Sleep By Alex Podcast - Ep 2 My Baby Wakes as Soon as I lay Them Down
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Welcome to the Sleep by Alex podcast. I am a certified pediatric sleep consultant and a mom of three, and I will be bringing you quick science backed sleep advice to get you and your baby or toddler sleeping well
hey everyone. Welcome to episode two. I am really excited about this episode because this is something that so many of you struggle with and I actually received a listener question to the email that inspired this topic. Let me start by reading the question.
This question is from Emily. My 10 month old has been waking up when I put him to sleep. He will be asleep in my arms and wake up immediately when touching the mattress. He does okay at night, but naps have been the struggle. Look forward to hearing tips on the pod. Thank you, Emily.
Okay, Emily, you are not alone here. We have all had that moment. Your baby is out cold in your arms. They seem like they're super asleep. You go to lay them in their bed, [00:01:00] as soon as their body hits the mattress, boom. Eyes are open. They're looking up at you. They're either crying or they're wide awake. Now you've gotta start the routine.
All over again, which you know can take longer and longer the older your baby gets.
So today we're gonna talk about why in the world does this happen? What is actually going on with my baby? Why did this used to work and now it does not.
And what you can do to prevent this from happening.
Okay. First, let's talk about why you are a baby, maybe waking up when you transfer them to their bed when they're nice and asleep.
The first one, which may seem very obvious if you have a newborn baby, is the startle reflex or the Moro reflex.
This is a reflex that newborns are born with.
And it can be triggered by sounds or the sensation of falling or a change in the environment. And when it's triggered, your baby is going to jerk, basically throw their arms out, jerk their head, maybe cry out.
It's usually strongest [00:02:00] in the first three to four months of life, but it can last six plus months for some babies.
When your baby is all snuggled up against you, you are sort of helping calm their startle reflex. When you move them into their bed, especially if you try and lay them straight onto their back, , you're going to trigger that startle reflex. They're going to feel like they're falling all of a sudden and jerk their arms and head and wake themselves up.
So that's one reason why your baby may be waking up as you transfer.
Another reason your baby may be waking up is because they're in a very light stage of sleep, so babies are going to cycle through light stages of sleep and deeper stages of sleep.
Most of the time we're transferring our baby when they've only been asleep for less than 10 or 15 minutes, which means most likely they're still in a light stage of sleep, so it's going to be pretty easy for them to wake up with movement or change in environment, or a transfer into their bed. Another reason your baby may be waking up is because of a temperature shift, so your body is [00:03:00] really warm.
The crib or the bassinet is cold.
They're snuggled up against your body getting all that warmth from you. And as their body moves into the cool bassinet or a crib, all of a sudden it sort of shocks them awake.
Okay. A couple more reasons to cover before we get into what you can do about this. Don't worry, we're gonna get there. Movement is another reason your baby could be waking up if your baby is used to falling asleep as you are rocking or patting them and they're getting that sort of movement and motion input from you. Their crib or bassinet likely doesn't do the same motion, so they are going from being in motion rocking or being patted to a still crib or bassinet, which can make them wake up.
Another thing is familiarity. So your baby may be familiar with the feeling of sleeping in your arms and unfamiliar with their crib or bassinet space.
[00:04:00] Finally, the reason that your baby may be waking on transfer can be a sleep pressure issue. So if your baby is overtired or under tired when you're trying to get them down for a nap or down for bed, this can make it harder for them to settle and get back to sleep after they sort of get moved around and maybe stir awake a little bit.
Sometimes if they don't have the right amount of sleep pressure, that little stir in the transfer can mean I am fully awake and ready to rock and roll, or I am crying my eyes out tired, but I can't get back to sleep. This can be an issue with their sleep pressure.
Okay, so what exactly can we do about this then? What are some transfer techniques that actually work and how can we actually just prevent this whole transfer in the first place? I'm gonna get to all of that. So the first thing you're gonna wanna examine is your baby's sleep pressure.
As I said before, overt tiredness or under tiredness is going to make it hard [00:05:00] to get to sleep easily and stay asleep at naptime and bedtime. So first, start by following age appropriate wake windows. If your baby's a newborn, you also wanna tune into their sleepy cues in combination with those wake windows.
So we really wanna make sure, are we getting them down when they're sleepy, not too tired. They have enough sleep pressure to take a solid nap, but they're not so tired that they're crying and totally fighting you on it and have a hard time getting to sleep even though they're exhausted. They have got the right amount of sleep pressure to get down and stay down. That's really first and foremost what you wanna focus on.
\ Next up, if your baby is not yet rolling, so most likely they're, you know, under four months still and they have quite an intense startle reflex. I highly recommend using a swaddle if you are shooting for an independent nap. In the crib or a bassinet with your newborn, a swaddle is 100% necessary.
It's going to prevent that startle [00:06:00] reflex. It's going to create that sense of containment around them. It's going to be so much easier to transfer them when they're swaddled because as you transfer, if their startle reflex is triggered, hopefully the swaddle will sort of negate some of that and keep them asleep.
Along those same lines, if you have your baby all swaddled up and asleep in your arms, you're gonna wanna keep them on their side, close to your body as long as possible before you lay them down in their crib or bassinet. This is because laying them down straight on their back , can trigger that startle reflex.
So keeping them on their side is going to help reduce that. Jerking. You'll hold them close to your body on their side. As you lean over the crib or bassinet for as long as you can, you're gonna lay them down on their side first and then slowly roll them to their back while keeping one hand firmly on their chest.
Either hold your hand there on their chest or jostle them a little bit [00:07:00] in their crib or bassinet to ensure that they stay asleep or get back to sleep in case they woke up a little bit. You may have to stay like that for a few minutes before you walk away. Some people also like to transfer feet and butt first into the bassinet.
I find that as long as you're not holding them flat on their back first, 'cause that's what can sort of trigger that startle reflex. As long as you're kind of holding them like upright and sideways and then you slowly do the feet and butt, that may work for you. But I find it easier to just go from side to back with your .
Hand on their chest.
You can do something similar with an older baby who is not swaddled. But of course, transferring older babies can get a lot trickier, and I'm gonna talk about that a little later. But holding them close to your body for as long as you can, as you transfer them into their crib and then keeping your hands on them.
Providing some pressure on their limbs or their chest, can help keep them asleep even when they're not swaddled.
Another quick tip you might [00:08:00] choose to do, especially if you have a newborn, is warm up the crib or the bassinet with a heating pad. So make sure you're using something that is safe. It's not gonna make the bed too hot, and you are not laying your baby down in the bed while the heating pad is in there.
You're just turning the heating pad on. Putting it in the crib or bassinet, letting it warm up for a few minutes, taking it out of there. Of course, testing with your hand to make sure that it's not too hot or anything, it's just warm before laying your baby down in the crib. That can sort of help eliminate that shock like, ah, I was warm and now this is a cold, hard surface.
I know I am blowing through these tips quickly for you, but I want to make sure that as busy moms, we cut to the chase and get you the info you need in the shortest amount of time possible so you can move on with your day. 'cause I know you have a lot of things you could be doing right now. So the fact that you're even listening means I really want to make the most outta your time.
So I'm gonna continue on, stick with me.
Another thing you're gonna wanna do is set up your baby's sleep [00:09:00] environment for success. We want an environment conducive to sleep, so a super dark room. I'm talking really dark, as dark as you can get it if your baby seems sensitive to light coming in, or they easily wake up as you transfer them, or they're easily stimulated.
A dark room is really gonna help, especially with some sort of sound machine, white noise machine running. These things are going to help on that transfer in case they do wake up, it'll help them get back to sleep.
So I have one more quick tip to throw in here before I get to the most important thing you can do to just get rid of this transfer nonsense altogether. And the quick tip I'm throwing in here only because I know I should, and some of you are going to wonder about it.
But to be honest, I don't really recommend doing this a lot. And I'll tell you why I would pick this as a last resort thing to try. So what you can do is make sure that you wait until they're in a deep. Sleep before [00:10:00] transferring them. So as I said earlier, babies are going to be in light stages of sleep and deep stages of sleep.
One thing you can do is make sure that you've held them for at least 10 to 15 minutes until they're in a nice deep stage of sleep. They are ConEd out.
You know their limbs are heavy. They are super asleep before transferring them. This can help keep them asleep on the transfer. Now, why don't I recommend this? Because if you're still rocking your baby to sleep. They might be only taking 30 or 45 minute naps. This is really common for a baby who gets rocked to sleep or at bedtime.
They may only be sleeping 90 minutes or two hours before they're gonna wake up for you again. So the reason I recommend this one as a very last resort is because do you really wanna spend 15 minutes of their 30 minute nap holding them? I don't think so. I would rather do all of the other things to get their whole 30 minute nap in their bed before I'm gonna need to be holding them [00:11:00] again to help them extend their nap, right?
If a nap sleep cycle is 30 to 45 minutes, I do not want 15 of those precious minutes to be in my arms. I want to do everything else I possibly can before I try this. I hope that makes sense. But if this works for you and you wanna keep rocking with that, you totally should. I just don't choose to do this because that nap time is sacred.
And if I end up having to help my baby extend their nap with a contact nap, great, then so be it. I'm totally happy with that, but I would love the first 30 minutes to be in their crib.
Okay, so now I'm coming to the most important thing you can do to completely eliminate these failed transfers, and this is to get your baby to associate their crib with falling asleep right now, if you are transferring your baby into their crib or bassinet when they're already asleep, they do not associate that space with sleeping.
And some of you [00:12:00] are thinking, Alex, my baby sleeps in there for hours on end all night long. Like, yes, I'm helping them get back to sleep, but then they're spending their time sleeping in there. How can they not associate that space with sleep? That's because they're asleep when they go in it.
So they don't know that they're sleeping in there. They wake up in there and they're like, where the hell am I? And they cry for you and they need help getting back to sleep. Right. So this means if your baby doesn't associate their crib with falling asleep, when they wake up on the transfer or they wake up a little bit into their nap or a little bit into bedtime, they're gonna be like, ah, where am I?
Like now? I need the whole song and dance to get me back to sleep in your arms. Because I don't fall asleep in this space. I may sleep in this space, but I know nothing about it because I don't fall asleep here. So how do we do this? First of all, if you have a newborn, and by newborn I'm talking any baby younger than four months old, we cannot teach them to self-soothe and fall [00:13:00] asleep independently in their criber bassinet quite yet.
Yes, you can absolutely practice. There's nothing wrong with laying them down, awake and giving them two minutes to see what they can do, but it's really normal that your newborn needs to be rocked to sleep. That being said, if your newborn has a hard time transferring into their crib bassinet, it can be super helpful to lay them down before they are asleep.
That reduces the risk of waking on transfer. So get your baby nice and drowsy. They're almost asleep. You lay them down in their bed, and then you can have your hand on their chest. You jostle them to sleep in their crib, and you don't have to worry about the transfer at all.
Now, of course, if your baby is older than four months old, you can try this technique as well, . But sometimes it does get a lot harder. As your baby gets older, it's really normal. It's gonna take longer to rock them, to sleep. The moment you lay them down, they're crying, they want you to hold them, they're really set in their ways.
They're gonna put up a bigger fight,
and they're just [00:14:00] so much more aware of their surroundings and more stimulated by their surroundings than maybe a six week old would be. So if your baby is older than four months and you're struggling with these failed transfers, the key to success is teaching your baby to initiate sleep in their bed.
Because as I said earlier, when they fall asleep on your arms or they fall asleep while feeding, and then they wake up on the transfer, now they're in their bed. They're no longer in your arms. Of course, they're gonna cry out and want you to pick them up, and they're going to need that same help to get to sleep.
You don't have to deal with this at all. You can teach your baby to fall asleep in their bed, and this is going to be that first step anyways, towards longer naps and dropping night wake up as well. Now you might be thinking, okay, Alex, great. Like when I lay my five month old and they're bed awake, they just scream and cry and they don't go to sleep. So how am I supposed to teach them to initiate sleep in their bed when they hate their crib and they won't go to sleep? I. Well, in episode one [00:15:00] I did talk a lot about sleep associations and I sort of broke down what your options are when it comes to changing up your sleep habits and getting your baby to fall asleep independently.
If you have not listened to that episode, I would go back to episode one and listen to it. It's a really quick listen, it's 15 minutes and it will be worth your time If you've gotten this far and you feel like, Ugh. Now what do I do? So because of episode one, I'm not gonna dive into the exact methods to teaching independent sleep.
But what I will say is, if you're looking for support in this and finding an individualized method that really jives with your baby's temperament and your goals and your wishes, then I have options for you.
First, I have my four to 24 month sleep learning course, which is a video course that includes over 20 videos that breaks down this entire process from sleep training and attachment to daytime sleep, to nap lengthening, to independent sleep initiation, to dropping night feeds. It has it [00:16:00] all. So you may choose to check out that course if you're more of a DIY person.
If you like courses, but you would like a little bit of support, if some questions pop up, then the Sleep by Alex membership is perfect for you because it's a monthly membership where you get access to the course and any guide or material I've ever created. But you also have the ability to send me your questions whenever you want.
I reply to everybody within 24 hours. I have five live question and answer calls, video calls in the membership every month. You can ask me a hundred questions a day if you want to, so that's a great option as well. If you're like, I'm a little bit of a DIY person. I like watching courses. I don't need one-on-one help, but I would like to ask some questions here and there.
Finally, if you're like, no, Alex, I can't watch another freaking course. I don't wanna watch a video, I don't wanna listen to another podcast. I don't wanna read another book. I just want somebody to listen to my situation and what's going on with my baby and my [00:17:00] wants and needs, and help me within one hour nail down an exact plan for me to do today.
If that's the keys for you, then a one-on-one consultation would be perfect. We meet together on the phone for an hour. I learn everything and anything I need to know about you and your baby. And you're gonna walk away from that consultation with a written step-by-step plan that is exactly individualized to your situation.
And I will guide you through every step of the way.
If any of these are something you're interested in, I've put all the information in the show notes,
now, before I say goodbye, I just wanna say if you are struggling with these transfers, this is so normal. You are not a failure. You are doing great. Your baby can sleep better even if it feels like you are doomed. I know it can be totally exhausting when you spend a ton of time getting your baby asleep only for them to wake up right away.
I have been there, so hang in there. I am always thinking of you. I want you to [00:18:00] try one or two of the tips that I talked about this week and then let me know how it goes. Reach out to me at Sleep by Alex on Instagram. Send me a message. If you have your own question that you would like to possibly be addressed on the podcast, please send it to Sleep by Alex [email protected].
I'll put that in the show notes as well. You can write me your question or you can send me a voice memo. I would love to hear your voice as well. I. And finally, of course, I would love if you shared this with somebody, if you left a review if you subscribe to the podcast, every single download and follow truly means the most to me.
You just have no idea. All right, see you next week.
