Your newborn’s sleep pattern

Your newborn sleeps about 16 hours a day. This figure is only an average value and can vary greatly depending on the child. Because just as adults sleep for different lengths of time, this is also the case with babies. As a rule, newborns sleep between 13 and 20 hours. The times he is awake increase with age. Difficulty falling asleep and repeated nocturnal awakenings are normal in infants. When your baby is five weeks old, it will also experience its first growth spurt , which can also cause restless nights. So that you and your partner do not suffer from lack of sleep and oversleeping, you should use every opportunity your baby gives you to catch up on valuable sleep. Your baby will be in touch when it needs you again.

In bed with mom?

Children sleep best in their parents’ bed. Because there they feel safe and it is also nice for the parents not to have to get up immediately when the baby cries. Still, many experts advise against letting a baby sleep in the same bed in the first year of life for safety reasons. In our article “Can a child sleep in the parents’ bed” we have listed the most important pros and cons for parents and babies sleeping together.

If you decide to sleep together with your baby, a so-called family bed is suitable. If your bed isn’t wide enough, you can buy an extra mattress and expand it into a family bed. Alternatively, you can put an extra baby bed next to your bed as a “baby balcony”. Experience has shown that this quickly becomes too small for your baby, so you can also convert a cot into a baby balcony. The bars should be removable and the bed adjusted to the height of the parents’ bed. You can still use the cot when your baby is getting bigger and should no longer serve as a baby balcony.

Although it is convenient for breastfeeding mothers to have the baby sleep in the parent’s bed, there are a few bed-sharing rules that you should follow:

• Newborns are not yet able to balance their ambient temperature well and there is a risk of overheating in the parents’ bed. Overheating is considered one of the causes of sudden infant death syndrome. You should make sure that he doesn’t sleep under the same blanket as his parents, because the heat radiating from your body and that of your partner is stored under the blanket. This is pleasant for you, but dangerous for your baby, because it is not yet able to regulate its own body temperature (e.g. by sweating or shaking). A thin blanket or, depending on the room temperature, a nightgown/romper suit is sufficient for your baby. The ideal room temperature for babies is 18°C. A draft should be avoided.
• You and your partner should also be non-smokers, as the emission of nicotine and other harmful substances can harm your baby. You should not only give up smoking in bed. Because even if you are not smoking, your breath emits pollutants. If you want to be on the safe side, your baby should not sleep in your bed in this case.
• Of course, the bed should also be safe so that your baby cannot fall out of the bed or into a crevice that is too large.
• You should also make sure that your baby cannot be crushed or suffocated by oversized blankets or other bedding accessories.
• Your baby should be able to sleep supine on the mattress. Lying on your stomach can make breathing difficult.
• Toys in the crib or strings nearby can also endanger your child’s breathing or injure it in other ways. The mattress should be neither too hard nor too soft.

The baby monitor

If your baby sleeps in another room, it’s a good idea to leave the doors open or use a baby monitor. After all, you need to know when your baby is crying. With the help of the baby monitor and the powerful baby cries, you will immediately notice when your baby needs something.

This is how sleeping behavior develops in the first year of life

Would you like to learn more about the sleeping behavior of babies? Then click on our special “How your baby learns to sleep” . There you will find a lot of interesting background information and useful tips that you can use to help your baby sleep well. In the following articles you can also find out how babies’ sleep patterns develop, especially in their first year of life:

• 1st-3rd Month: Your baby’s day-night rhythm
• 4th-6th Month: The long way to sleeping through the night
• 7th-9th Month: This is how sleeping works
• 10th-12th Month: Find sleep rhythm

This is how your newborn develops in other areas

Your newborn still sleeps a lot, but it is still making developmental progress:

• Movement: Your baby’s reflexes
• Nutrition: The first breastfeeding meals
• Communication: This is how your baby makes contact
• Senses: Your baby can do that
• Growth: why babies lose weight after birth