Any parent wants to see their child contented, slept, cheerful and cheerful. Healthy sleep is very important for your baby. However, all children are different, and their sleep patterns are not the same: some hardly sleep, while others are “sleepyheads,” ready to spend a long time in the crib. Is it okay if the child sleeps all day?
Healthy sleep is very important for babies
Sleep features of newborns
If an adult, after falling asleep, immediately plunges into deep sleep, the baby of the first months of life enters it through a phase of REM sleep, which lasts a couple of tens of minutes. During this period, he can easily wake up, so the baby needs the help of adults to fall asleep. After that, the small twitching of the muscles stops - they are relaxed, the fists straighten. In this state, the baby can be transferred to the crib for a long sleep.
After about an hour, the eyelids will begin to flutter again, breathing will become more frequent, arms and legs will move. REM sleep comes again, if during these 10 minutes the baby does not wake up (for example, due to hunger), he will easily enter into deep sleep again.
How long should a baby sleep a day?
Each child is individual, however, on average, a newborn baby is "supposed" to sleep from 14 to 18 hours a day, the number of dreams and their total duration change as the toddler grows up.
The newborn sleeps most of the day
Until the age of three months, babies sleep almost all the time - a total of 17 to 18 hours, on the threshold of 4 months of life, the total duration of sleep is approaching 15 hours.
In the next 90 days of life, most babies interrupt daytime wakefulness with 2-3 dreams, plus 10-11 hours at night (with awakening for food). After 6 months, babies (not all) are able to endure all night without waking up.
Why does the child sleep all day
Parents, of course, are happy when the baby gives them enough sleep, but if a small child constantly sleeps all day, they begin to worry and look for possible reasons for this. Those can be both harmless and hazardous to the health of the baby.
Breastfeeding problems
According to the WHO recommendations, breastfeeding on demand is ideal for a healthy baby, i.e. with free access to the chest at any time of the day. However, it is far from always possible to establish breastfeeding. If the baby practically "hangs" on the chest all the time and at the same time does not gain weight, most likely, he is not eating enough. Also, the baby may suck poorly and rarely require milk, since he does not have enough strength. Such a child will generally sleep "peacefully" all day, but this is only from weakness and lack of nutrition and fluid in the body.
Important! In this situation, dehydration, jaundice or hypoglycemia may develop, which will provoke even more drowsiness and end up in hospitalization.
Therefore, a sleepy "lazy" child, when the duration of sleep is exceeded, should be woken up and taught to suckle the breast, so that he understands the connection between the unpleasant sensations of hunger, sucking milk and the subsequent pleasant feeling of satiety and satisfaction.
Difficult childbirth
The first test that a baby faces in the postnatal existence is the process of childbirth itself. Sometimes it is so heavy and exhausting that a new person must take a long time to gain strength, it is best done in a dream. In addition, the use of medication (especially for anesthesia) during labor can also provoke drowsiness and poor suckling, the baby is lethargic for several days and is unable to coordinate breathing and swallowing breast milk. Therefore, it is quite normal for a newborn to sleep all day after a difficult birth.
Confused day and night
Another reason for the baby's not entirely normal sleep pattern is that he simply confused night and day: at night he is cheerful and cheerful, and sleeps during the day. At the same time, such an inverted order of affairs does not bother the child (he is playful, active, appetite is in order), but the parents are deprived of their strength and full night's rest (as a result, they develop chronic fatigue, irritability and inattention).
To prevent such confusion, the baby should not be allowed to sleep for more than 4 hours between feedings during the day, the longest sleep periods should be at night, when melatonin and growth hormone are more actively produced.
After illness
Almost all young patients, after suffering infectious and other diseases (accompanied by fever and other unpleasant symptoms), look overwhelmed and sleepy. In this way, the baby's body, weakened by attacks of harmful microbes and viruses, restores vital energy. Latent infection also contributes to the disruption of circadian sleep rhythms.
After illness, the baby can sleep all day.
Additional Information. If the disease was accompanied by a runny nose and nasal congestion, a constant cough, and the child simply could not sleep normally because of them, then after these symptoms recede, he makes up for lost time.
Other possible causes
There may be more harmless reasons for too long a child's daytime sleep. For example, when the day before the baby spent the whole day without rest: he got very overexcited and lost his energy, then in the "sleeping room" he simply replenishes it and then sleeps as usual. Changes in the weather can also cause increased sleepiness in young children (especially in weather-dependent ones).
What to do, kid confused day with night
If a baby has begun to stay awake at night, and to sleep during the day, it is necessary, first of all, to determine the cause of such a failure in the regime.
The kid confused day and night
If these are symptoms of painful conditions (colic, pain, runny nose), consultation with a pediatrician and prescribed adequate treatment will help.
When health problems are ruled out, the most effective but laborious advice is not to let your child fall asleep during the day. If the problem concerns children of the first year of life, it is enough to remove one of the daytime dreams for a while so that he does not sleep at least 4 hours before the start of night sleep.
In general, from the very birth it is recommended to teach the baby to distinguish between day and night, developing in him the notion that day is when it is light and noisy, and night is dark and quiet.
In 1 month
Newborn babies are well helped by "white noise" (similar to intrauterine sounds, which are still associated with peace and pleasure in the baby), by itself or superimposed on quiet calm classical music.
Full darkness is necessary for proper sleep, so it is undesirable to use even the dimmest nightlights. They can be turned on when the mother gets up to feed the baby. It is also advisable to have blackout curtains or blinds on the windows so that the child is not disturbed by bright street light.
At 3 months
Often a 3-month-old baby begins to suffer from colic, so at this age, for a comfortable night's sleep, it is very important to follow the diet: do not overfeed at night and supply with sufficient moisture.
Overheating is also unacceptable, so the air in the room where the baby sleeps must be cooled. A walk in a stroller is very good for falling asleep at night - many babies are well rocked.
Babies fall asleep well after an evening walk in the fresh air
If a child sleeps all day for 3 months, it is necessary to organize for him comfortable conditions for a full night's sleep and easy falling asleep: the baby should not be overeating, not wrapped up, the bed and pajamas should be very soft and not constrain his body.
You can use aromatherapy (in the form of a few drops of peppermint oil in an aroma lamp or when bathing a child), as well as a sachet pillow with "sleeping" herbs to be placed near the bed.
At 4 months
At this age, a small child is more and more awake during the daytime, therefore, when there is a confusion of day and night, it should be loaded as much as possible during the daytime, while daytime sleep is desirable to minimize (only in case of visible severe fatigue). To keep the little one active, you can use:
- funny and perky children's songs;
- do a light massage and turn over on the tummy;
- new toys;
- constant conversations, nursery rhymes, jokes.
For older children, you can increase physical activity: this is gymnastics (by age), outdoor games, swimming and walking.
Note! After consultation with a pediatrician, it is possible to use soothing teas and decoctions for better sleep in the evenings.
Table of sleep norms in children under one year old
American scientists, having brought together the opinions of neurologists, pediatricians and psychologists, have drawn up approximate recommendations for the duration of sleep and wakefulness in young children.
Sleep rates for babies under one year old
| Age, months | Sleep duration per day, hour. | At night | In the afternoon | Number of daytime dreams |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 15-18 | 8-10 | 6-9 | 3-4 |
| 2 | 15-17 | 8-10 | 6-7 | 3-4 |
| 3 | 14-16 | 9-11 | 5 | 3 |
| 4 to 5 | 15 | 10 | 4-5 | 3 |
| 6 to 8 | 14,5 | 11 | 3,5 | 2-3 |
| 9 to 12 | 13,5-14 | 11 | 2-3,5 | 2 |
These numbers are average - each child is different.
When to see a doctor
If the baby sleeps all day, you should first find out why this is happening, because this is not always something alarming. If this situation does not repeat every day, the baby has a normal temperature and appetite, then everything is fine, he is just a little overtired.
When a child is lethargic, eats poorly and does not play, it is worth taking him to the pediatrician - perhaps this is an illness, and he needs to be prescribed treatment.
Normalization of diet and sleep patterns
Each baby has his own individual need for sleep, parents should determine it as accurately as possible and make sure that the little man “picks up” his sleep hours. After all, lack of sleep can accumulate and have a very negative effect on the health and development of the baby. It is worth spending a few weeks to get your baby to sleep.
Parents should analyze the child's day regimen and his diet (also the diet of a nursing mother), remove heaving foods. It is advisable to create bedtime rituals that help babies to tune in to a night's rest.
In order for the baby to wake up crying less often at night to ask for food, it is necessary to feed him enough (but not excessively) before bed.
For young children, proper sleep is very important. Sometimes babies can sleep all day, sometimes this does not mean anything terrible (for example, the child was overexcited the day before and could not sleep at night), but it happens that measures should be taken (for example, he is constantly malnourished or starts to get sick). Parents should monitor the child's activity throughout the day and take timely action.
