If your little one is awake for long periods during the night before going back to sleep some time (even hours) later, it is what you may have heard referred to as a ‘split night’. Often, whatever you may try to get your baby back off won’t work, and they may even be perfectly content in this awake period, just not able to get back off to sleep.
There are several things you can look at to tackle split nights, which we will run through below…
1) Daytime sleep balance
As your baby gets a little older, too much daytime sleep can mean they are waking as they have simply had enough sleep, and have to wait until they are tired again to go back to sleep. This can impact daytime naps too, and then become progressively worse if bedtimes are then adjusted earlier to compensate any overtiredness later in the day.
2) Nap Transition
For the same reason as above, this can happen if your baby’s sleep needs have dropped but your daytime nap routine hasn’t reflected and adjusted for this yet.
3) Bedtime
It could be that bedtime could be too early, so when your baby wakes during the night, they have had a good sleep and are ready for play time! Again, this can become progressively worse if bedtimes are then adjusted earlier to compensate any overtiredness later in the day.
4) Settling to sleep
Although it’s not a problem for some babies, it is common for babies that are settled to sleep with lots of parental input to struggle to go back to sleep independently throughout the night (or naps) between sleep cycles. Make sure you give them lots of practice to master this skill of falling to sleep independently.
5) Developmental
Milestones happen for every baby at various ages. Rolling, crawling, walking, talking etc, can mean they are eager to practice this new skill, even in the middle of the night! Encouraging lots of practice during the day can help, but often this is just a phase that will soon pass. Sometimes reacting too quickly can encourage the wake up though, so if they are happy, wait it out and see if they will settle them self back to sleep.
If you need more help on split nights, please do get in touch.
