Your little bundle came into the world with big beautiful eyes, perfect little toes and the sweetest newborn smell. But chances are, she probably didn’t arrive with the best sleep skills. Newborns are known for having wildly erratic snooze patterns and waking up countless times throughout the night. And while it’s all completely normal, it can also be exhausting.
Older babies can be sleep trained, or taught to soothe themselves to sleep without help from anyone else, so that their weary parents can (finally!) get some shut-eye.
So is it possible to sleep train (also called sleep teach) a newborn baby? Not really, but you can take steps to help your brand-new baby sleep better and get some more rest yourself.
Sleep training a newborn: Can you do it?
While a night of longer stretches of sleep probably sounds amazing right now, unfortunately, you can’t sleep train a newborn. Here's why:
- Very young babies don’t yet have a sense of day or night. They’re simply not capable of sticking to a sleep schedule.
- Newborns can’t go all night without eating. In fact, their tiny tummies and nutritional needs mean they should be fed at least a few times overnight.
- Newborns can’t self-soothe. They need your help to fall asleep with ample soothing, like shushing, swaying and rocking.
- Crying is how newborns communicate their basic needs. You can’t spoil a newborn. When a very young baby cries, she’s signaling she needs to be fed, comforted and loved. Comforting her helps her feel safe and secure. After all, she’s just entered a brand new world, and it can sometimes be a little scary. Responding to her cries is key for teaching her one of the most important lessons of all: No matter what time it is, you’ll always be there for her.
Are newborn sleep schedules a good idea?
Newborn babies sleep a lot — anywhere from 14 to 17 hours in a 24-hour period, though it can vary. But despite all that slumbering, they’re not capable of getting onto a sleep schedule yet.
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In the very early days, when your little one needs to eat practically around the clock and doesn’t yet have a sense of day or night, she may only sleep for an hour or two at a time and should snooze no more than three or four hours before waking up to eat. So she’s just not capable of having set naptimes or bedtimes.
Operating without any schedule can be hard on tired new parents. But the good news is that this stage doesn’t go on forever. By the time your baby is about a month old, you can start giving the days some sense of structure. And bedtime routines, usually defined by a feed, a bath a few times a week, books, lullabies and cuddles, are a good idea almost right from the start.
How to help your newborn develop good sleep habits
Though it isn’t possible to set a sleep schedule for a newborn baby, you can help her develop good sleep habits from the day you bring her home.
- Start by helping your little one learn the difference between day and night. When she’s awake during the day, keep things lively by offering plenty of stimulating playtime and conversation, and head outside for some daylight too. Just be sure to protect your baby from too much sun exposure. Stick to shaded areas and keep her skin covered. If that’s not possible, apply a small amount of baby-safe sunscreen (made with either titanium dioxide or zinc oxide, which sit on top of the skin and are hypoallergenic) to her face, the tops of her hands and her feet. In the evenings, keep things quieter and dim the lights to send the signal that it’s time to wind down. After a few weeks, she’ll start to get the hang of it.
- Stick with a similar routine for naps. Feeding, rocking, soothing, songs, or a story are all gentle cues that send your baby the message that it’s time to relax (and hopefully, fall asleep).
- Introduce a basic bedtime routine. Similarly, a quick routine at night can help signal that it’s time to sleep. Try the four Bs: breastfeed/bottle, bath, book, bed.
Even with this sense of routine, keep in mind that a formal schedule is still a few months away. Trying to get your newborn to stick to a schedule, by, say, keeping her awake too long or waking her from naps early is a recipe for an overtired baby. And that can actually make it harder for her to sleep well at night.
By the time your little one reaches the 3- or 4-month mark, her sleep-wake pattern will start to solidify into a somewhat predictable schedule. It probably won’t be down to the minute, but you’ll begin to have a solid sense of when your baby will probably wake in the morning, go down for her naps and go to bed in the evening.
At that point, she'll be ready for a sleep schedule, as well as a feeding and general daily schedule.
When can you start sleep training your baby?
Most experts recommend holding off on sleep training until a baby is 4 to 6 months old.
By that point, most babies are developmentally ready and old enough to learn how to self-soothe when they're going to sleep and when they wake up overnight.
They're better equipped to handle their own crying and fussiness that might rouse them from sleep or happen before they drift off for the night. And they also don't need as many middle-of-the-night feeds.
How to cope until you can sleep train your baby
Your newborn’s short, unpredictable snoozes and round-the-clock feedings can understandably leave you drained. But it’s a completely normal part of her development — and one that won’t last for very long. (Though it can certainly feel long while you’re in the thick of it.)
That's why sleep training and schedules should wait until your baby is older and more developmentally ready.
In the meantime, keep the coffee brewing, sneak in naps whenever you can and don’t be afraid to ask for help so you can get a little more rest. A few months from now, you’ll be past this stage of extreme sleep deprivation — even if you can’t quite remember how you made it through!
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