts. This is when you begin to establish boundaries that will (gently) nudge your baby towards sleeping when you need to work. Don’t worry, your baby wants this. They’re basically begging for that bedtime routine, they’re screaming for the consistency that the “eat, sleep, play” schedules provide*.
Perhaps “What to Expect When You’re Expecting” would phrase this topic a little more eloquently. Perhaps their section is titled “How to Gently Adjust Your Baby’s Rhythm to Match the Beat of Yours.” However, as a millennial, your attention span is limited. So, in an effort to be as concise as possible…
How To Train Your Baby (*From the Perspective of a Parent, Not a Certified Sleep Expert)
- Establish a bedtime routine as early as possible.
Sleep training will be covered in a future post, and young babies (especially newborns) will not be responsive to this strategy at such an early age.
However, establishing a bedtime routine as soon as you leave the hospital can encourage baby to view evening and nighttime as periods of longer, more condensed sleep (which equates to more rest and homework time for you). You should expose your baby to daylight during the day, and keep the room very dark during nap times and at night. This helps establish their circadian rhythm and, in turn, reminds your baby that nightfall = bedtime.
Your bedtime routine should last roughly 30 minutes, and perhaps feature a dramatic reading of Green Eggs and Ham, a warm bath and a slight spritz of lavender while you administer a brief massage (babies are high maintenance; this is a reality you are stuck with now). - Get your baby on a nap schedule.
Babies have wake windows, meaning how long they should be awake before you delve into overtired land (not a happy place). You should respect your baby’s wake windows, and attempt to get them on a nap schedule where you consistently put them down after the same interval of time following each nap.
Most newborn to 6 week babies have a wake window of 1.5 hours (this is an average, not a rule). This means that at about 80 minutes, you should start reading your baby a story, singing a lullaby and putting them into their crib for a nap. If you can consistently predict each nap, and they can become accustomed to this routine, you can find a way to comfortably complete your assignments by creating somewhat of a schedule for yourself. - Be wary of sleep crutches.
Homework, perhaps real work, and life in general are not very accommodating to sleep crutches. Driving for hours on end in the middle of the night, because this is the only way that baby will sleep, is not a sustainable practice.
Rocking, nursing, swaying, dancing, bopping, pacifiers — these are all crutches that will teach your baby that sleep is associated with one of these activities. Putting baby to bed is difficult, and you should definitely comfort them in the early stages. However, if your baby is not fussy, try putting them down (swaddled, on their back, in their own space, in a dark room, at a comfortable temperature, perhaps with a white noise machine on) and see whether you can bypass these crutches altogether. - If Baby Won’t Sleep, Consider Baby-Wearing
If your baby, despite your best efforts, will not nap or sleep — then a possibility would be to multi-task and complete your homework while wearing your baby. Proximity to mom is generally irresistible to a tired baby, and working on a history assignment with a mini-me strapped to your chest makes the whole process a little less daunting.
*disclaimer. This is not a verifiable fact, merely speculation based on an assumption.
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