Episode 7: Newborn Sleep Insights

Today, Craig and Arielle unpack the often mystifying world of newborn sleep—those crucial first three months. The inspiration for this episode was Craig's new niece, who was 2 weeks old at the time of recording. Whether you're navigating the unpredictable waters of infant sleep or just curious about what's normal, this episode promises to arm you with the insights you need to feel a bit more in control—or at least to understand that sometimes, chaos is just part of the parenting package.

• [00:00:00] Introduction and disclaimer
• [00:01:09] Welcoming listeners back and introducing the episode's focus on newborn sleep
• [00:02:12] Discussion on the erratic nature of newborn sleep
• [00:03:22] Personal story about sleep expectations with a newborn
• [00:08:21] Explanation of active sleep in newborns and advice for parents
• [00:10:41] Impact of external factors like maternity and paternity leave on sleep
• [00:14:26] Transition to detailed discussion on sleep cues and signs of tiredness in newborns
• [00:21:08] Exploring the science of sleep cycles and the development of circadian rhythms
• [00:26:35] Discussion on the "witching hour" and strategies to cope with it
• [00:32:23] Month-by-month sleep development and expectations
• [00:37:38] Review of sleep tools and technologies affecting newborn sleep
• [00:42:35] Closing remarks and where to find more resources

Notable Quotes:

• Craig Canapari MD: "Things will get better with time, even if you're really struggling. It's funny, my older son was one of those babies that we took him home from the hospital. My wife had a c-section the first night. And he slept six hours overnight."
• Arielle Greenleaf: "I think one of the biggest things I wish I had known back in the day was I didn't know really about active sleep. And so I think when she was coming, she's going through that, what did you call it?"
• Arielle Greenleaf: "I always tell newborn parents, don't rush. They will tell you if they need you. They will, they have lungs and they can scream."
• Craig Canapari MD: "A newborn, that could be anywhere from 13 to 14 hours per or 20 hours within a 24 hour period. So if you have a baby who's natural sleep needs at that point is 20 hours a day, you are gonna feel like a parenting genius."

Links and Resources:

• Sleep and Wakefulness by Nathaniel Kleitman
• Why room sharing is important for safe sleep
• AAP Safe Sleep Guidelines
• Period of purple crying
• How many wet diapers per day
• Happiest Baby on the Block
• Bringing up Bebe- and Le Pause
• Wirecutter article on the SNOO

Connect with Us! Send us an email about questions, feedback, or ideas for future topics.

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
Welcome to the Sleep Edit, apodcast devoted to helping tired
kids and parents sleep better.
We focus on actionable evidence-basedsleep advice, so everyone in your
home can sleep through the night.
Now, a quick disclaimer, this podcastis for general informational purposes
only and does not constitute thepractice of medicine, nursing, or
other professional healthcare services,including the giving of medical advice.

(00:27):
No doctor patient relationship is formed.
The use of this information andthe materials linked to this
podcast and any associated videocontent are at the user's own risk.
The content on the show is not intendedto be a substitute for professional
medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Users should not disregard ordelay obtaining medical help for

(00:50):
any medical condition they have.
Or that their children may have,they should seek the assistance
of their healthcare professionalsfor any such conditions.
Nothing stated here reflectsthe views of our employers or
the employees of our guests.
Enjoy the show.
Well, welcome back to the sleep edit.

(01:11):
I am Dr.
Craig Canapari.
And I'm Arielle Greenleaf.
We are going to talk today about achallenging topic for a lot of parents,
which is specifically newborn sleepIn the first three months this is very
top of mind for me because my brotherand his wife just had their first baby
Oh, congratulations.
I'm an uncle now fivetimes over, which is pretty

(01:33):
Yeah.
I know I'm an expert uncle at this point.
Top uncle uncles.com.
That's great.
I think you'd be a great uncle.
I am a great uncle, honestly, Igive good gifts, like the sorts
of gifts that the parents don'treally want to give for their
right.
Like Nerf guns and stuff like that.

(01:55):
Do we do cool stuff when Iget some testimonials on here
from my nieces and nephews?
We're gonna talk about newborn sleep,specifically sleep in the first
three months of life for infants.
A challenging and confusing timefor parents who are frequently sleep
deprived and have a lot of support,
Yeah.
And I think, the number one thing thatI like to share with newborn parents

(02:18):
is just that newborn sleep is erratic.
And it's, it can be frustratingbecause you may see programs or google
schedules or methods of, schedulingyour newborn and it's just not
biologically like it's normal for ababy, a newborn sleep to be erratic.

(02:42):
Some people have unicorn babies and theybring them home from the hospital and
they sleep through the night right away.
And others, like my own theyare waking every one to three
hours, day and night to feed and.
That's normal.
So I think it's really importantfor us to set expectations when it
comes to newborn sleep in that it isslowly, actually, it quickly matures.

(03:06):
A lot happens over the first threemonths when it comes to a lot of
things, but certainly with sleep.
Yeah, I think that, thingswill get better with time, even
if you're really struggling.
It's funny, my older son wasone of those babies that we
took him home from the hospital.
My wife had a c-section the first night.
And he slept six hours overnight.

(03:27):
And I woke up in the morning and Iwas worried that he was dead, and
I ran to his room and he was okay.
But I think that there's amassive range of what is normal
sleep in a 24 hour period.
So for a newborn, that could beanywhere from 13 to 14 hours per or
20 hours within a 24 hour period.

(03:48):
So if you have a baby who's natural, Sleepneeds at that point is 20 hours a day, you
are gonna feel like a parenting genius.
It is gonna go so smoothly for you.
No matter what you do, yourbaby is going to sleep well.
Now these high sleep need babies.
You might have struggles later on whenthey're say have to, if they're going

(04:08):
into childcare or something like that,they can't nap as much as they want to.
But in the newborn period,they're very easy to deal with.
The children who are on the low endof the spectrum tend to represent a
real challenge for parents becauseI can guarantee you those 13 or 14
hours are not happening in a row.
And they're scattered throughout the day.

(04:29):
these are the parents whoreally struggle quite a bit.
There's a typicalpattern of newborn sleep.
So what we know about newborn sleepwas clear, probably pretty early on.
There's actually a famousbook I got right here.
It's A Sleep and Wakefulnessby Nathaniel Kleitman.
And Kleitman graphed out hisnewborn daughter's sleep periods

(04:54):
in the first three months of life.
And what he saw was that essentiallythere'd be a period of sleep, which
could be anywhere from one to two hours.
The baby would wake up, cry, want to feed.
Parents would changetheir diaper, et cetera.
And then pretty soon after that, thebaby would start to get tired again,

(05:18):
need to get put down again or fallasleep in a parent's arms, fall asleep
in a lot of different places andthe cycle would just repeat itself.
So there's this sort of inherentrhythmicity to it with a cycle
length of like probably two to threehours, maybe a little bit shorter
in the immediate newborn period.
I've always seen that newborn,like one single sleep cycle for a
newborn is shorter than an adult.

(05:41):
But I always have seen it as 30 to45 minutes as a single sleep cycle.
So I think what you're referringto is the ultradian cycle, and that
is when we look at measurement ofbrainwave activity during sleep.
So we will see people, most adults andchildren older than six months of age,
we will see them cycle through nonREM sleep, then REM sleep, and then

(06:04):
maybe have a brief awakening out ofREM sleep, then fall back asleep again.
In an older child or adult thatis two or three hours in an infant
that is typically 60 to 90 minutes.
And one thing that I think is importantfor parents to understand as well
is that the way that infants cyclethrough sleep, especially young

(06:24):
infants and newborns, is differentthan the way that older infants do.
Older infants and adults, they have thisslow wave sleep, which is fairly deep.
Then they go through REM sleep wherethe breathing might be a little
bit irregular, but every muscle intheir body is otherwise paralyzed
except for the diaphragm, the mainbreathing muscle in the eye muscles.
In newborns, this is inverted.
So newborns enter sleep throughthe analog of REM sleep,

(06:48):
which is called active sleep.
And what's interesting about thisis newborns don't have that complete
paralysis during REM or dream sleep.
So they will commonly cry out,move, grunt, smack their lips, et
cetera, and do all this weird stuffright when they're falling asleep.
That is often alarming to newparents, and this is normal.
Then they'll go through a periodof what is called quiet sleep, and

(07:11):
then that's analogous to slow wavesleep and then often wake up to feed.
So it's inverted right at birth.
And then once kids get to three or fourmonths, you'll see that sort of flip of
that cycling there and you'll see a more.
Traditional is not the right word.
What for the rest of thelifespan, which is non-REM sleep
and REM sleep cycling over and

(07:33):
I think you make a reallyinteresting point there.
And I think one of the biggest things Iwish I had known back in the day was I
didn't know really about active sleep.
And so I think when she was, si, youmentioned like a long, a 60 to 90
minute cycle, actual sleep cycle.
I think what I did, and I knowother parents have done the same

(07:57):
is as she was coming, she's goingthrough that, what did you call it?
When she was going through that andshe was cycling through the REM sleep,
I mistook that as she needed me.
She needed to be fed, she neededsomething, she needed to get up.
So I always tell newbornparents, don't rush.
They will tell you if they need you.

(08:17):
They will, they havelungs and they can scream.
And so if they're just twitching orgrunting or even crying out a little
bit, give them a little space and see ifthey then cycle back into quiet sleep.
Because I think one of the biggestproblems is we just don't know this stuff

(08:39):
when we come home from the hospital.
And we inadvertently create a habit of,going over to the baby when, anytime
they make a squawk or a movement.
So I think that's really something that alot of my newborns, newborn clients in the
past have said, wow, I didn't know that.

(09:00):
There's a book, I think it was like,came out seven or eight years ago,
called Bringing Up Bbe, which wasby Pamela Druckerman, I believe.
And it talked about she was raising herinfant in France which, again, it's a
western country, but there are a lotof different behaviors around sleep.
And a lot of the French babiesseemed to sleep pretty well.
And she talked about this ideathat French parents tend not to

(09:23):
rush in the first sign of trouble.
Was it le pause or something?
Yeah.
She called it La p which my Frenchfriend thought was terrible.
And that's true in this situationtoo, if you hear your baby stirring
in the monitor, just wait a moment.
You again, like you are, you doneed to be responsive in these
first three months of life.
Children don't know how to self-soothe.

(09:44):
They obviously need to feed frequently,but, if you hear a little bit of
noise coming from your child, youdon't have to rush over, pop the
pacifier in the cry hole or immediatelystart changing their diaper.
You can just wait a momentand see what happens.
Not, I'm not saying wait 30 minutestill they're screaming, but like you'll
get a feel for how these rhythms work.

(10:05):
I think the fact is babiesdon't, this sort of pattern of.
Sleep, wake feed sleep ispretty hardwired into them.
Like you're not, the cyclelengths may be shorter or longer.
Sometimes they're gonna bemore frequent during the day.
Sometimes they're gonnabe more frequent at night.
If your baby is sleeping some of thetime feeding, you're doing it right.

(10:27):
It's, if it feels chaotic, it is a littlebit chaotic because the natural maturation
of cycling through different stages ofsleep, the lengthening of sleep at night
having more sleep at night during theday takes a little while to kick in.
I think one of the tricky parts too,is again, you and I were talking about
how in the United States we don'thave maternity leave for very long.

(10:52):
At the same time, the AAP recommends roomsharing for, up to six months, but babies
are loud and they do cycle into loud,phases of sleep and it affects parents.
I think it's challenging because alot of parents, a lot of moms have
to go back to work after six weeks.

(11:13):
Paternity leave is short, andit's very stressful because
there's some urgency, right?
To get things on track.
And the fact is that there'sonly so much you can control.
And if you're maternity leave isthree months long there's a good
chance your baby's still gonnabe waking up during the night.
But you what, why don't we starttalking about the sort of sleep

(11:36):
cycles that, in the first threemonths, what you would expect and at
different stages of the game and whatparents maybe should be focusing on.
Yeah, absolutely.
I think it's really important in the firstmonth of life again, to give yourself
grace and get used to this new reality.

(11:59):
Even if it's your second, third, fourthbaby, it's going to be different.
Assume we're going to just fall intothis role of knowing what to do and
pray that our baby knows how to sleep.
But I think having some gracewith yourself is really important.
But as far as sleep goes essentiallyyour baby is probably going to just
be, eating, sleeping, waking up,pooping, eating, sleeping, It's very

(12:28):
normal for anywhere from 13 to 14hours or 20 hours in a 24 hour period.
It's very common.
Their number one job of a newbornis to gain weight and to grow.
Waking frequently to eat isnormal and should be expected,
as frustrating as it might be.
So let's see.

(12:48):
First month of life.
How frequently do youexpect baby to be feeding?
Would say anywhere fromevery one to three hours.
It depends, I've had some clientsin the past whose newborns have
just needed to, especially ifyou're establishing breastfeeding.
So supply and demand is essential.
And so in some cases, somebreastfed babies might need to

(13:12):
be fed every hour or 90 minutes.
But in general, it's probablyevery two to three hours.
I'm just giving extremes there.
So they're definitelywaking at that point.
I think it's important to understandtoo, like I think some parents think
that they need to start keeping themawake or trying to keep them awake.
And I think it's important to followyour baby's cues at this stage because.

(13:37):
You don't wanna keep a baby up 'causeit's just gonna make them uncomfortable
and grumpy and then it's going tomake you uncomfortable and grumpy.
So why don't you review some of thesleep cues that parents should be
looking for in a very young infant.
It might signal that the child is,needing to be soothed to sleep?
I think by the time they're yawningbig yawns it's definitely overdue.

(14:02):
You gotta get 'em down right away.
But I think, pulling on ears orlike any sort of rhythmic movement
to attempt to soothe I'm tryingto think of other things that
No.
I think that's good.
Because these things can be very subtle
Very
I feel like you don't miss muchby trying to put your baby down
and to them put them down, right?

(14:24):
they'll let you know ifthey're not ready to go to
Exactly.
And that's why I think following cuesand especially in that first month
of life is probably your best bet.
Do not try to look online for newbornsleep schedules at that point because
you are just going to drive yourselfcrazy and you'll be expecting something

(14:44):
that is not biologically normal.
Yeah.
I think this is the biggest challengeof the first month is parents just
learning their baby's rhythms.
I think something that's very importantto think about immediately in that
first month is safe sleep and I cannotoverstate the importance of this because.

(15:05):
Young newborns and younginfants are vulnerable.
And again, this is always a difficulttopic to talk about because it's
stressful, but infants are atrisk for suffocation and they're
also risk for something calledsudden Infant death syndrome.
So I just wanna quickly reviewthe American Academy of Pediatric.
Recommendations for safe sleep.

(15:26):
And I'm gonna go primacy is back to sleep.
That means having your baby beingput down on their back and on a
sleeping surface that is separatefrom any other human beings with
no soft pillows or blankets nearby.
You can have your baby swaddled,you can have your baby in a sleep
sack, but not with loose pillows,blankets, stuffed animals or bumpers.

(15:51):
And I can tell you, I used to use aphoto on my website and presentations
was of my three or four month oldholding a teddy bear and sleeping.
And I'm like, that's so cute on the side.
And I'm like, that's so cute.
it doesn't really scan that well.
And those of us who are sleepprofessionals, it is really common
to look at stock photos and productadvertisements with infants in
terribly unsafe sleeping environments.

(16:13):
Have a picture of Ashleysleeping in the rock and play.
Yeah.
I think that's now off the market.
there's also an recommendation forroom sharing, but not bed sharing.
And to be honest, I used to be alittle skeptical of this because
when the recommendation firstcame out, I thought the evidence
it was based on was fairly weak.

(16:34):
But with the most recent iteration ofthe safe sleep guidelines, which we'll
link to in the show notes, there was someresearch that was fairly compelling, that
room sharing, at least in the first sixmonths, which is the AAP recommendation,
does reduce the risk of SIDS.
I think there's one important caveatto offer here, which is that if room
sharing with your infant is resultingin unsafe sleep behaviors, which is.

(16:59):
Most commonly taking your babyup, falling asleep with them
on a chair, a sofa, et cetera.
Then you're probably better off speakingwith your pediatrician and maybe
having them sleep in a separate room.
I was just at a sleep conference wherethey were talking about you can have
your baby in your room, but it is okayto use a visual barrier so you are
not staring at your baby and rushingit every time they stir or move.

(17:22):
Also, when they get a little bitolder so they're not staring at you
and wondering why you aren't rushingover and giving them attention
when they're doing something cute.
That's helpful for toddlers too.
So I think that visual is,that's a really good point.
and just to hit a couple othersafe sleep things using a
pacifier in the first six months.
Breastfeeding, avoiding tobaccoexposures co-sleeping and bed sharing

(17:44):
are can be a hot button topic.
And again, at theconference I was just at.
Some parents, they had a survey ofparents who were co-sleeping and
said, and the title of the talk was,don't judge me 'cause I'm co-sleeping.
And I think that the challengeis that there is a suffocation
risk with co-sleeping.
There are ways to reduce risks somewhat,having no other adults or children in the

(18:05):
bed having the mattress on the floor sothere's no risk of entrapment against the
wall or the child falling off of the bed.
Having the parent.
Basically, you can't have any blanketsor pillows anywhere near the baby.
I think the best thing for parentsand again, often you have, you're
breastfeeding a lot during the night.
do like those bassinets that aredirectly attached to the side of the bed.

(18:30):
I think those are safe.
the cos sleepers that go inthe bed in the sleep positions.
Those aren't safe.
Don't recommend those.
But I think certainly what I'd say forparents is talk about this with your
pediatrician, especially if you feel likeyou need to deviate from these guidelines.
They're there for a reason andthat's the reason is to prevent
something tragic from happening.
some of these recommendationsare hard to follow.

(18:51):
Yeah.
one of the things that's in thenews right now, but was part of
the new Safe sleep guidelines isavoiding weighted sleep products.
So no weighted swaddles, Sleep sack.
And there's a push right now.
Some, big retailers are pullingthem off the market because of the

(19:13):
evidence that they are not safe.
This one is a big one to mebecause, the marketing is slick,
and they know that you're tired.
They know that parents are looking foranything that might help their baby sleep.
And look, this weighted swaddlewill help your baby feel cuddled
while you're not cuddling them.
Avoid, co-sleeping or whatever it is.

(19:36):
Buy this product and yourbaby will magically sleep.
Now, I had one sent to me,actually, I've had two sent to me.
Different companies and one of them wasalmost a pound and it was for an infant,
and I was shocked at how heavy it was.
Shocked.
So

(19:58):
Yeah.
And I think I just wanna amplifythat and say that when you under,
I'm a pulmonologist by training,we know that babies actually
have weak breathing muscles.
There's a lot of differentreasons why infants are vulnerable
to compromise in breathing.
Their chest wall is soft, their ribs aresoft, and their, the, also, the way that
their diaphragm, their main breathingmuscle inserts into the rib cage is

(20:22):
just not as mechanically advantageous.
Really.
Yeah, I avoid the stuff like the plague.
Swaddling is okay, and swaddlinggives that pressure cue.
A nice tight swaddle is great.
my older boy had to be swaddled, and ifhe was not swaddled sufficiently well,
he would start getting his arm out, likeHoudini, and then he would start hitting

(20:42):
himself in the head and wake himself up.
So I think that, we reallywere very careful about that.
my other kid hated the swaddle,didn't like the swaddle.
You don't have to swaddle ifyour kid doesn't like it, but
if it helps swaddle them up.
But when they start to bemaking progress towards rolling,
that's when you gotta stop
yep.
and usually that's a little bit later,but some kids roll early, so if they

(21:04):
look like they're about to startrolling, you gotta stop the swaddle.
Yeah.
but I wanted to add to month one.
day and night confusion.
So if you wanna talk about thescience behind that, I always
find that very interesting.
Sure.
So we've talked about the ultradian cycle.
There's also the circadian cycle.
Circadian refers to a cyclethat's about the length of a day

(21:26):
and a night, a 24 hour period.
And there's a reason that even inmy world, Arielle's world, the first
month or two, even the worst sleepers,they sleep most of the time at night.
They're awake most of the time of day.
And that's because this emergence ofthe circadian cycle, and there's a
lot of hormones which are signalingchemicals in the body which drive this.

(21:49):
the primary one is melatonin, whichyou may have heard of because it's
frequently used over the counter.
Melatonin is the hormone of darkness,and it, you start to secrete
about an hour before you go tosleep at night, and that's called
the dim light melatonin onset.
And then you have an offset about anhour after you wake up in the morning.
And that's but even like individualcells in the body have circadian

(22:10):
pacemakers that sort of govern things.
But maybe in the technical term isentrained by phenomenon like melatonin
being secreted at certain times.
Babies at birth do not havea mature melatonin secretion.
They do not have normal circadian rhythms.
It is quite common for your infant'slonger periods of wakefulness may

(22:31):
be occurring in the evening or atnight when you are trying to sleep.
And they may be sleeping much of the day.
And yeah, it's not a great, as much asyou love your baby, you don't necessarily
wanna be partying with them at two in themorning, although they may have a strong
preference for that, which will not returnuntil they are in college, hopefully.

(22:53):
Do you do with a parentwho's dealing with this?
How do you help them
Always like to be realistic withtiming because it's not something
that's gonna be fixed overnight.
I think when we talk about adjustingsleep or learning, sleep learning
and things like that, we think that,there are gonna be immediate results.
But when it comes to newborns, you can trythings and sometimes they'll work within a

(23:15):
few days, sometimes it'll be a few weeks.
Other times they just don'tever work until you're able
to do more formal training.
But with this particular problemI recommend getting baby outside
into the light or if you can getthem into the sunshine, if they're
awake long enough, that's great.
Otherwise, I keep daytime brightand at a normal noise level,

(23:39):
and then keep nighttime darker.
And quieter.
So we're trying to promote,because social cues do play a
role as well in developing this.
So if we are able to signal those things,then we can slowly work toward having
them distinguish between day and night.
Newborn naps can be anywherefrom 20 minutes to five hours.

(24:02):
But what I would say is a lot oftimes parents will say baby is taking
five hour naps during the day andthen up every two hours overnight.
And so what I try to do is havethem wake baby after two hours
during the day, offer a feeding.
It can be hard in the beginning, ticklingfeet, things like that, trying to get them

(24:24):
to wake up, but this, putting a cap onthat daytime sleep, even if you feed them
and they go right back to sleep, at leastyou've gotten them up and they've fed and
you're changing the fact that you wantto push those longer stretches overnight.
Those are the two things that I recommend,and also I like parents to understand

(24:46):
that it does rectify itself withinabout six weeks or so, give or take.
Yeah, we did.
Personally, we didn't struggle withthis with either of our kids, but it
can be really difficult to handle.
One thing I wanna talk a little bit aboutis sleep in motion versus sleep in a crib.
When I lived outside of Boston therewas a, well-known Starbucks, and

(25:08):
the Starbucks had a drive through.
So if a mom was desperate for theirchild to sleep, they would hop in the car
and drive to Starbucks and drive back.
And that from where we lived, thatduration of drive was, about 40 minutes.
So sometimes if you were desperate toget your kid to sleep, you'd go get
yourself a cappuccino or something.
Certainly a lot of devices likeswings are very popular, taking babies

(25:32):
in strollers driving in the car.
And I think that For older kids.
We talk about sleep onset associations,like having associations with sleep
that parents can't reproduce duringthe night lead to night wakings.
I'm less concerned aboutthis in this age group.
But I do think it's importantthat it also means attended sleep.

(25:53):
Like you should not leave yourchild sleeping unattended in a
car seat There have been, cases ofkids getting the straps, getting
malpositioned, suffocation, et cetera.
So if your child is sleeping in aswing, and we did this a lot with
our older son, it, he was in theliving room where we were now.
We didn't have to stay there every secondwatching him, but we didn't stick him in

(26:16):
a swing in his bedroom, and then just.
Not come back for three or four hours.
So I think that's animportant distinction.
'cause it is it can be reallyuseful for children that are,
have struggling to settle.
I don't have a problem with it, but justagain, the swing is fine, but don't put
your kid in there for four hours and
Not look at them
Absolutely.

(26:36):
The other thing talkabout the witching hour.
You Do you see that developing more inthe first month or in the second month?
I think we talked about those in the past.
Yeah, why don't you go with the witching
Yeah, so the witching hour,I always say it's a misnomer.
It reminds me of morning sicknessbecause it's like morning sickness
is not limited to Morning.

(26:58):
Oh, Craig, you don't evenget to know these joys.
But anyway so the witching hour,usually comes on right when dad's
coming home from work or the otherparent is coming home from work.
Someone's been home all day with anewborn and the other parent comes in
and baby decides that They aren't veryhappy and they can be extremely fussy and

(27:21):
or cry for a couple of hours, honestly.
And it's really, I remember thinkingI was never ever going to dinner with
my husband again because every nightI was just spending that time trying
to help her feel comfortable again.

(27:42):
With this, it's verydifficult to give solutions.
I think it's very individual.
Sometimes you'll find ifyou're a nursing parent.
There's cluster feeding goingon at night in this time.
And they can be eating very frequently inthe first month, like every 30 minutes or
something during this witching hour time.
And the witching hour can lastanywhere from an hour to three, four,

(28:07):
sometimes five hours, unfortunately.
But it is something that theygrow out of, and generally it's
better by six to eight weeks.
So there is hope.
It doesn't feel like it whenyou're going through it.
It feels like six to eight weeks is six toeight centuries, but it does And I would
just do what you can to get through it.

(28:28):
Ask your partner for help if you have apartner or family member or friend who
can come over to just trade off becauseit can be very difficult and stressful.
Yeah.
I.
and this ties into the period ofPurple Crying, which a program
that's put together for the NationalCenter on Shaken Baby Syndrome.
Obviously Shaken Baby is a formof child abuse, where parents get

(28:49):
very frustrated and shake theirbabies, which can be devastating.
And it's hard to imagine yourselfin this situation until your four
week old has cried for three hoursand nothing you've done has worked.
And it is incredibly stressful.
Purple is actually an acronym.
P stands for Peak of Crying.
U is for unexpected.
The crying comes and goes.
R is for resists soothing.

(29:11):
L is for long lastingand E is for evening.
So this ties into thisidea of the witching hour.
I would say to parents when your childis going through this, and really
the peak is four to six weeks of age.
At this point you've seenyour pediatrician a bunch.
If your child is feedingwell, growing well, et cetera.
You go through your checklist.
If your baby's crying,is their diaper clean?

(29:32):
Are they hungry?
is their clothing wet?
For some reason you take a look atthem, you make sure they're well
and you know it is okay to put yourbaby down someplace safe if you're
feeling frustrated and let them cry.
No matter what some people saycrying is not dangerous for babies.
Sometimes they cry.

(29:52):
It's a natural developmental phasethat we're going through here.
And, it can be challenging, but youwill get through it and then you'll move
on to month three when things tend tostart to go a little bit more smoothly.
I wonder a little bit about,colicky babies and that diagnosis
in general, but ' cause I feelnot every baby has purple crying.

(30:16):
I had a friend who ha her son had itand it was just five hours every day.
And I think the witching hour,most many babies go through, but
purple is a little more extended.
Wouldn't you say that?
It's more the just distinction or,
I think what they're trying to get atis there is a phenomenon of increased

(30:38):
crying developmentally at this period.
And for a lot of parents, it's alarming,And I'd say, yeah, the kids in the purple
crying they have this diagnosis of colic,which is really just, you're on the more
extreme end of this developmental phase.
And it can be a lot.
And I always encourage, kids,they're drawing up their

(31:00):
legs their abdomen is stiff.
And the way you can differentiatethis is usually the colic episodes.
They may be prolonged, but they usuallyhave a predictable rhythm to them.
Of course, if you are everworried that your baby is doing
something out of the ordinary,you should call your pediatrician.
If you're worried there's somethingwrong with your baby, call your
pediatrician and go to the emergency room.

(31:21):
You should also recognize thatthere are gonna be cycles of crying,
You'll have checked everything.
Your baby is growingand developing normally.
It's just gonna be, difficult.
This is happening at night when you'reexhausted and you're trying to sleep.
is there a reason why these babiesneed to go through this period?
I feel like there's alot of voodoo around it.

(31:44):
And again, please reach outto us if I get this wrong.
But my understanding is there ispeople try things like gripe water.
They may try switching formula,protein allergy or something like that.
Try things like gavascon drops.
I don't think there's a lotrobust field of evidence about
this, or it's understood.
Of course there are childrenwho actually have GI issues, et

(32:06):
cetera, which can mimic this.
But that's why you need towork with your pediatrician.
I think colic is what we call thiswhen we don't have a good reason
Yeah.
So let's talk about monththree, maturing sleep cycles.
I wasn't done with month two.
I didn't mean to rush you.

(32:26):
That's okay.
Yeah, I think the thing I love aboutmonth two is that you're getting out
of those really stressful things thatlike day and night confusion, the
purple crying and stuff that startsto get better by the end of month two.

(32:46):
And the other thing that happens andwhat I've seen it may not be medical.
I have a question
Yeah.
So are you saying about thebest thing about month two is
that it's a maximum 31 days?
Yeah, I know.
it's generalized, right?
And if a baby is early or they'rein the NICU and, I'm just,

(33:09):
Yeah.
The good is it doesn't last more than a
Yeah, exactly.
But I would say that one of the positivethings about it is that many times in this
month, we start to see a longer stretchof sleep at the start of the night.
And often we see more of a patternstarting to develop about the
day, what does our day look like?

(33:29):
This pattern usually does not stay thesame for the next month and a half.
There are many growth spurtsthat happen during this time.
And the three month growth spurtis one of the biggest ones.
And parents will call me and they'll say,oh my gosh, I think my baby's hitting
the four month sleep regression early.

(33:50):
And I always say, how old is your baby?
And their baby is around three months.
So three months is a huge growth period.
And it's important to know thatgrowth spurts don't last forever.
There are a few days your baby may wakemore to eat 'cause they're growing.
But backing up for a positivein the second month, I often

(34:10):
see babies start to consolidatethat first stretch of the night.
Yeah.
No I would agree.
But I think it was, wesegue into month three.
That's honestly, I think I rememberthat being a pretty exciting time.
You're starting, in month two is when youget the emergence of the social smile,
your baby does become more interactiveand you start to see more mature day
night cycling, the night awakenings,they're not gonna go away in month

(34:34):
three, but you're gonna, it's gonna,all of a sudden, like for most parents,
it starts to feel more manageable.
In month three.
You get a lengthening ofthat nighttime sleep period.
You get a transition to thebaby's entering sleep by this
deeper sort of non-REM sleepand cycling through REM sleep.
my, one of my hobby horses hereis what can parents control?

(34:55):
And I think one of the thingsyou can control is developing
a really good bedtime routine.
And to be frank, in the first two monthsit's nice and if it's your first child and
if you live in a two parent household orthere's other adults, often you'll have
some very elaborate parenting routine withthe singing of songs and the application
of lotions, the reading of stories,

(35:17):
sound like a sleep consultant.
Yeah.
The but I, I remember with my firstson, we'd have these long bedtime
routine and it would be so great.
And here's what I'd say to parentsis, have a bedtime routine.
Your ideal bedtime look, enjoy your baby'scompany as much as you can, but your,
the structure, the under scaffolding ofyour bedtime routine should be such that.

(35:41):
One parent can do it, right?
Because I get it, it's your firstnewborn, maybe you're nervous around
the bath or something like that.
But the fact is, if you are going tohave other children you are gonna have
to learn to get more efficient at this.
Say for most families, a basictemplate is if they need a bath again,
people don't need a bath every night.

(36:02):
We've talked about what happenedwhen I was a child in this podcast.
Which, go back through our social if youwant to, our social if you wanna see that.
But you may or may not bathe your child.
Change them into theirpajamas, sing them a song.
You rock them to sleep.
Still at this age, they're, youdon't really them to fall asleep,
drowsy, but awake at this, you cantry the end of month three, month

(36:22):
four, but there's no urgency to this.
But again, do your routine every night.
Feel comfortable with it.
Feel a sense of mastery.
The first couple times you're gonna doit, you're gonna be like, what am I doing?
You're gonna feel like a poser.
Like you don't know what you're doing.
The fact is your babydoesn't know any better.
Your baby thinks you're thebest no matter what you do.
Keep it simple.
keep it as something that'smanageable and not exhausting to you.

(36:43):
You should feel a little bit ofa lift with your bedtime routine.
You shouldn't feel like a sense of dreadthat it's this tremendously elaborate
process that you have to get through
yeah.
Because if you keep a consistentlike order of things, babies start
to understand those routines, I'malways surprised at how smart babies

(37:04):
are and how quickly they catch onwhen we provide the right environment
and the right behaviors ourselves.
So I think having that predictableroutine that, that's simple, that
anybody can do even, grandma or grandpaor whoever read, bathe the baby,
read a book, all these little things.
Keep it simple.

(37:25):
It does help a baby to start to settle.
'cause they know what's coming next.
A short bedtime routine consistentlyis way better than an elaborate bedtime
routine that you're struggling toget through on a consistent basis
basis
The fact is it your baby will learn tobe consistent if you're consistent, and
there's a certain amount of chaos thatgets introduced when we're sleepy, right?

(37:48):
you don't have to do it at theexact same time every night.
It's not, you don't need a checklist.
It's keep the same template.
Do it at the time.
That seems to work, which you'regonna have to feel out a little bit.
Arielle, I think this is somethingthat a lot of people who haven't had
their first baby don't realize too,which is the timing of bedtime can
often be quite late for babies that arenapping multiple times during the day.

(38:10):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Talk about that a little bit?
'cause I think that's maybe a sort ofa through line in these first couple
months of the timing of napping,the timing of the nighttime sleep,
yeah.
It's interesting because.
Again, I am not a medicalprofessional, so what I share
with you is completely anecdotal.

(38:33):
It's based off my experience of, I'veactually worked with thousands of parents
at this point, but I have actually foundthat many parents are struggling in that
bedtime, around the bedtime hours, right?
So even if the crying has stopped they'restruggling, or baby is fighting sleep.

(38:56):
And what I've found is for somebabies, not all moving bedtime earlier
actually helps them avoid a prolongedwitching hour or avoid fighting sleep.
And I can't say it acrossthe board for everybody.
I knew a baby that was consistent.
He had to go to bed by six,which is not what people think

(39:20):
when it comes to newborns.
Newborns, everyone is alwayssaying eight o'clock, nine
o'clock, 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock.
And that's just because they'regetting used to their routine.
As far as daytime goes, itcan start anywhere between
6:00 AM and 8:00 AM really.
And then at, in the beginning, yourbaby is not gonna be able to stay

(39:41):
awake for long periods of time.
And I always like to explain that thewake time, the time that they're awake.
Includes the feedingand the diaper changing.
It's not like you feed, youchange the diaper and then they
have an extra 45 minutes to play.
It's really that 45minutes includes all that.

(40:03):
And so for some people, especiallya nursing mom who child is cluster
feeding, whatever it is, it might take30 minutes to feed them and then, 10
minutes to change them and do put on aclean diaper and then you're back asleep.
So again it's especially in thefirst month, unpredictable there,
you just have to follow their cues.

(40:25):
But I think bedtime starts to back upfor most babies by the third month.
I think bedtime becomes apparent thatthe child is ready for bed earlier.
Say seven or eight o'clock or somethinglike that by around the third month.
And I feel like if parents are consistentwith bedtime and they're following

(40:45):
things, usually the baby gets used to it.
And because their rhythms are startingto become established, and I was
gonna say about the third month too.
This is, again, this is not all babies,but some babies develop, they start
to consolidate their daytime sleep.
And those 20 minute cat naps can suddenlybecome an hour long, throughout the day.

(41:10):
'cause cat naps are normal in newborns.
Cat nap is anywhere from 20 to 45 minutes.
And they can be very frustratingif you wanna get something done.
And it's like you put the baby down,they're awake by the third month.
Some babies are ready toconsolidate that sleep.
Not all.
But if you, if we look at their day andthen we offer that pause before going in,

(41:38):
I've had good success with some babies whothen put themselves on their own schedule.
It's usually about four naps by thethird month before that, anywhere
to, five to seven naps before that.
It's all naps,
Yeah, it's just naps all a 24 hour naps.
But in the third month you'reusually looking at four, maybe

(41:58):
five naps throughout the day.
And then by the fourth month, four napsis usually what, three to four naps.
'cause again, some babies areconsolidating into two, two hour naps and
an hour long cat or third nap or whatever.
So definitely the naps dropquickly as they get older.

(42:18):
Yeah.
And certainly thereare other factors here.
If your child is entering childcare atthree months of age, often they will adapt
surprisingly well to the schedules there.
It's just, the baby's learning.
So if you don't have anything elsein this, I thought we could talk
about sleep tools and technology.
Such as,
so there's lemme offer thecaveat that when my sons were

(42:43):
little, we had a audio monitor.
And we didn't have a video monitorfor lots of different reasons.
It didn't really feelparticularly necessary to me.
And now we're in a kind of adifferent era of technology.
So there are smartmonitoring technologies.
I'd say the Nanit is themost popular of these.
But there are others as well.

(43:03):
Which I'm appreciative of.
'cause like they really have bothprovided technology and paid for a lot
of research, not research that I've done.
I don't have a conflict here,in the community they're very
involved in like sleep research.
And then there are there are applicationslike you had mentioned, huckleberry,
which is one that purports to offer.
Idealized nap intervals for people.

(43:25):
And then there are technologies, likeI'd say in the sort of the most famous
of these sort of responsive bassinetsis the SNOO, which is designed by Harvey
Karp so let's start with monitors.
my take on monitors is this, is thatthe main purpose of a monitor is to
know whether or not your child needsyou when you're sleeping deeply or if

(43:46):
you're in another part of the house.
Everything else is just gravy.
if you are a person that likes data.
You might find one of thesesmart monitors helpful.
If you are a person who struggleswith anxiety, you might find
this data to be overwhelming.
And there's a phenomenon in adult sleepcalled orthosomnia, which is people have

(44:07):
sleep trackers, like I wear an Oura ring.
And their sleep gets worse 'causethey're obsessing about the data.
And I've definitely seen that in acouple of different contexts where
parents are really worrying about, sayhow their child's proportion of REM
sleep or something which is unclearwhat, how meaningful this data is.
So if you find that it is, you'restruggling with this data and you feel

(44:29):
like it, your pediatrician tells youthings are going great, you feel like
you're, what you're doing is workingexcept, but the monitor is giving you
data that suggests that's not the case.
I think you've gotta go with your gut.
I also know that the way that thepeople get the data from the Nanit
is by you having their smartphone bytheir bed and they use it as a monitor.

(44:49):
I think obviously some peoplestruggle with that, having their
phone in proximity to their bed.
'cause obviously you may look at yourphone and then look at other stuff on
your phone in the middle of the night,like Instagram or YouTube, and that's
can be counterproductive for your sleep.
What's your experiencebeen with Smart Monitors?
Oh yeah, so I just feel there's.
We have access to so much informationnow, and sometimes that's great

(45:15):
and sometimes it's horrible.
And I feel as though a lot of themoms that I work with are dealing
with some level of anxiety, andespecially because they're sleep
deprived, which makes perfect sense.
The two go hand in hand.
So the problem that I have with itis that parents can get obsessive

(45:41):
about watching the the child's wakeup just staring at it because they
almost have PTSD from the child wakingall night or something like that.
Staring at it keeping it on.
And then with the stuff that providesdata, they're like, oh my gosh, my child
is moving so much throughout the night.
And I say is your child crying out?
No.

(46:02):
Are they, do they seem likethey're uncomfortable or whatever?
No.
Then why do we have, whyis this important to us?
Is your child well rested?
Does the child seem wellrested in the morning?
Are there any behavioral issues?
No.
And so it's stop stressing.
And I tell parents this so much, I'mlike, back away from the monitor.

(46:26):
If your child needs you, it's fineto have a video monitor, a monitor.
I totally respect that.
it's your choice if youwanna have a monitor that is
monitoring every single move.
But I have a real problemwith the fact that so many of
the people I've worked with.
it causes so much more stress, andespecially the ones with the pulse ox

(46:49):
on them because they can easily comeoff and then they think the child is,
not breathing or there's false alarms.
And so that talk about, it's hardenough to get through the infancy stage.
So that's where I'm like, it'sgreat to have information, but do

(47:10):
we really need that much informationabout our child's sleep if they're
healthy and normally developing?
I had say I have a huge problem withthe cardiopulmonary monitors because
there's no evidence that any sortof monitoring prevents SIDS, right?
And there are lots of studies on this.

(47:31):
So first of all, it givesa sense of false security.
I'd be like, oh, the monitor's on,so maybe I could be a little bit more
relaxed about safe sleep guidelines,or maybe I don't need to worry
about having blankets in the bed.
'cause I've got the monitor on, which ispotentially dangerous these algorithms
for this data, they're proprietary.
We don't know how it's determining alarms.

(47:53):
There's not a lot of transparencywith devices like the Owlet.
And then we'll have parents comingin and be like, my monitor is
saying my kid's desaturating.
And now we're looking at maybedoing like a in lab sleep study,
which can be quite expensive
For an infant?
Oh yeah, no, we do.
And we study the infants all the time.
The other thing is in the era of roomsharing, yeah, you, maybe you need

(48:15):
the monitor when you, your baby's inbed and you are not, but when you're
in bed, you don't need the monitor.
They're gonna wake youup if they need you.
So again, if it gives you comfort.
If it helps you feel confident in yourparenting decisions, it's great if you
feel that the monitor is giving youdata that doesn't feel like it fits with

(48:35):
what you're seeing when you're lookingat your baby, or it's making you feel
bad about some of your decisions orless confident or anxious, then maybe.
And again, it's can be hard to havethis self-awareness that you perhaps
need to that it's not the right thing.
And I know that there's tearsof monitoring and technology to
again, like I, I love technology.

(48:55):
I would've totally been intothis stuff where my kids
were a little, there's there.
Yeah I think a lot of times parents needpermission to not be so hyper vigilant.
Like I feel like a lot of times parentsfeel like they need to be solving all

(49:16):
these issues that aren't even issueswhich then causes more stress and anxiety.
Yeah, anytime I have somebody who isjust really stressing out over it, I tell
them, I try to have a heart to heart andjust tell them that they should probably
back away from the monitor a little bit.

(49:37):
I would agree.
Now what do you think, because wewere just talking today I do not
have extensive experience with theHuckleberry app or anything like that.
I feel like it's funny, like I,we don't have a Go-to sleep diary
app that we use in our practice.
'cause none of them reallyquite export things in the way
that we want them to though.
I did see one recently thatwas cool called the Snap D.

(50:01):
Which is just a sleep diary app put outby a pharmaceutical company in Europe
and I've been playing around with it.
This is pretty good.
I love sleep diaries.
I think they're useful for parentsto understand their rhythms.
Paper works well as well.
What is your take on like these appdiaries or like that, especially
ones that provide guidance toparents about sleep timing?

(50:24):
If there's not a human, be behind it.
Analyzing the data for you, then.
I don't waste your money becauseAI isn't going to I know for a fact
because I get clients who purchaseapps that supposedly tell you the

(50:44):
best time to put your baby down.
Again, they probably work forsome people, otherwise the
company would be outta business.
However, if it's not working, then youshould probably talk to a human who
could help you make sense of the data.
And I cannot do my job without dailylogs and I wanna see sleep and feeding.

(51:09):
It's really
so I think this does come into selectionbias and I'd say to any parent, if
you're doing any of this stuff, usingany of this technology that's working
great for you, that's wonderful.
Our practices are enrichedfor people where they try this
stuff and it doesn't work.
We're not seeing the people who have tosucceed because they're still in business.
These aren't the peoplethat you and I see.

(51:31):
I,
Well, so let's talk about the SNOO and Iknow Harvey Karp who wrote The Happiest
Baby on the Block, which is a veryuseful baby book for me when my older
son was, in his period of purple crying.
yeah.
so I'm grateful to him and he createdthis device called the SNOO, which
sort of you strap your baby intoit and it moves and shushes when

(51:55):
they cry, and then it ramps down.
And you can either rent it or buy it.
It's I, I've talked to familieswho really like it and where
it's worked well for their kids.
I've also talked to families.
It wasn't never helpful.
According to their documentation, you'resupposed to use it for the first five to
six months, which I would not recommend.
And my concern with that is, even thoughit does have a weaning mode, is that you

(52:18):
are really going to be generating a lotof sleep onset associations with this.
And Again, this may be helpful forsome families, especially families
whose children are, whose parents haveto go to back work early, but it runs
the risk of being a little bit of acrutch if you're using it long term.
And again, like any of these technologies,if it is actively making your life

(52:39):
worse, you do not have to use it.
So if you're ba you put your, I don'tknow, in the first month or two when
it's hard if you put your baby in itand they sleep a little bit better.
I don't have a huge problem with it.
But if you're trying to put yourkid in this and they don't like
it, you don't have to use it.
And I would say that for me personally,I would be trying to wean babies

(53:02):
off this as quickly as possible.
Yes, I was just gonna say about the thirdmonth would be the best time to do it.
In my experience, I knowthey have a weaning mode.
But again, we see the people whostruggle and so I see and have
worked with and have had to helpmany families wean off of the SNOO.

(53:29):
And I have a problem with the factthat these four and five month
olds are still being swaddled.
And I think there's some developmentalconcerns about swaddling as kids get
older and wanna be using their hands more.
But I would agree that I don't know,it's a, I think that the people who
made it are well-intentioned and they'retrying to solve a problem that is very

(53:52):
real, which is sleep deprived parents.
I honestly don't worryabout sleep deprived babies.
'cause they're gonnaget the sleep they need.
They are not necessarily goingto do it convenient for you..
yeah, exactly.
And babies aren't drivingcars or jet planes.
They're not doing surgery,they're not trying to prepare
for big presentations at work.

(54:14):
But parents have realworld responsibilities.
And, I applaud anyone who's trying tomake the world a little bit better and
help parents sleep a little bit better.
But I think like any of thesethings are tools and a tool can
help you or it can hurt you.
None of them are magic.
it would be cool if there'ssomething that worked perfectly for
everyone without any caveats, butthat's just not how things work.

(54:36):
Right.
so I'd say to parents,be an informed consumer.
Try things out.
But if they don't work, youdon't have to stick with them.
Yeah.
I would also say one of the otherthings that parents come to me and
they're like, I've tried 15 differenttypes of swaddles and or sleep sack,
and they're still not sleeping well.

(54:57):
Sleep sack do not help babies sleep.
And I know that the marketing is slickand I know that they promise things or
they at least allude to better sleep.
But honestly, swaddles and sleep sacksare really just a wearable blanket.

(55:18):
For your baby.
And yeah, it's just a blanket that's safe.
So don't get caught up in, I've triedthis swaddle, I've tried that swaddle
and spending, I've literally talkedto people that have spent hundreds and
hundreds of dollars on swaddles and sleepbecause they think one of them is gonna
magically make their child sleep better.

(55:39):
So I think we covered allthe questions we wanted to.
What are the red flags whenparents really should be worried
about their newborn sleep?
And why don't I take the medicalones and maybe you cover the ones
that are, when parents need, reallyneed help with managing the sort of
mechanics of and timing of sleep.
if you're experiencing a newbornthat's awake for hours and hours,

(56:01):
or is not sleeping, just no matterwhat you do, I would then refer
over to a pediatrician becausesomething might be underlying there.
I agree with you that if you everare uncertain or questioning,
call your pediatrician don't everfeel like you're bothering them.

(56:22):
I think it's better to be safe than sorry.
Most likely your baby's okay andjust being normal, you never know.
And so I'll, toss it to you for themedical, because there are a lot
of times I do just have the parentcheck in with the, the pediatrician,
but if your baby is gaining weightappropriately and there are, normal

(56:44):
bowel movements, normal diaper, wetdiapers and they're not sleeping
great, it's just normal for a newborn.
Yeah I'd say the red flags are, lookat what you expect babies to do, right?
They're supposed to grow.
So if they're not growing, thatis probably the most concerning
thing that needs to be evaluated.

(57:04):
And that's why you see yourpediatrician so frequently in the
first couple of weeks of life.
And then you, after that, every coupleof weeks, and then a monthly tempo.
Certainly if your baby is, it's I don'twanna say if your baby's inconsolable
at all, you should be worried, butI'd say certainly if it seems out
they're inconsolable in a way thatis out of what you expect yeah, if
your kid's crying for two or threehours every evening, that's normal.

(57:27):
But what if your kid is crying for,and at a different time of day, or in
a different way than you're used to?
I think certainly any problems withpeeing or pooping if your baby seems
weak or floppy I think that you'renot gonna miss bad stuff, honestly.
But sometimes it takes a moment justto step back, take stock of things.
Even you could say, okay,I'm looking at my baby.

(57:48):
He's vigorous.
His last weigh-in was good.
He's had lots of peeing and pooping.
He's okay.
He's just fussy right now.
Versus being like, he reallydoesn't look like he normally does
something really feels wrong to me.
Then you reach out because I, ifthere's one thing I've learned is
to always trust parental intuition.

(58:09):
And if a parent is worried that there'ssomething wrong I'm worried too until
I've done my due diligence and madesure that we're not missing something
Yeah, I always feelbest regardless of age.
If something seems off, it's just somuch better to just get them cleared
medically, just so that you're dealingwith something behavioral, but with
newborns, that's normal behavior.

(58:29):
There's nothing we're gonnabe able to do that's going to
magically fix them overnight.
But certainly good routines.
Trying to follow their cues, keepingthem well rested as best as you can.
that's basically your job.
That, and feeding themand helping them grow.
Tummy time can help strengthentheir core and their neck muscles.

(58:52):
It's, I believe it'srecommended for safe sleep
Yeah, no, absolutely.
Since it used to be kids beforethe Back to Sleep campaign, which
I think was in the early nineties.
They'd have kids would sleep prone, they'dsleep on their bellies, which was, yeah.
The reason is kids sleep better
yeah,
rallies.
Back to sleep is safer becausethey're infants aroused more easily.

(59:14):
It's a feature, not a bug, butthat's the world we live in.
They, we do see some developmentallike delay and some motor milestones.
My kid hated
yeah, mine
My older son, oh my God,he just lay there and
Oh, yeah, she screamedand then I'm like, great.
Am I totally screwing my kid up?
She doesn't even wanna do tummy time,and she'd just be screaming at me and
I'm like, all I can't do this anymore.

(59:35):
So if you can't dotummy time, don't worry.
yeah, guys feed your kids, put themdown when they're tired, cuddle 'em,
love them, you're gonna do fine.
Make sure that they'resleeping in a safe environment.
Take care of yourself too.
Ask for help.
So I'm Craig.
And I'm Arielle,
What's our email address again?

(59:55):
People have questions.
[e-mail] Andif you have topics you want
covered, shoot us an email.
Yeah, thanks for listening.
Thank you.
Thanks so much forlistening to the Sleep edit.
You can find transcripts atthe web address Sleeped show.

(01:00:19):
You can also find video of theepisodes at that address as
well as in my YouTube channel.
You can find me at Dr.
Craig canna perry.com and on allsocial media at D-R-C-A-N-A-P-A-R-I.
You can find Ariel atInstagram at Ariel Greenleaf.
That's A-R-I-E-L-L-E-G-R-E-E-N-L-E-A.

(01:00:45):
If you like the flavor of the advice here.
Please check out my book.
It's Never Too Late to Sleep.
Train the Low Stress Way to high QualitySleep for babies, kids, and parents.
It's available whereverfine books are sold.
If you found this useful, pleasesubscribe at Spotify or Apple Podcast
and share it with your friends.
It really helps as we're tryingto get the show off the ground.

(01:01:06):
Thanks.