Why Do Newborns Go to Bed So Late?
Why does my newborn go to bed at 10pm?
In those newborn days, I know it’s absolutely exhausting trying to stay awake until your baby goes to bed around 10:00pm. In fact, I often have my husband take over at about 8:00pm because I cannot hang😂. BUT, there’s a reason I recommend a late bedtime for your newborn!
Here’s why:
Newborns are not releasing melatonin in the brain yet and therefore have not formed solid circadian rhythms yet. Because of this, they are likely only going to do one long stretch of sleep at this point. Yes, you can still get a good 6-8 hour stretch once you start to teach them how, but if you start that stretch at 7pm, your baby is going to be awake and ready to party around 1am-3am, which means YOU will need to be awake and ready to party. No thank you!
In order to optimize this long stretch of sleep with a time-frame that’s more doable, AND that will form good sleep habits, I recommend a 10pm bedtime so that when that long stretch is over, your baby is waking up around 4am-6am instead of the middle of the night. Ideally, if you’re using my method, your baby is sleeping 10pm-6am around 8 weeks.
Eight hours in the same window you’re likely already going to be asleep? Yes please!
Then of course, once your baby is around the 12 week mark, you can slowly and gently move bedtime up to start getting that 7pm-7am schedule. If you’re not sure how to do that, I walk you through the entire thing (and everything else about sleep) in The Sleep Fairy Way Course.