When children sleep poorly, parents do, too. When it is 4 a.m. In Sleeping Through the Night , Mindell provides practical help for parents of newborns through three and one-half years. Her strategies, she says, usually enable the child to sleep through the night within one to two weeks. Mindell gives plenty of specific advice for bedtimes and bedtime routines.
Many babies make the transition to sleep easier if they have a favorite object in their crib.
One study, she reports, showed babies were calmed by the comforting smell of a T-shirt Mom had worn all day. Read older children favorite stories at bedtime, she suggests. They'll find the familiarity relaxing. Save new stories for daytime hours. Sleep problems, Mindell asserts, are not uniquely different from other behavioral problems with which parents must deal.