Generally, does sleep improve as baby gets older?

[junkieu]

And if they start good can you expect that to continue? I’m expecting dc soon and feel so worried about sleep. Please no sarcasm…I know lots don’t sleep and I have to expect that.

Sleep is not linear. You’ll have good times and bad times.

Eventually it all pans out.

Generally, they wake when they are hungry when they are small. As they become able to take on more "food" they will stay full for longer at night. There's a gradual shift from "feeding every X hours all the time" to "feeding every X hours in the day and every Y at night." Add in the fact that some babies are more settled than others, calmer, aren't windy....

There's no major formula but, on the whole, they do gradually get better! I still remember waking in a sudden shock wondering what had gone wrong when DS1 slept for an hour longer at night than expected.

they can get worse along the way too - sort of 2 steps forward 1 step back though.

There is no way of knowing. My eldest always slept really well, while my youngest has been horrific. He's 17 months and is only just sleeping through reliably.

However, you get used to it, sort of. You're able to function on a lot less sleep than you think, when you've no choice!

Congratulations.

Hey junkieu,

You know, it is completely normal to be worried about your little one's sleep. There is so much into that and sleep is a complex thing. I know that from my experience once becoming a mum and i guess for this reason I'm helping other parents with the sleep now:)
Answering your question, the answer is not that simple. I don't know your little one's age and your current challenge... so I will give you a general answer..
Yes, it improves, if your little one is newborn as when they are around 4 months old, the sleep architecture is changing so in a short way they are able to sleep longer at night and they wake windows are expanding.
No, if your baby/toddler or even a pre-schooler is older and waking multiple times per night as they rely on something external to put them back to sleep (there is lots into that so its not only about sleep associations). Sometimes parents wait for the mark of 3months, 6months, 12 months and nothing is changing. If that is your case then I would look deeper into that as sometimes the things we were doing before to help our children are not sustainable anymore and need adapting or changing.

I hope my answer helps you a little bit:) You are not alone as I meet many parents who go through the same worries. Thankfully there are many sleep solutions that are gentle, responsive and lovingso that children feel loved and supported.

Hugs,
Ewa

100% this. Its also luck. I remember listening to a friend talk about how his child slept well because he was such a relaxed parent. So, implying that my baby didn't sleep well because I was stressed. Eh no, I was stressed because I was getting less than 5 hours of sleep night, he was getting 13. Knob.

As @mintbiscuit said, it's lots of ups & downs. They get teeth, get poorly, growth spurts, start nursery/school, all of which can disturb sleep. Or they're just hellish from the start & continue like that (DD2) Don't worry too much about it, just go with the flow & 10 minute naps are your friend if/when it's really bad. Good luck

No. Sleep is developmental, not linear. So they’ll go through good patches where they may sleep a few hours and bad patches where they’re up every hour or two.

This is a great article on the reality of baby sleep:

https://sarahockwell-smith.com/2017/07/24/the-rollercoaster-of-real-baby-sleep/

It’s really important to manage your expectations about how babies actually
sleep. Particularly at first they may not want to sleep anywhere but on you and reject the Moses basket/next to me/cot etc.

My ds was and still is a great sleeper; he was bottle fed.

My daughter is 2 and the longest stretch she's ever slept before waking is 3 hours. Otherwise it's every 1-2; she is breastfed.

Unsure if any coincidence re fed but thought I'd say it!

First baby had long sleeps and long naps, teething was still hard but still a good sleeper for most part.
Second woke every hour for first 3 years..
when I had my first uninterrupted 7 hours after that I felt amazing.. can't imagine not having full sleeps now.
Whatever happens you will get through it.

Absolutely no way to know, it's not a predictable thing

Ask 1000 parents and you'd probably get 1000 answers

DC1 slept through from around 2 months and has done every night since with not a single interruption from illness, teething or jet lag. DC2 has definitely had blips but overall it has got better over time.

Also, I think it’s relatively rare to get a newborn sleeping through but that most (although not all obviously!) toddlers have cracked it. So yes you are likely to see improvement over time.

But it’s also worth keeping in mind that improvements are often less to do with baby spontaneously getting better and have more to do with the parents sleep training, tweaking the nap routine, doing dreamfeeds, throwing 15 glow in the dark dummies in the cot, feeding weetabix before bed etc. etc. Beyond the initial newborn period it doesn’t have to be something that is completely outside of your control, there are things you can do, should you want to, to try to improve their sleep.

As others have said it's not linear and you go 2 steps forward 1 step back then maybe 3 steps forward and then 4 steps back. My biggest bit of advice is to have no expectations and treat every night as a brand new night. Just because you had a great night before doesn't mean tonight will be good and vice versa.

It's so tough but if it was impossible to live with then no one would go on to have more children. Ignore the housework etc for the first few weeks and just get every second of sleep you can.

My daughter slept through from 4 weeks old, but before that was up for up to 4 hours at a time during the night. She was a nightmare to get to sleep. Still is at 7.

My son slept through on his second night and consistently slept 12h from about 2 months. He’s 1 now and sleeps worse now than as a baby, but on the whole is great too.

My DS is 21 years and 10 months and sleep beautifully through the night.

The first three month were bad, but it's such a small time in the grand scheme of things.😂

I struggle to get my 22 year old out of bed in the morning 😂

Dgs slept better as a baby than he has since he was a toddler. He's coming up for four now and dd rarely gets an undisturbed night and he's rarely in bed after 5am each morning. Reward charts, gro clock etc have made no difference. He's full on fourteen hours a day with no naps.

You never know what you're going to get. I have 3 dc and my eldest slept through from 8 weeks and never looked back. My second child slept through aged 4 and my third child is 5 and sleeps badly due to autism.

They're all different.

My 19 month old started sleeping longer stretches by 12 weeks, would only sleep when held for the first 8 weeks. Health visitor told me sleep pattern settles down by 12 months but our toddler rarely sleeps through. Wakes 1-3 times a night and awake for the day at 6am. We did escape sleep regressions but suspect that's because the sleep isn't too great. Teething and separation anxiety make dd sleep much worse

My friends children first one only slept for 2 hours in 24 was a very happy child, 2nd one she had to wake up for feeds, 3rd was similar to the first but was a miserable baby.
You never know don’t expect lots of sleep and if u get done u will b happy.

Each child is different.

DS1 didn't sleep that well until he was 1. He was fine after that apart from a blip at just under 3.

DS2 was great from 6 weeks old until he was 1 and then he was horrendous until age 2-3. He got better gradually after that but still ends up in my bed at age 5.

Mostly but I

It goes up and down, but generally yes I'd say the good bits get better and the bad bits get less bad (with the exception of illness of course).

DD1 slept 8 hours straight for the first 12 weeks of her life, then it all went to hell and we had misery for the next three months. Then it gradually got better and she's a great sleeper now (she's nearly 4) and has been for about 3 years. But I put this down to luck rather than anything we did unfortunately, so I don't know how to replicate it for DD2 (11 months).

All things pass Op. By the time they are out of the toddler years most children sleep for 10 or 12 hours a night without waking except when they are ill. It seems scary but the baby years are not very long in the grand scheme of things.

There’s no point stressing about it now because it won’t change anything!

We had quite a difficult first 6 months, then did sleep training (I always recommend Dr Ferber’s book) and it was life changing.

And btw no . Being a good sleeper as a newborn has f all to do with sleep later !