Is your babies bedtime too late?
Nurturing the Nurturer postpartum doula insights
A lot of the sleep issues I come across are products of a bedtime that is too late. The awake time between the last nap of the day and bedtime is the most sensitive. What I mean by this is that if we are putting baby down too late, stretching baby out too long, it is a recipe for nightwakings, a restless sleep and an early morning wake-up. Therefore, it is vital that we are really ‘nailing’ bedtime and that we aren’t keeping baby up too late. What time would you put an 8 year old to bed? Likely not at 10:00pm, right? Then why should a little baby, only months old, have a bedtime that late? It should be the exact opposite – babies should be going to bed much earlier than older children as their sleep needs are exponentially more than a school-aged child
So how do I know when I should put my baby to bed for the night? As I mentioned in the first paragraph, it is of utmost importance that the stretch from the last nap to bedtime is not too long as this will cause fragmented night sleep. Below, I will outline how long that last stretch should be, and as well, how many naps on average that babies need at each age. Keep in mind as well, that if the last nap was very short, you may need to shorten the awake time even more.
0-2 months: babies this age sleep around the clock and have 4 or more naps every day. Bedtime in newborns is naturally late, usually around 9:00pm or later, but it is important to start moving the bedtime earlier around 6/8 weeks. By 2 months, baby’s last nap should be ending by 6:30pm. Bedtime should be around 6:30-8:30pm and should occur about 1-2 hours after the last nap ends.
3 months: babies this age should be on a solid 4 nap schedule with the last nap of the day ending by 5:30pm. Bedtime should be no later than 1.5-1.75 hours after the last nap ends. Remember, this is asleep by time so we want to put baby down 15 minutes prior to this to allow him time to fall asleep. So, this means that bedtime should not be much later than 7:15pm.
4 months: This is the age where babies will transition from 4 naps to 3 naps. This might mean that your baby will flip-flop back and forth between 4 naps and 3 naps depending on what time she woke up in the morning, and the quality of the day’s naps. If it is a 3 nap day, it is likely you will be needing an early bedtime. Do not be afraid of an early bedtime during nap transitions – it will be your saving grace! At 4 months, all naps should be ending by 5:00pm with bedtime happening about 2-2.25 hours after the last nap ends. So again, this means that bedtime should not be much later than 7:15pm.
5 months: Babies at this age should be solidly on a 3 nap schedule. All naps should be ending by 5:00pm and bedtime should occur no later than 2-2.5 hours after the last nap ends. This means that bedtime will be around 7:00-7:30pm which is a very age-appropriate bedtime considering you just lost one entire sleep period when you transitioned from 4 naps to 3, and babies this age still need 11-12 hours of night sleep with up to 2 night feedings.
6/7 months: Babies still need 3 naps at this age and most stay on a 3 nap schedule until 8/9 months of age. Naps should be ending by 5:00pm with bedtime happening 2.25-2.75 hours after the last nap ends. So a bedtime of no later than 7:45pm is age-appropriate.
8/9 months: This is the age where most babies will drop their 3rd nap and move to a 2 nap schedule. This nap transition also means that we want to use a super early bedtime on the days where we can’t fit in a 3rd nap or baby refuses it entirely. Do not be afraid of putting your child down to bed as early as 4:45pm. This does not mean that baby will be up at 4:00 in the morning! Remember, less day sleep = more night sleep. You have just lost an entire sleep period so baby will need to make up for this loss of sleep during the night. Our goal with babies younger than 9 months of age is to protect night sleep at all costs. There is no advantage to a late catnap and thus a later bedtime if baby is up every 3-4 hours at night crying. All naps should be ending by 4:00pm with bedtime occurring 3-3.75 hours after the last nap ends. This means a bedtime no later than 7:30/7:45pm.
10-18 months: This section is for babies within this age range but still on 2 naps. Most babies keep 2 naps until 13-18 months, with the average being 15 months. Do not be too quick to drop that second nap as the longer we can hold off this transition, the smoother it will be. Again, all naps should be ending by 4:00pm with bedtime happening between 3-4 hours after the last nap ends. Note: we would want to use the lower end of that range for younger babies closer to 10-12 months. As well, as we approach the 2-1 nap transition the afternoon nap may shrink and become less restful. This means that you will want to shorten the time between this nap and bedtime as well to keep baby well-rested. Bedtime should be no later than 7:00-8:00pm. If you are finding that baby starts to wake frequently at night or earlier in the morning than usual, try scaling back bedtime even more, possibly to even 2.5-3 hours after the last nap ends. This is a normal pattern as we get closer to dropping the second nap. It can seem daunting to move your child’s bedtime earlier when previously they were going to sleep much later but it is very important in order to ensure good quality, healthy, and restorative night sleep. Make sure that if you are working to move the bedtime earlier, that you have a consistent and soothing bedtime routine in place to signal to the child that this is in fact bedtime and not another nap. At the beginning, you may want to do a bath every single night as this is often a surefire cue to babies that bedtime is impending. A lot of parents may worry that their spouse will never see the baby if bedtime is so early but if baby was previously sleeping in because of the late bedtime, then the other parent may get an opportunity to see baby in the morning once baby’s wake-up time moves earlier and to a more ‘natural’ time. Unfortunately, babies very rarely fit into our schedules as their sleep needs are just so high, but there is not much for a baby that is more important than healthy sleep (well, food maybe!)
Pam Edwards is a Certified Infant & Child Sleep Consultant and founder of Wee Bee Dreaming Paediatric Sleep Consulting, now based out of Kamloops,