Toddlers and babies need a lot of sleep during the early stages to help in the rapid growth of their bodies and brain. On the other hand, parents might find it increasingly difficult to get some sleep. This is mostly attributed to frequent feeding, walking across the halls to try, and putting a fussy baby to sleep or frequent diaper changes.
Getting inadequate sleep can impact the health of parents in the long term. Though there is very little that you can do to change the schedule of your newborn, there are some alternatives. You can alter some of your pre-bedtime routines to ensure that you get some sleep.
Here are some handy tips to help you get some more sleep.
- Avoid Screen Time
New mothers might spend some time researching parenting tips or might be tempted to scroll through their social media feeds. But any sort of screen time, be it laptop, TV or smartphone can impact your sleep cycles considerably. The blue and green light that they emit can impact your sleep.
Your brain perceives that it is daytime due to these lights and thus it produces cortisol, which makes it difficult to get sleep. You must avoid screentime at least 30 to 60 minutes before sleep.
- Split Duties
It might be a more prudent option to discuss splitting duties during the night. If you are bottle-feeding the baby, you can discuss with your partner to take turns and feed the baby. Letting the mother sleep for at least 5 hours continuously is essential for her emotional health.
The same might not be feasible during breastfeeding. However, you can split the diaper changing duties at night.
- Skip Certain Household Chores
You might have a strong urge to use the vacuum cleaner or top up the dishwasher or complete a few other chores instead of sleeping. It might be more fruitful to get some sleep over getting some of these chores done. If any of your friends or family are visiting, they would understand if the house were in a bit of a mess.
- Ask for Help
You should not shy away from asking your friends or family for any kind of help during the early days. You can ask them to pick up some groceries, hold the baby while you take a quick nap or help you with changing the diaper and so on. You can even check with some friends and family members to take care of feeding the baby and changing the diaper at night.
- Utilise Parental Leave
Parental leave policies might differ based on the organisations, but there is a possibility that both parents might have access to parental leaves. Instead of taking the leaves together, let your spouse take leaves after a few weeks to help you with sleep as you transition.
The above are some tips that new mothers can use to get some sleep, which can be a challenge during the early days.
