Questions tagged [sleep]
How and when children sleep. For questions on how to get them to sleep, see the [bedtime] tag.
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Why does my infant wake crying the instant we put him in his bed?
This is probably a classic but here goes. Some time between midnight and three my 9 month old will wake crying. Often he is hungry or has gas and can be fairly easily consoled and falls asleep in our ...
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What are some do's and dont's for an effective bedtime ritual?
I think most parents agree that it's helpful to follow some fixed ritual when putting a child to bed.
What elements in such rituals are particularly useful, and what should be avoided?
There are ...
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Bedtime for 12-13 year old girl
My 12-13 daughter currently goes to bed at 9:00 PM but lately she's been asking to go to bed at a later time, like 9:30 or 10:00 PM.
I know she'll be starting high school soon and might need a later ...
user31083
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Do I really need to wake my newborn to feed him?
We have a two week old child. He's eating well during the day, eating at least 8 times a day, and is breast feeding. His weight gain has been 'normal' so far, and he regained his original birth weight ...
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Can an infant choke on spit-up?
I have a 5 week old daughter. She spits up after feeding sometimes (especially if she feeds too much in one sitting). We have been worried about her choking on the spit-up. Especially in the night ...
user30275
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Is there any scientific evidence in favor of co-sleeping with children?
Many people choose to co-sleep with their children because of supposed psychological and sleep quality reasons. Are there any scientific studies or other concrete evidence to back them up?
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How quickly do I need to change my newborn with a dirty diaper?
How quickly do I need to jump on changing a dirty diaper? What are the downsides of waiting vs getting right to it?
I have two specific scenarios in mind:
I'm holding my son during the day time, ...
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How do I get my 6-month-old to sleep better at night?
So our 6-month-old boy still doesn't sleep through the night. He still wakes up at least once and wants to eat.
He takes 3 naps during the day, ranging from 30 minutes to 1.5 (sometimes 2) hours.
We ...
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What to do about my toddler's fixation on the smell of her mother’s hair?
I would like to help my 2-year-old daughter sleep without smelling and pulling my wife's hair. Every night, my wife gets nervous and headaches, as our daughter pulls her hair for at least 30 minutes. ...
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Getting a 2-year-old back to sleep in the middle of the night
We have always had trouble with our little boy not sleeping through the night. He will do it in spells (every night for a week, then not at all for a fortnight). But he has recently developed a ...
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How can I stop my two year old from taking off his diaper in bed?
Recently, my two-year-old son has been taking off his diaper at nap time. It's usually full and dirty and makes a big mess. He has managed to do it while wearing all types of pants (even overalls). ...
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What are reasons for setting a teen bedtime
I'd like to set a bed / wake time (or guideline) for my teen. While a part of me would say something like 8:00 a.m. in summer, something like being up by 10:00 is okay with me. But logistically (...
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Is putting a 9-year-old to bed early abusive?
My 9-year-old goes to bed between 6:00 - 7:00 pm, though she doesn't go to sleep for an hour or so later. Her teacher was "very concerned" about us putting her to bed so early and commented that it "...
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How to calm a toddler before bedtime?
I don't know about older children, but toddlers often get more agitated as they get more tired and by the time they are in bed it can take a while before they actually sleep.
I often read that taking ...
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How can we 'gracefully' stop taking our 5yo for a late-night toilet visit every night?
We have a 5 year old daughter, L. Her development is normal, she is a bright, happy girl with perfect daytime continence. She has no problem using the toilet entirely unattended.
However, we have a ...
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How do you manage free time when you have kids?
My problem is I have almost zero free time. I have two young kids 3 and 2 when they where young my wife didn't want to let them fall asleep by themselves so now I take the 2 year old and my wife ...
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How do you potty train for overnight?
My three year old is well on her way to being potty trained. She rarely has any accidents, , at least during the day. My wife and I put her in pull ups to sleep at night.
My question is, whats the ...
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How can my toddler learn to stay under the blanket at night?
My 2yo son slept in a sleeping bag (see image below) until around 1½ years old, then he didn't like that anymore so we switched to using a blanket. He moves around so much while sleeping that the ...
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How can we get our son to stop sleeping in our bed?
My son is 2 years old and he sleeps with us in our bed. We have tried every possible way of getting him to leave our bed at night, and I'm getting nervous about him growing out of it. My wife and I no ...
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Baby always rolling over and ending up sleeping on his stomach, is it dangerous?
Our 3 months old baby is very keen on rolling over and being on his stomach. Most of the time he automatically rolls over in a few minutes after we put him on his back, including during bed time. Is ...
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Are there any dangers or downsides to white noise as a calming tool
We find white nose to be extremely effective for soothing our 5-week old son. Loud white noise (60 decibels or so) will help soothe him when he is overtired and crying, and if we play soft white noise ...
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Advice for carrying out the "Stay in Bed" technique with our 2-year-old
My two-year old has always had trouble settling and sleeping through the night, but recently the problem seems to have become an awful lot worse. It all came to a head one night a few weeks ago after ...
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Our 4 year old won't fall asleep until 11pm
Our 4 year old doesn't like to sleep. I know that sounds like what every kid says, but let me clarify. She doesn't cry at bedtime, she just won't sleep.
We start to get her ready for bed around 8pm. ...
user1446
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Do we NEED to help a baby learn how to self-sooth? And how long can it take?
Before our girls were born, I told my husband that I didn't want to go through "crying it out" because I knew I wouldn't be comfortable with it. At the time he agreed with me.
However, after close to ...
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How can I get my 12-month baby to sleep in her bed?
My 12-month baby doesn't want to fall asleep in her own bed. We could do it in her rocking cot, but now it's too small, and currently we get her to sleep outside of bed, but every time she wakes up ...
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How do I help my 4 month old nap longer?
My daughter is 4 1/2 months old and she only naps for 30-45 minutes at a time. She wakes up happy, but she is tired again after a little over an hour.
I know some babies are naturally short nappers. ...
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Is it traumatic for a toddler to be left in their bedroom with the door shut?
I've posted here before asking for advice for getting our toddler (2 yrs 5 mths) to sleep, as he's going through a very difficult phase. Once put to bed, he constantly gets out of bed and/or screams. ...
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Should I respond to "fussing" the same as crying in an infant?
During the night my 7-week-old will fuss in his sleep (grunt, flail, etc...). This fussing rarely proceeds to crying but he usually will not settle on his own. When I pick him up he will usually ...
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What can help a seven year old boy cope with night terrors and being constantly afraid?
My son used to be very independent little boy without any fears. In the last two years his night terrors and fears have gotten out of control.
He dreams about robots, house fires, tornadoes. The ...
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When upgrading our toddler from a cot to a bed, how do we keep him in his bed?
We want to convert our son's cot into a bed this weekend (starting Friday evening). We think it's time to transition because he often tries to climb out (but fails yet), and during daytime playing he ...
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Toddler does not want to fall asleep
My 2½ year old son does not want to sleep, regardless how tired he is. He will do anything and everything he can think of, just to avoid falling asleep. It usually takes 1-1½ hours (sometimes even ...
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Feeding a newborn throughout the night without letting him cry
My wife and I have a newborn on the way in a few months, and I was wondering about one aspect of night-feedings.
Popular wisdom is that we shouldn't let the baby get to the point that they're crying ...
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3-year-old boy co-sleeps: kicks and hits us in sleep
Our three-year-old boy who has been sleeping between my wife and me is becoming a problem. I know we need to transition him to his own bed and we will go through that process in the near future. We ...
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Is crib use (mostly) universal?
We have friends who decided against a crib in favor of a futon mattress on the floor. This idea came from the book Montessori from the Start. The benefits for the baby are that they aren't confined ...
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Toddler requires Mom or Dad to stay in the room to fall asleep
My toddler refuses to go to sleep without my wife or myself sitting or lying next to his bed.
Background - My son is about 2.5 years old. His birthday is in October. He has been sleeping in a toddler ...
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2 year old still does not (and has never) slept through the night
In his now 26 months of life, he has probably slept all the way through the night 15, maybe 20 times. They seemed to be an irregularity, never happened two nights in a row.
He is a easy as pie to ...
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At what age do kids start sleeping through the night?
My son is now almost 12 months old and he still doesn't sleep through the night regularly. Maybe one night a month he will sleep from 7pm->6.30am without waking, and that's only if he's utterly ...
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How can I get my 2.5 year old to sleep on his own?
My toddler sleeps well at night, its getting him to bed part is really frustrating. The main problem is that he won't let me leave the room until he falls asleep. He is not scared to be alone, he ...
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How do you prevent a toddler from waking too early?
My 18 month old has started waking up progressively earlier every morning for the past couple of weeks. It used to be that he would wake up between 6am-7am, which was no problem because I would wake ...
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Should we encourage our 2-year old to give up his naps?
Our son is 2 years old as of September, and he's been trying to skip his mid-day nap lately.
What usually happens is at around 1-2 PM, he'll start to get sleepy. At this time, if we put on soothing ...
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My 9-month old baby only sleeps in our arms
My daughter is 9 months old and she is accustomed to fall asleep in our arms since she was born - after falling asleep we place her in the crib. The problem is that if she feels this transition she ...
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How can I get my toddler to sleep later in the mornings?
My son, now 15 months old, was sleeping through the night, and waking up consistently at 6am. However, over the past few months he had been gradually waking up earlier. Now he wakes up consistently ...
user420
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How do you stop a toddler from trying to get into bed with her parents in the middle of the night?
For a few weeks now my 2 year old daughter has woken up in the middle of the night crying for mom or dad. This started out when we took off her diaper and she would cry to go to the potty. She picked ...
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How can I stop my toddler from having nightmares about robots?
When my son was one-and-a-half, my sister gave us a Wall.e Robot toy; it talks when you push buttons and moves back and forth. He loved it.
But all of a sudden a year later he has become terrified of ...
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What is the correct temperature and humidity to maintain in a child's room at night?
We have been advised to keep the child's bedroom cool and humid. Are there any specific guidelines on the correct ranges of temperatures and humidity?
Currently, we are using a humidifier and have ...
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How can we end nighttime 'comfort' nursing?
My wife and I are just finishing up a 4 week trip home to visit the grandparents (we live in Australia, they in North America). We have introduced the unfortunate habit in our 10 month old daughter ...
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How long can a 3-month-old go without eating?
My 3-month-old son has started sleeping through the night, with a vengeance. He sleeps for hours. And when he finally wakes up and I expect him to be starving, he's often still ready to happily play ...
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How to put a newborn/infant to sleep to bed without waking her?
There is a question "why do children wake up and cry immediately after being put to bed" already on this site, which has answers partly covering my question. But only partly.
How do I put my newborn ...
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How can we get our newborn to sleep at night as soundly as he does in the day?
We've just had a new arrival- a little boy, now 7 days old.
During the day he sleeps like a dream. As I write this, he has been asleep for around 4 hours without really stirring at all.
The only ...
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What approaches can I use with an 9-year-old who bed-wets and is a heavy sleeper?
Our 9-year-old son still bed-wets.
The problem is that he is an extremely heavy sleeper; when he needs to pee, he does not wake up - even manually trying to wake him up (either to try and pee ...
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