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What's worse than dragging yourself around all day, completely drained of energy, after getting up with the baby 10x? How about not being able to find answers to your sleep problems! That's one thing the Sweet Slumber clients have in common. They say they’ve tried everything before coming to us- and maybe they have!

If YOU are a parent who cannot wait to improve sleep, this episode is for you! The Baby-Centered Sleep approach cloves the toughest cases AND supports the overall well-being of babies and young children. It even feels right!

This show explains pediatric sleep expert Meredith Brough's focus and sleep solutions that are truly centered on little ones’ needs. What a breath of fresh air to find something so rare! These are the answers that everyone should be checking out- both for their effectiveness and their loving, nurturing, big hearted focus on supporting precious little people.

00:32.45

mbrough

Hello so happy to be producing another show today. It's been so much fun to make weekly episodes. It's crazy how that used to be hard for me to imagine. And now I'm thinking of ideas all the time and like “oh maybe I should do two a week” isn't that crazy I just love it. It's been so much fun and I'm so glad that many of you are enjoying it and finding value. So thanks for being here. In today's episode called “understanding Baby Center sleep,” I'll be explaining what this is and why you should learn about it. I want to tell you about my approach today. Basically, baby-centered sleep is the new name for my style of sleep coaching. I'm using it from my programs, I'm using it from my sleep coach school, and even a mastermind for my sleep coach students. I used to call my approach “supported sleep” and that name just didn't say enough. I used it, I liked it, and what it made people think about, but it just didn't do it justice. I was talking to a friend. One of my past podcast interviewees, Amanda, about this predicament once I remember when it was a couple months ago maybe and I was like you know I just wish I could find a name for my approach that really fits, and that I really love.

02:01.74

mbrough

I just started listing out different phrases for her and I said it's centered on babies. It's centered on moms. She said “well then use baby-centerered sleep” and I was like “oh my gosh. Thank you!”  So I'm super excited. It just really fits. It's so perfect. It's also child centered and it is also mom centered but the child's at the center of everything first. So we're going to talk about that today. I want to help you understand. Why I chose that name and actually even let it lead you as a parent in improving sleep. So we'll talk a lot about this phrase and what it means. Hope this is helpful for you. So when you hear baby centered or child centered What do you think of when you hear these phrases?

02:52.76

mbrough

Obviously I already mentioned centered on the baby, centered on the child. But what it really means to me is that parents keep their focus on their baby, on their well-being, on their needs, and that they don't dismiss those things. They don't forget how important it is to put the baby at the forefront of everything. It is absolutely imperative that parents approach raising a baby this way. We need to try and figure out what they're expressing, what their nature is, what their temperament is, who they are, what they need, and what's best for them. Especially because there are some babies out there who are a lot more demanding and a lot more complex and very sensitive and they're just not the easy going Babies. You know I can understand why some people just don't get it because they're raising a child that's so easy to care for. They just don't understand why it takes all this effort but there are children that are extremely demanding and exhausting even and confusing and they're the ones I'm really concerned about and they're the ones that I work with. We are going to talk a lot about that type of child more than anything. They have different needs. They need more from their parents and it's more exhausting and they struggle with their sleep more. You know honestly one of the things about them though is that parents influence them so much more.

04:22.38

mbrough

It's almost like leaving a fingerprint on your child in a good way. You know some people just aren't going to be able to leave the same impression on their child. They're not going to be able to impact their child as much. That's a better way of putting it.  I think that's a very rewarding thing to focus on as you raise a more difficult child. Just knowing this child is going to have a major piece of you, they're going to be similar to you in many ways, you're going to see yourself in them, and you're just going to know that you've really made an impact on their well-being and I think that's beautiful. Sorry for being a little fumbly mouth today. So when it comes to raising babies, the most important thing to focus on is not us, not what we want, not what we need. In fact, those things can be very distracting and side note we have to also remember our needs I'm not saying that we completely take a back burner. We could back seat whatever because that's dangerous too. So there's a balance of making sure we meet our needs, making sure that we're not depleted, that we're leaning on our village, that we're finding a way to meet our needs. But the problem is that parents will often put their needs or once ahead of their babies when it comes to sleep. That's a real problem. It's like we go from looking at these little people as pure and innocent and beautiful and then as they become more challenging or we become more tired we lose sight of that. Maybe we even become a little numb.

05:58.28

mbrough

We get used to our kids, and we are used to being parents of a  four or five six months old maybe even sooner and parents are just like I'm desperate I need to sleep. This is what we do: we sleep train. This is what our society does. It's normal everybody tells me it's normal and we just forget. But it's so important to not lose sight of what they want, what they need, and how important those needs are to meet. Especially while we improve sleep. In my company and my sleep coach training school we believe in supporting each baby and child's optimal development and growth,  wellbeing , and future well-being. We do everything we can to never lose sight of these things. So what are some of the needs that get overlooked with old fashioned sleep training, which is definitely not baby centered sleep. So number one I'm gonna talk about a little bit more than the other ones and this is important to understand. Babies cannot comfort themselves so when they're upset, they're not feeling well, when they're over stimulated, they're something's off, they just don't feel well they cannot go, “Oh okay, if I do this I'll feel better. Oh. I'm going to use coping skills.” They can't be that complex. They don't have those abilities. They're not wired for that yet. One of the problems, one of the reasons people get confused about this is that there are easy going babies. I'll talk about that in a second.

07:29.23

mbrough

Which just don't really get worked up in the first place and they calm down settle down so easily. Then the other big factor that I notice is that the word self-soothing, which is really just meant to explain that babies might learn how to fall asleep on their own and then self-settle in between sleep cycles, that's all that's supposed to mean. People hear it and they think that babies can comfort themselves. I hear it all the time. This phrase “work it out on their own, I have to leave them to work it out on their own, they need to turn inward and figure it out.” They're not even wired to do that. Some babies have minimal coping skills from the time they're very young and again these are the easy going babies. They might turn away, suck a thumb, kick their feet, and those are just ways for them to relax. Maybe they're kicking their nervous system into gear and they're just like alright this is how I relax. I'm ready to go to sleep. It's amazing to me that there's some babies like that because of how hard it is for other babies to fall asleep or other babies to be calmed, but that is very common. Many babies don't even have those minimal coping skills but all babies rely on their parents to help them feel calm, comforted, at peace and feel better, especially when they're sick or they're teething. Okay, so you're going to see that the most across the board when they're sick or teething or in pain.

09:04.38

mbrough

So here are some other things that are overlooked, other needs that are overlooked with old fashioned sleep training. Some babies hate Independence. This is the way they're built and I say hate and that's a really strong word, but what I mean is it's absolutely not on their radar. Independence is completely foreign to them and they are not interested and it will take a really long time for them to even be ready for that. But that also affects sleep. So sleeping in their own bed or sleeping in their own room, that's going to take some time. If you are trying to approach things in a healthy way with these babies where you can tell it's not right for them and you're not forcing things. Another thing that's overlooked is babies can have trouble falling asleep. They need help. And some babies don't even want to fall asleep so they need coercion and I don't mean that in a bad way I just mean lots and lots of effort from Mom and dad. These babies also take longer to sleep for longer periods or take longer naps because they just really want to help falling asleep. Babies who don't know how to fall asleep on their own, honestly, I hear people in the baby Led Sleep world who say it's a totally normal thing for a baby to know how to fall asleep. What they're saying is nestling into Mom's arms, breastfeed to sleep, parents help them fall asleep.

10:40.98

mbrough

I'm talking about actually being able to go in a crib and fall asleep on their own. That's not natural for a lot of babies. They just cry. They don't know what to do or they might play and feel wired and stay awake forever until they crash or until they cry intensely. These are the babies who I call them signalers. They just depend on their parents for sleep and this could go on for a really long time. It could go on for a year or two years or 3 or 4. At some point they just naturally start falling asleep without so much help and so that is totally possible for parents to just wait and and hopefully things just work out. But there are babies who wake up so often. It's extremely exhausting and babies who are awake in the middle of the night and that's why I have a job because I'm not going around trying to change everything or fix everything. I want to help the families who have the toughest situations. I absolutely believe that between the experience that I have, and the tools that I have, and my intuition, my gift for this work, and God in my corner, that I can solve anything. That's been the case, really exciting to see big changes in families who would be waiting possibly years, or mom going back to work and being extremely exhausted and unable to focus, worried she's going to lose her job dragging falling asleep at work, maybe has a more serious job where being alert and attentive is super important.

12:14.46

mbrough

Maybe you know people are falling asleep at the wheel. There's so many more things that could you know list more reasons for parents to feel like they really need help with sleep. But it's these really tough cases that  I focus on the most because I feel like there's no answers out there for you. So I'm just trying to help you understand your child if you have a child like this that's not interested in Independence. That is just not learning how to fall asleep on their own or drowsy but awake or with your help. I've got answers for you. So another need that's overlooked. People think babies are spoiled or they think they're capable of manipulating us, so parents will stop being responsive. They just think babies should be left in their cribs for long periods of time and that they'll figure it out and because kids will sometimes start sleeping better when their parents do this, people call it working, but I really don't like that term for it because we don't want babies to shut down and not ask for help. We don't want them to stop crying out for help. A pretty typical thing that happens with sleep training is that once teething kicks in something really tough, you know the baby's not feeling well, they start getting more demanding and they don't sleep well anymore.

13:45.26

mbrough

And then their parents start being responsive again and then the cycle repeats. The parents get really worn out. They think they're spoiling their baby. It's their fault or my baby's manipulating me and they're relying on me too much. I'm spoiling them.

14:04.19

mbrough

Then they withdraw their support and then go through the whole cycle again. Sometimes it doesn't do anything after one repeat, sometimes multiple repeats, nothing changes with sleep. So people come to me in those situations. But what I really want to get through is all the responsiveness and showing up when your child needs you is what helps them thrive. It's amazing if you do some research on responsive parenting especially with babies. You will find so much information and insight on this. I collect articles. I collect studies on this so that I can share with people. Basically being responsive to a child surrounds them with this feeling, this sense of security of peace, absolute bliss. This helps them develop optimally in every single way and that makes sense if you think about a child's needs being met without having stress, a care in the world, not being left on their own, not having these periods of crying.  It's going to affect them. It's just common sense. Because we know that being very responsive and teaching or building security with these kids actually helps them develop optimally. That's what I focus on like let's do that for these babies. Let's give them that.

15:34.68

mbrough

I Think that's one of the best things you can keep in your mind when you're tempted to do something more drastic or forceful with sleep. Just remember that your responsiveness helps your child develop optimally in every single way. I use optimal because I don't want to say perfect because. There's genetics. There's disorders. There's things that can be a factor that can be going on and we can't cure all of those things but we can give each child their best outcome. Their best outlook you know? So Just think about that, optimal just means that we're really increasing the odds of a child developing properly in every way. So this would be the way they grow physically, the way their brains develop, the way they grow and develop mentally emotionally, socially, spiritually, mentally, intellectually you name it. Parents can affect their children's well-being in every way possible by being there for them and sacrificing their sleep, their wants, and their needs, and it's temporary isn't that amazing. So You might Think “What the heck is this sleep coach telling us to just wait and be patient and not change things.” Well it doesn't matter if you hire a sleep Coach, Sleep consultant.

17:08.31

mbrough

You're going to need these tips. You're going to need to be responsive. You're going to need to be patient. We cannot change the nature of a child so some kids are just going to take longer to sleep for ten or twelve hours at night. Some kids are going to take longer to take optimal naps. Some kids are going to go through regressions and suffer more and need more comfort from their parents. So this topic is just really important. We have to decide and commit to being responsive and being there so that these kiddos can thrive. Some people have it harder than others. Some people are going to have to keep waking up with their little ones once or twice at night. Even if you hire a coach. Maybe it's a little bit worse than that because there's a regression going on but those are temporary. I also want to just note, like I said earlier, that my approach is also mom-centered or parent-centered. I can say that because I teach moms how to listen to their intuition and I'm sorry I keep using the word mom or mother because that's my passion and that's who I love working with, but I definitely work with all types of parents. So don't don't take that wrong. I just absolutely adore helping moms because of the struggles that I've been through and that's who I relate to. Some of my programs are geared towards them. So I teach moms but also parents how to listen to their intuition and feel connected to their child while they improve sleep.

18:37.41

mbrough

I help them feel cared for, supported and validated. I help them carry their burdens. They never feel judged. They always feel they are right. They're the expert on their child. Their parenting style is right. Their sleep goals are what matter and my opinions and my feelings and my style, none of that matters. It's really off the table. It doesn't matter and I absolutely am passionate about helping mothers feel confident and at peace, and reassured. I just love the opportunity that I have to impact women as they are transitioning into motherhood. They call that merescents. I'm so excited that I have this opportunity because it's tough. It is so tough and I struggled so much on my own not having family nearby, moving a lot, and starting over often when my kids were little. But I had a church community. I made friends and they became my family. It's just really important for us to open up, to ask for help, to share our struggles, and to help other people with their struggles. And so that's where my love for mentoring was born. Just these experiences as a new mom and also learning the hard way. When I received bad advice or being on my own when I didn't have help. I know what it's like. Having five kids I Promise it's interesting. People have more kids than me.

20:10.79

mbrough

I can't imagine how they do it. But 5 kids under eight was a lot. So anyways, I'm trying to help you understand that working with me is a package. You are important to me and so is your child's well-being. I just want to reiterate that I don't believe that babies and children's needs should be forgotten to meet our needs and that might sound unkind. But even when a mom is in a really poor state I believe that there's a different answer that we don't have to turn to ferber or cry it out. I mean intense Ferber crying, that checks time, where we just follow the clock and we don't really tune in to the baby, and how they sound, and what they need. Some people think that intense crying is okay when trying to improve sleep. So other steps you might take instead that like I mentioned I believe there's other ways to approach this instead of going there. Being that village having a village turning to them accepting help, resources, people to take care of you, people take care of the baby. I don't say that lightly guys I mean I know that there's people out there who like “but I'm alone.” It's so important for you to be proactive and surround yourself with people who can help.

21:40.92

mbrough

Sometimes as professionals, you know there's organizations out there for young single moms, for single moms, for people who have less means, but you can be proactive. You can go to a church. You can find a community, you can go to mom groups, you can even just have a mom group on Facebook. I have one, come to mine, baby centered sleep, come find us, you don't have to be alone. Like I said I don't take this lightly because I've been there. I've been the village for people and it's taken a lot of effort and work and sacrifice sometimes. I started my career because of an experience I had taking care of a woman and her twin babies. I'm sorry if you've heard this before but this is a part of who I am and in being in that village. This lady that I I met the same exact day I met her, I took her home with me. She spent the night at my house and then I kept her babies for 4 nights so she could recover from illness and move into her apartment and feel a little bit sane. She had postpartum depression anxiety. She needed some rest and she needed some extra love and care. I actually helped her for several months after that and this is a very meaningful experience that I had. I love that family. They became our family. 

23:13.64

mbrough

I also drove 4 hours to help a mom who believed she was going to be admitted to a hospital for her postpartum anxiety and depression. I did not charge her for the trip. I went out there and I helped because I just couldn't stand by, I couldn't watch, I couldn't listen to her struggle. I needed to help her and I was able to help her. It was really exciting. Her little boy was sleeping really great by the time the weekend was over. It was a miracle.  So we have to be the miracles that people need during these times. We don't have to punish babies or inflict trauma on them because mom's suffering. It's not a price that's worth paying. I want you to know how to get more sleep but I also want you to do it in a way that builds your child's security, trust independence, and ability to regulate their own emotions. I say that because actually being there and providing comfort to a child helps them establish the neural pathways that will help them one day cope and comfort themselves. It's pretty exciting stuff but it does take till they're 3 , 4 or five years old and that's just the beginning of being able to cope. It's not like all of a sudden at that age they're awesome at it. We know that from being around little children I want to help you improve sleep by keeping all of those elements in place in a way that helps you feel good about yourself as a parent too. I don't want you to have regrets. I mean I tell you I meet people all the time who say.

24:45.58

mbrough

“I still regret the sleep training. I still regret the crying that I had to listen to,” and some of these people only did it for one night. There's just a better way. You'll feel confident, and reassured, at peace, you'll learn to understand your child better. And then doing so will give you more patience and compassion when your child's waking up for comfort or separation anxiety. I'm going to outline the way I improve sleep on a basic level. Hopefully you'll notice some patterns and see how you can improve sleep while staying baby centered. The first thing that I like to look at with families is consistency. Wherever there is inconsistency tighten things up, ship shape. Are you using different methods in your home? Are there multiple people who are using different methods to get a child to sleep? Maybe 1 time you are rocking, 1 time you're feeding, 1 time you're walking. Maybe all the people that are caring for the child have different ways. Try and synchronize that and see if everyone can do the same thing and simplify things. Obviously the end goal is to get the child to fall asleep on their own if they're waking often, so you probably need a sleep method and that can definitely change things. Are you all over the place and following different sleep cues? Is bedtime all over the place based on a hectic night after work? Do you put your child to sleep in different rooms all the time? People will put their child to sleep in a family area, and a bedroom, and another bedroom, and carry the baby, and drive, and back in the family room etc. 

26:16.46

mbrough

Some of that's okay, being flexible is fine, especially with a younger baby. But let's tone it down a little bit like let's use the stroller, let's use the car seat as needed. Let's use a bedroom. That's great if we can do that. Do you have a routine? Even for naps you need a routine. It can be very short but you want things to be in the same order. Do you sometimes pick up your child when they cry and other times leave them alone? Does 1 parent do this and 1 parent's very responsive? Do you respond differently at night every single time you go into to greet your baby? So those are things that you can look at to really tighten up consistency. Consistency helps little ones feel safe and secure and the more safe and secure they feel the better they'll sleep. So the next step is to go over the details of everything holistic including schedule and look for any missing links. So this is not something you may be able to do on your own but it's something that I do and my students do. Just make sure that there's nothing missing because there's so many natural factors that improve sleep. This is really important and I’m not going to spend time on it, like I said this is very basic, but these are things that you'll get when you work with us. Number 3 is work on that security. So you're working on it with consistency, you're working on it with a schedule. All of that like structure and predictability helps children feel secure. But also we want to make sure to be responsive. I say 99% responsive when I tell people about this..

28:06.99

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Because you're human and there's gonna be times when you're like worked up. You're frustrated. You're upset. You have to walk away or maybe you're in the shower or you're going in the bathroom. Those are totally understandable times when a baby might have to cry for a little bit because it's very very short term and you know babies cry to communicate. We don't want to let them get really worked up, but like if you're frustrated or upset then it's better for you to have some space. So 99% of the time be responsive and then when a child's in the room crying, they can cry for a few minutes like in the middle of their sleep, during naps or nighttime. That's normal but we want to listen to the type of cry. We want it to be really light fussing, not worked up, not intense and maybe it's intermittent like some crying, quiet back and forth. Okay, that type of thing you can wait a few minutes because kids totally put themselves back to sleep. They can cry in their sleep and that's really normal. You don't have to rush to them. But I do understand that some babies wake up all the way when we don't rush and some babies are intense right away. So they're exceptions and I actually don't worry about wait time until they do know how to fall asleep on their own. We want to protect the room and make it a happy place and spend lots of time in there. These things teach security. We want to be comforting. 

29:34.53

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We want to kind of keep this at the forefront of our our minds too. This is one of the first things that I teach and emphasize when I work with people. So I'm giving these in order and in steps. But like all this stuff happens in the first week. Then I usually wait a week or 2 focusing on all those things and then start working on teaching independent sleep skills. I just want to make a note here that this isn't proven in studies or research to improve sleep. It is pretty common knowledge among sleep consultants and sleep coaches that teaching independent sleep skills can help little ones sleep better because they're not relying on their parents. They're learning how to connect sleep cycles. One of the main reasons that I teach this is that I can do it tear free. I have my magical ways. I have 8 methods to teach babies how to fall asleep on their own without tears.

30:30.34

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And I can't wait until this is proven so people can stop questioning it because I mean I've worked with over a thousand babies now, and I've seen it so many times. I cannot express to you that this is a really huge factor key to eliminating night wakings, lengthening out night sleep, and lengthening out naps. So when I say lengthening out night sleep I don't mean just stretches I mean like they sleep later in the morning. It's pretty cool. So I've also seen this a lot in my Facebook group and my students so I promise you I'm not making this up. But I'm also not obsessed with it and I say that because. I don't believe in fixing things that aren't broken. I don't believe in this attitude of it's your fault if your child doesn't sleep well. I don't believe in a child too old to learn. You should have taught them when they're younger. I don't believe that every baby needs to know how to fall asleep on their own or they're going to sleep badly at some point. That's not true. I have absolutely especially, in my sleep group, seen a lot of babies who sleep great and they're fed to sleep babies who sleep great, and they bed share. ( safe sleep 7 side note.) I don't want anyone to think that this is a must, but basically if your child is sleeping pretty erratically. They're waking up often and need tons of support going back to sleep and it's often and you're exhausted then this is a key to making sleep better.

32:01.98

mbrough

One way to look at this is to come up with an intuitive way to get your child to fall asleep in their bed.I know that's very vague but I say it that way because mom's parents are awesome. Like if you could really think about your baby and think about what you know, what you already know, and how the goal is just to get them to fall asleep in the bed, in the crib, on the floor mattress. Whatever it is. And separate the independent part. We don't have to teach independence. They don't have to fall asleep alone with no person nearby at first. We just want them to fall asleep in a bed. That's your goal: get creative. Try to think of different ways you can work with your child. I know it can be super hard. So kids who need motion, they need to be held, they need to feed to sleep, and they need to cuddle to sleep, they're the tough tough cases. I have methods for them. So I'm being kind of general here because you and I aren't working together right now necessarily. Most people who hear me aren't working with me so I want to help you just realize that you have intuitive powers. You can be in tuned to your child and you can come up with ideas. I have a couple of podcast episodes that give some suggestions, some methods that I modified.

33:31.14

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I'm thinking it's 14. It's like a loving approach to sleep training. So look for that episode because I have some examples of methods and you can actually take that information and make your own.

33:48.16

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Ideally, you would come to me because I have methods for sensitive and spirited babies and they work really well. It's really exciting because parents just really struggle to progress in this area without my method. So Just keep that in mind we can work together I've got this for you. You can teach them to fall asleep on their own without being there later. This can be a big key to, once a child can fall asleep in their own bed, then they fall asleep with no one in the room and that can just be for the last couple of minutes, they start connecting sleep cycles more. It's almost like you get out of their way and they just show you how awesome they are. I don't mean that in a mean way because babies and children depend on their moms and they need us their parents and it's just that you're like empowering them. You're enabling them. In a good Way. You're helping them do this thing and it's exciting. So Anyone who feels kind of negative about that idea maybe look at it a little differently. Empowering them is really exciting and you know what they learn to sleep deeper. Security and that side of things helps kids sleep deeper too. So that means not being quite as attuned to all the things that are going on in their little bodies as they go through regressions and development and teething. One of the biggest goals of most parents is independent sleep and this can take a really long time for little ones.

35:19.44

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I Believe in fostering Independence. It's a natural process that happens as parents meet their children's needs and let them be very attached to them. I Just have some activities and some methods that speed this process up a little bit in a really healthy Way. So the next suggestion or the next order of steps is to respond to babies' needs at night.  I've already talked about being responsive. I already talked about how it's okay to wait a few minutes, but this is a little bit more specific. So you try to soothe the baby in the crib and pick them up when they need to be picked up. Because a lot of babies need to be picked up to feel better and to calm down. But just once try to lie them back down and then if that doesn't work, go to rocking or feeding or bouncing or whatever is the tool that helps them get to sleep. Do the least dependent steps first then the most dependent steps last when you expect your baby to feed, like this is a normal time, they always wake up at this time, do the whole process quickly and then get to the feeding. When you do things in this order, you always meet their needs and encourage independence.

36:45.94

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Okay I think this is my last 1. Think about night weaning or don't think about night weeing. People will decide like it's totally normal to wake up once or twice at night. I am not worried about this, I agree. That's great, especially before they're 1 offer it. It's not like we should decide how long they can go, like that doesn't even make sense right? But if you do want to Nightween, say your baby is older than five or six months, because I don't suggest it before that. You can actually test them. I'll talk about that in just a second. Some babies ween from night feedings on their own and that's the dream way. They just cut out feeding spikes extending their sleep. It's really cool. I love seeing that, it can happen as young as a couple months old people can be skeptics, but again, these are probably the really easy going babies, fat  little babies who eat really well during the day. Four of my kids did this at two months old. They just kept extending their night sleep on their own until it got up to 10 to 12 hours and they weren't making up. They were little piggies. They were fat and got full feedings and I got lots of good sleep. I totally appreciate that I was very spoiled, but a lot of babies, these signalers that I've mentioned before aren't going to do that naturally no matter what you do. They just don't okay, so just be aware of that and these are the babies that you probably like as a parent might be tempted to try a gradual night ween at some point.

38:21.79

mbrough

I am not 1 to force this or or push it at all. It's just parents' prerogative. A way to test is when you gradually reduce a feeding if the baby wakes up sooner than a usual stretch of sleep, that's one sign that they're not ready. But if you reduce it just a little bit and that might be you know a minute or 2 of breastfeeding or it might be like a half ounce or fifteen milliliters and they take a nice long stretch of sleep. Then that's less good. I wouldn't expect to see that the first night, maybe second or third night, because we also want to offer more food during the day and help them make up those missing calories. Doing it gradually helps them adjust gradually and it's more subtle. There's less tears over it. They just adjust and then they start eating more during the day. It's really cool. So I have parents do that, decreasing those feedings or those bottles. Every 2 or 3 days super slowly and then usually they just stop waking up for those feedings on their own. It's really cool, especially if you do it as a dream feed. I don't like to talk about this one too much because it's definitely not for everyone. I'm not pushing it and there's more details to know that I usually share with my clients.

39:57.30

mbrough

So look at this idea case by case, do not think I'm pushing this on you. Just another little tip for you. Some parents are afraid to try the gradual night weaning. Even if it's around one when that's pretty natural because they're eating lots of solids. Maybe they just aren't eating that well during the day or they're not having as much milk as a mom wants. But what I have seen is that gradual night weaning helps babies eat better during the day. Because we're offering more solids and milk and they're eating less at night. It's actually a really cool way to reverse that problem. So I just went over a lot of information with you. How I improve sleep for a lot of families. There can absolutely be more steps and more troubleshooting to do. These are just a few examples of how to improve sleep while keeping your baby's needs at the center of your work and all of your efforts. It can be hard to understand babies and their needs. It can be difficult to reprogram your mind and eliminate your fears. But these ideas and principles that I've been sharing with you are really important. I Suggest going back to some of my older episodes and listening to them so you can change your mindset, put aside your fears and anxieties and also think about your child's needs more.

41:18.47

mbrough

Episode number 5 and 14 will help you. Thanks for listening to this insight today. I hope it was helpful. If you're interested in working with me, please go to my website at sweetslumbertime.com click on the contact tab, set up a sleep intervention call, and we'll take it from there. And 1 last request before we go. If you found this episode helpful please take a moment to review my podcast on Apple Podcasts or any of the podcast apps I'm happy to hear from you and if you love this episode, please share it as well. And we want to help other people learn about the baby-centered sleep approach. I love helping you. I love bringing you relief and reassurance that you're doing your best. I love giving you hope that sleep can get better without all the tears and without waiting for years. I love being here with you. Thanks for spending time with me until next time we'll see you soon.

Key words: baby-centered sleep, meet baby's needs, optimal development, responsive parenting, gentle parenting, gentle sleep coach, help baby sleep better, spirited baby, sensitive baby, high needs baby