Do babies sleep more during growth spurts?

(April 1, 2011)

When your baby has not been born yet, there is little for the baby to distinguish between night and day. The baby can sleep as much as it likes and be active when it feels like it. The rhythmic moves of your breathing usually lull the baby to sleep when it’s still in the womb. There were no sudden changes in light or temperature and no noises to wake the baby up.
Unfortunately, when the baby leaves the safe comfort of your womb, it comes into a world where there are noises, light and dark, temperature changes, and hunger. Couple this will the increasing needs of the body during the baby growth spurts, and you have a baby that cannot establish a regular sleep cycle and feels cranky all the time.

It is a very complicated task to ensure that your baby sleeps well at night and that it coincides with your own sleep patterns. Since your baby has never really been separated from you, it is also not easy to make new routines and adjust with them.

The baby growth spurts affect your baby’s sleep considerably. Babies usually have erratic sleep patterns, but during one of the baby growth spurts, the baby may be hungry all the time, therefore not getting enough sleep. As the baby is not able to get as much sleep as it would like, it may get cranky and cry even more than usual.

Typical baby growth spurts last for a few days, during which the baby will sleep more in certain blocks of time, but will experience a very erratic sleep pattern. There is no baby growth spurts formula that can help you be prepared for your baby’s changing sleep cycles and your baby’s increasing demands for food as well as attention.

There are baby growth spurt charts available with pediatricians, but none of them could possibly prepare for your own child. Different children experience their growth spurts differently, and so the baby growth spurts charts that you have, may only be indicative of what to expect. Babies usually wake up and sleep if you make them do so. The more you do that, the more comfortable the baby will be with you. Once the baby settles down in a more comfortable growth pattern, and leaves the baby growth spurts behind it, you will be able to experience a more regular sleep pattern as well as more regular feeding patterns.

Submitted by N on April 1, 2011 at 06:57