Why Should I Teach My Baby to Fall Asleep Independently?
Tell me if this sounds familiar…
You’ve just spent 30 minutes rocking, bouncing and swaying your baby to sleep, then went through the careful process of setting them down and walking away as slowly and quietly as possible so they don’t wake up.
You close the door behind you, let out a sigh of relief, only to hear your baby crying 30 minutes later😅. The worst part!? You have to repeat this process no less than 7 times throughout the night and neither of you get sleep.
If you can relate to this scenario at all, you’re not alone! And the good news is, it’s a fairly simple fix! The answer? Teach your baby how to fall asleep independently. But why?
Imagine you’re sleeping in your bed, you wake up in the middle of the night and find that you're in your backyard😱. Are you going to be calm and go back to sleep? Or are you going to sit up and be like “what just happened?” The latter, because your body was in a totally different place than it was when you fell asleep to begin with!
As our bodies go through sleep cycles in the night, they expect to be in the same place they were at bedtime. So if your baby fell asleep in motion in your arms, and they wake up holding completely still in their own bed, they are going to react as if you would if you woke up in the backyard: wide awake and looking around like WHAT IS HAPPENING?! 😂
This is why it's so important for your baby to fall asleep in their bed independently so when they transition through sleep cycles, they do a little scan of the room and they’re like “okay, I’m in the same place. Everything is the same. I can go right back to sleep!!”
Not sure where to start? I have a FREE class that walks you through the top 5 reasons your baby might not be sleeping and what you can do about it.
It’s not too late, and you CAN teach your baby to sleep in a safe and gentle way. You’ve got this!