The Art of Not Sleeping
By: Sara Patricia Kelly
Tags: Parenting, Sleep Training, Baby Sleep Training, Responsive Parenting, Baby Sleep

The Art of Not Sleeping

I was scrolling through my Facebook feed the other day and I read the following post by a desperate mummy, “I CANNOT do this anymore! Nearly 10 months and I have not slept for longer than an hour at a time… I actually daydream about being in a coma just for some rest”.

I could have written this myself — well, the first part anyway. My 9-month-old, Oliver*, is an awful sleeper. We’ve tried it all. White noise. Pink noise. Lullabies. Cuddles. A solid nighttime routine… nothing works. Every night is a battle. Oliver can only sleep when he is absolutely exhausted and, even then, he doesn’t stay asleep for long.

The nightly ordeal begins after bath time. Our darling nugget mutates into a kicky boy. He will kick-kick-kick his chunky chicky drumstick legs like crazy as I desperately try to smooth lavender lotion on his tummy (it’s supposedly calming) and pull his pyjamas on. When he is all kicked-out, Oliver rubs his eyes and then I know he is ready to sleep. That doesn’t mean he won’t resist — kicking, squirming, and moaning at the breast until he cannot fight the fatigue anymore. Next, come the false starts. Oliver seems to be asleep — his eyes are closed. But as I ever so gently carry him to bed, his little mouth quivers then wails the moment he touches the mattress. Or, he gets a second wind and is back to kicking! After a few repeated attempts, Oliver eventually drifts off to the land of dreams only to keep on waking up again and again and again. Every hour. All through the night. Sometimes Oliver manages a two-hour stretch of sleep. Once he even slept for five hours straight. That happy fluke happened after one of his vaccinations. But, on average, Oliver is an hourly waker which means I have become an hourly waker.

This is not how I imagined motherhood would be. Yes, I had a vague expectation of a few sleepless nights. But I never thought putting a baby to sleep would be so difficult. My mother loves to lament that the situation is so unfair. I was a “perfect baby” who slept soundly through the night. So, how did I end up with such a night monster? Just let him cry it out, she says.

I used to worry about waking up, not a lack of sleep

My so-called sleep journey started in the third trimester of my pregnancy. I attended a series of antenatal classes run by the National University Hospital in Singapore, where I live. When we got to the lesson on breastfeeding, the midwife cautioned that newborns must feed every 2–3 hours. As a chronic sleeper-inner, this was a shocking thing to hear (clearly I don’t have many friends with babies). I was quick to interject, “Does being a mother mean you have extra energy?” hoping there were some special hormones that made the daunting task of feeding around the clock possible. The midwife responded curtly, If your baby sleeps longer than three hours, you must wake her up and feed her.

That first night I brought Oliver home, I fretted about oversleeping. I diligently set my alarm, and my husband’s phone, to go off at 2-hour intervals with a 10-minute snooze. I even contemplated asking my mum to call me early the next morning just to ensure I was up and Oliver was still alive. I needn’t have been so worried. My little boy was perfectly capable of waking up on his own — and waking me up too. Maybe my question to the midwife wasn’t so stupid. Being a mum doesn’t necessarily give you extra energy. But, it does give you special waking up powers. No matter how exhausted I am, Oliver’s cries can always jolt me into action.

We have some bubble trouble a brewing

The first few months of life were the toughest. We had bubble trouble. Now, unless you’ve lived through a gassy baby, you couldn’t possibly comprehend the horrendous stress and sleep deprivation involved. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. Oliver woke so frequently — every thirty to forty minutes at night, grunting and writhing with gas. I desperately wanted to ease his pain. I desperately wanted some sleep.

Everyone around me offered well-meaning yet useless advice and always with the caveat that it was my fault; if Oliver was so gassy, I mustn’t be burping him properly. Poor Oliver. I nearly beat him trying to get more burps out. It just wasn’t happening for us.

The main culprit, when it comes to excessive night wakings and gassiness in newborns, is an out-of-whack circadian clock. Think of it this way — your baby is not waking because of the gas. Baby is waking because their sleep pattern isn’t well-aligned with day and night. When bub wakes up , their sympathetic nervous system is stimulated which, in turn, activates the gut. This causes gas. But, I didn’t learn that until much later.

In those early days, the only topic I had the energy to talk about was Oliver and his gas. One bored friend joked, maybe Oliver is scoffing beans behind your back? I was delirious enough to consider it. My Google search history was just as bored. All day, every day, I was Googling, “how to help a gassy baby”. I discovered a wealth of YouTube videos demonstrating how to expel gas from an infant. There is a special technique involving bicycle kicks to help them fart. I tried my best but the damned bicycle manoeuvre didn’t work.

The only thing that kept me going was the mini-milestones I set. I had faith that things would improve when Oliver turned three month’s, which is the end of the fourth trimester. The Internet promised me that, by then, Oliver’s digestive system would have matured and he should be sleeping through the night. But, three months came and went with no change. So, I rationed that Oliver was slow and needed until four months. Then I fixated on five months. Then six months. The bubble trouble eventually stopped. However, the fragmented sleep remained.

My baby must be broken. He can’t follow any of the sleep rules

The only thing worse than sleep deprivation is feeling like an incompetent mother. Everything the Internet said about babies and sleep didn’t work for us. For instance:

Never nurse or rock your child to sleep because that is a sleep prop

(Oliver was always falling asleep at the breast)

(Oliver was always falling asleep at the breast) Implement a sleep schedule as babies find comfort in routine

(Neither Oliver nor myself can follow a schedule to save our lives. He must have inherited the disorganised gene from me)

(Neither Oliver nor myself can follow a schedule to save our lives. He must have inherited the disorganised gene from me) Put your child to bed when they are dozy but not asleep so they can learn to “fall asleep” on their own

(MISSION IMPOSSIBLE)

(MISSION IMPOSSIBLE) Your baby is cranky because they’re overtired

(Oliver gets cranky about everything. He must be permanently overtired)

(Oliver gets cranky about everything. He must be permanently overtired) Sleep breeds sleep

(I don’t get it. Oliver doesn’t get it. More sleep doesn’t equal better sleep in our family)

These so-called rules are derived from sleep training practices popular in Western culture. But sleep training doesn’t work for every baby. And, unless you know where to look, it’s hard to find alternative perspectives.

I understand why our society promotes sleep training. We’ve all heard the saying, it takes a village to raise a child but we don’t live in communities anymore. Scroll any online mummies group and you will see that the lack of support and the need for sleep are common themes. I have never fantasized about being in a coma. But, I have had the thought, Ughhh you’re still here, after being woken up for the zillionith time. That’s where sleep training comes in.

Sleep training is pitched as this wonderful solution for babies to sleep through the night. You train your baby to become “independent” and “self-soothe” by leaving them to fall asleep on their own or cry it out if they wake up in the middle of the night. Sleep training advises against nursing, rocking, swaying, or patting a baby to sleep. Babies must learn how to achieve shut-eye without parental intervention.

I don’t sleep train Oliver. Not by design, initially, because we could never conform to the rules. But as I read more on the subject, I decided that I am okay to “spoil him” (as my mother would put it). Babies are born with millions of brain cells but there are very few connections between them. How we nurture our young shapes how their brains get wired. Sleep training is a convenient fix for sleep-deprived parents. But it doesn’t take a genius to recognise that sleep training goes against what nature intended. Babies should depend on their parents. They need their comfort and warmth. And, babies should be nursed to sleep. Breastfeeding releases the hormone, cholecystokinin, in both mother and baby which results in a sleepy feeling. In any case, I figured Oliver won’t be a baby for long. What’s a few years of broken sleep in the scheme of things?

The family who sleep together, stay together

Surviving frequent wakings isn’t easy. But, for me, ditching the cot for a co-sleeping arrangement was a game-changer and it happened by accident. Oliver was around four months old and we were moving house. Have you tried unpacking with a baby in tow? That first night in our new place we were surrounded by unopened boxes. We went to bed, exhausted, on a mattress on the floor. O — M — G. Best slumber of my life. Sublime. Each time Oliver woke up, I simply flung out a boob, and then went back to sleep. Compare that to climbing out of bed, picking baby up, going to the armchair, nursing, placing baby ever so carefully back in the cot, experiencing one or two false starts, and then doing that eight or more times a night. It’s a no brainer. Oliver never went back to his crib.

As this BBC article will tell you, Is the Western way of raising kids weird? co-sleeping is not at all common in the West. I used to associate it with SIDS. Yet, around the world, many families sleep together. We only have these weird ideas about independence and spoiling your child in the West. When it comes to safety, the odds of rolling over your baby in your sleep are slim. We still have a sense of self-awareness while asleep otherwise we would be falling off the bed each night. Loose blankets, pillows, and crevices are a greater hazard.

Once I decided that we would be co-sleeping moving forward, I had to convince my husband. The Safe Sleep Seven are guidelines for how to safely sleep in the same bed with your baby. But my hubby was worried at the thought of Oliver somersaulting onto the floor and hitting his wee head. Solution: a giant make-shift floor bed.

Floor beds aren’t easy to find in Singapore (although they are insanely popular in Japan). We eventually found a minimalist low-rise bed frame design at Namu. We bought two beds — a king-size and a super single, removed the legs, and squashed them together to create a huge sleeping space. We also treated ourselves to a set of luxurious Tencel sheets. And hey, presto! We could all sleep comfortably together as a family. Co-sleeping doesn’t necessarily reduce nighttime wakings (although it can). But, it does help breastfeeding mum’s get more sleep as they can nurse while lying down. When Oliver is ready, he will eventually move into his own room with the single-sized bed. But, I hope that won’t be anytime soon.

I love co-sleeping with Oliver and it’s not just about better quality sleep. Now I get to spend so much more time with him. And that is very precious when you are a full-time working mum.

It no longer feels overwhelming

Another lifesaver in my sleep journey was learning about the Possums approach to sleep. Possums was developed by an Australian doctor and academic named Dr Pamela Douglas and is the antithesis of sleeping training. The program is ground in the notion that sensory stimulation and the circadian rhythm are key drivers of sleep. Here are some of the precepts:

Treat each day like an adventure

(Go outside! Play games! Read books! Babies need sensory stimulation)

(Go outside! Play games! Read books! Babies need sensory stimulation) Put your baby down for a nap when they are tired

(Watch for sleepy cues)

(Watch for sleepy cues) Reset the circadian rhythm by waking up at the same time each morning

(Earlier is better)

(Earlier is better) Go to bed at night when your baby is tired

(It’s a myth that babies must go to bed early)

(It’s a myth that babies must go to bed early) Offer breastmilk or formula flexibly

(As they say, you got boobs — use them)

(As they say, you got boobs — use them) Avoid too much napping and late naps

(Duh! If baby sleeps too much during the day, they won’t be tired at night)

Now, this all might seem so basic, it’s obvious. However, by the time I came across Possums I had been completely taken in by the sleep training concepts that have permeated modern society. I believed in the sleep schedule. I was convinced that if Oliver remained awake beyond the recommended wake window (2–3 hours for infants under nine months) he would self-destruct in an overtired meltdown. We wasted so many hours in a darkened room, white noise blaring, while I shushed, hushed and downright willed Oliver to sleep even though he wasn’t tired. All because the “sleep schedule” dictated it was nap time.

The thirty dollars I paid for the Possums Baby and Toddler Sleep Program was money well-spent. It didn’t help Oliver sleep better at night. But it reassured me that my baby wasn’t broken and I wasn’t completely incompetent. I started to go with the flow instead of watching the clock and logging naps, and I forgot about the wake windows. Yes, it took Possums for me to realise the obvious — the very worst thing that can happen if my baby is overtired is that he will go to sleep. As a result, our days became a lot less stressful and a lot more enjoyable.

Some simple truths

Babies wake frequently. That’s a biological norm. Just like us adults, some babies sleep well and others don’t. I know sleep training is an alluring solution for exhausted parents (I’ve considered it many times). But, we all know, in our heart of hearts, that sleep training is solely for the benefit of parents. Children will learn to sleep through the night when they are physically, developmentally and emotionally ready.

I have learned that adopting the right attitude, and having realistic expectations around sleep, make all the difference. I went through a period of feeling frustrated by Oliver’s allergic reaction to beddy-byes. I’d spend a good hour (or more) trying to get him to bed, only for him to wake up 30 minutes later — and again and again and again. My evenings weren’t mine. I couldn’t find time to wash the dishes, write an email, watch a movie, or do anything else because he kept interrupting me. I resented the twenty or so minutes it would take for me to resettle him each time.

Eventually, I let go of those feelings. My attitude was causing me to feel burnt out, not Oliver, although it was a journey to realise that. I’ve spent my entire adulthood running a million miles an hour — wanting to be productive, hoping to be successful, and trying to keep my shit together. But it has been so hard trying to maintain these personal standards. I think Julianne Moore said it best, “It’s not difficult to take care of a child; it’s difficult to do anything else while taking care of a child.”

So, my advice is to slow down. Don’t beat yourself up for having a sticky floor or taking an inordinately long time to respond to messages. Redefine what it means to be productive and successful. Work and household chores will never run away. They will always be there, eagerly waiting. But a child’s babyhood is fleeting.

The old days of Oliver’s bubble trouble already feel like a lifetime ago. My choice to be a responsive parent, and not implement sleep training, means that Oliver and I will have an incredible bond for the rest of our lives. And that is worth all the sleepless nights.

*Names have been changed for this article.

Further reading:

If you are struggling with your decision not to sleep train, you are not alone. Here are some resources that have helped me during my sleep journey: