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How to get your baby to sleep through the night

Posted Sep 10, 2010 by Beth Gaddis

Updated Sep 10, 2010 at 11:38 AM

When I think back to when Chris was born, I just want to put my head down and cry.  We had so much going on, including Chris’ health problems, my husband’s lay-off, my return to work weeks earlier than planned and then my husband’s heart attack. 

As you can imagine, I was incredibly sleep-deprived as I tried to juggle the full-time job, my husband’s care, my toddler and a newborn.  When I was home, I did all the feedings – every three hours from 3 p.m. until 4 a.m. Then I would start getting ready for my early-morning job. Chris was a good baby, but he could cry like a banshee, and I would rush to his room to keep him from waking up my husband and toddler.

I know a lot of you have been through the wringer, too.  Like me, you probably wanted to throttle all the well-meaning friends who raved their babies slept through the night from the start.

Now there’s help.  If you’re pregnant, thinking about becoming pregnant,or have a young child who hates going to bed, you have to read “The Baby Sleeps Tonight.” 

Shari Mezrah, a sleep specialist in South Tampa,  published the book in April. She’s helped parents all over the world get their infants to sleep through the night by 9 weeks old.  The key is creating and sticking to a schedule of half-hour feedings, regular naps and set playtimes. 

Skeptical?  So was Sarah Klapman, whose daughter Gabrielle would only sleep for 20 minutes at a time and would cry pretty much the rest of the time. After two months, she and her husband were desperate and called Mezrah. “We went through the schedule and the plan and thought, ‘yeah, right, this is going to work,’ but you’ll try anything because you’ve tried everything else,” Klapman said.

They started following the schedule, which included using formula instead of breastmilk for the 9 p.m. feeding, and little by little, Gabrielle started sleeping longer and longer. “The weird thing for me was waking her up to feed her,” Klapman said.  That would be weird for me, too.  Anytime my babe slept longer than expected, I cheered! I didn’t think about the effect that would have on his next naptime.

Mezrah says parents have to teach their children to know the difference between day and night. She recommends setting an eat-play-sleep schedule from birth, but says most parents don’t realize their baby needs help until they’re a few weeks old.

“It’s never too late to get on a schedule.  However the longer you wait, the more challenging it can be because you’ll be faced with patterns of conditioning,” Mezrah said.

I talked to a mom on Davis Islands who didn’t get her son, Max, on the plan until he was almost 3 months old. “It was hard at first, but because I had a plan and I wasn’t just flying by the seat of my pants, that really helped,” said Liz Palmer.

One of the toughest pieces of advice Mezrah gives: don’t rush to pick up your baby when you hear him cry. Instead, wait 15 minutes and see if he can learn to soothe himself. “If the sound bothers you, put in ear plugs and watch the clock. And it would work.  He would stop crying,” Palmer said.  By the time Max was 10 months old, he was sleeping 12 hours a night.

Mezrah’s book has tips for parents of toddlers, too. Last month, she talked to WFLA, Channel 8 about how to establish a sleep schedule for older kids heading back to school. (Video)

Check out her website for more details, plus look for more information about “The Baby Sleeps Tonight” in The Tampa Tribune’s 4You Health section on Sept. 25.

Here is a picture of Max Palmer, who began sleeping through the night after his mom, Liz Palmer, put him on the Baby Sleeps Tonight schedule.