Baby bed time

[sunhat88]

My in laws had their first grandchild around 6 months ago. They live close to them and see them a lot daytime and evening. The babies bed time is the parents bedtime so the baby is up all evening with them and goes to bed 11 or 12 ish. That's what works for their circumstances. I'm hoping at the right time my baby that's due will have more of a 7pm bed time routine as it will suit my circumstances. We live a distance but will stay with my in laws from time to time. I'm anticipating it may be hard to maintain this routine on these visits. They often have people visit them in the evening or go to family friends houses and the first grandchild will always be there and up and in a very different routine. My question really is how do babies cope with a few days every few weeks of a totally different sleep routine to the one you have at home? Will it create a nightmare the next day or when we get home? I want to be flexible and not too regimented but I don't really know how this will work. Any advice would be great. Thank you. x

When dd was a small baby it was fine and she would go along with whatever was happening. She really didn't have a proper bedtime until gone 6 months anyway.

After that we would take her out with us but try to settle her in her buggy or travel cot at roughly the usual time. She would get overtired, grumpy and tricky to settle otherwise.

Now she's a toddler it completely throws her if she's late to bed. She's very tired and tearful and asks to go to bed. And grumpy in the morning if she hasn't had enough sleep.

I think all kids are different and some will manage better than others but the rest of the family need to respect your choices for your child including evening routine and bed time.

Up to about 6 months DS2 stayed downstairs till we went to bed. He cluster fed a lot of the evening and slept on my lap till about 10 when I went to bed. Newborns have no concept of day and night to begin with. Bedtime moved forward naturally without much input from me. He's 19 months now and goes to bed between 730 and 830 now depending on his daytime nap.
The advice is to have baby sleeping in the same room as you till 6 months anyway and you really have to wait to see what type of baby you get, they really don't care what fits in with your circumstances! You might get a fantastic sleeper or you might not. You just have to wait and see!
I think that you have to wait and see how they are with different routines too. DS1 would sleep anywhere, at parties, at weddings, in the pushchair, it didn't matter. DS2 will not sleep unless he is at home, he is much more suited to a routine. It's good in one way as he's always asleep earlier than DS1 was but it's more restrictive, especially for things like family parties. DS1 would sleep in his pushchair but with DS2 we have to leave.

Baby sleeps in the same room as you until 6 months anyway so unless you plan to go to bed at 7 it will be downstairs later. My DS is 5 months and will go to sleep at about 8 and I'll stay up until he wakes for a feed then transfer him upstairs.

Babies don't really care where they are so just take pram with you and put down to sleep there. Will need to wake when you go home but if already in PJ's you can resettle quite quickly when home

Before 4 months most babies can sleep any where with anything happening around them.

Before 6 months a baby should always sleep in a room with an adult.

As PP have said, current research and safe sleeping advice says baby must be in same room as an adult until 6 months, whether they are asleep or awake, so even if they settle off to sleep, they should be downstairs with you in moses basket etc

And while it might 'suit your circumstances' for them to go to bed at seven, I don't think babies necessarily follow what suit their parents

Always had the opposite issue. DD up late with us and relatives out of bed and making as much noise as possible at the crack of dawn (even if they were at our house). We stay at a hotel now and see them when it suits us.

DD was a night owl from birth, as was I (we still are). You don't get a say over everything.

My 4 month old sleeps in a side cot in our room and goes to sleep between 6 and 8pm every night. Sometimes I'll visit family and be out until 8 or 9 so I normally let her sleep on me from about 7ish then resettle her into her bed when we get home. Sometimes the resettling can take up to an hour but it hasn't had any detrimental effects on her sleep so far.

I'm going on holiday for a week next month however with a time difference of 2 hours and I'm dreading it ruining her sleep as I'm well aware we've hit the jackpot in these early months with a baby who likes to sleep.

I should add that I go to bed about midnight after she's asleep. I just use a video monitor.

I went somewhere with a 5 hour time difference with my (then) 4 month old. Don't recall any major issues (but I did take the hammock with me).

Would you not just settle your baby down to sleep at the usual time (7pm) and then put her down upstairs with a baby monitor in the room while you go downstairs?

Until my daughter was 6 months she stayed up with us anyway as she always slept in the same room as us as per the SIDS guidelines. She'd spend the evening breastfeeding/ dozing on us or in the carry cot (and travel cot when a bit older) so any change in routine wouldn't make much of a difference. I think between 6 months and a year she would have been ok with a change in routine either (although she has never gone to bed later than 8- not even on days she has had no daytime sleep). After she turned 1 she would have got really grumpy after about 9pm and wanted bed.

It probably depends on what age you get your baby into a routine. By 12 weeks both of mine were upstairs asleep between 7-8pm depending what time their last nap had been. They only slept for 3 x 30 min stretches up to about 6 months old so were ready for bed by 7ish.

They went into their own rooms at this age too as they were too big for the moses basket. You just don't know what kind (and size) of baby you'll produce!

SIDS guidelines advise babies in the same room as at least one parent until 6 months.

Yes when they're tiny they would be down with you and you could take them out in the evening if you are going somewhere. When they have a proper bedtime and are over 6 months I think it's completely unfair to take them out somewhere and have them awake til midnight. Some children may handle it but mine certainly wouldn't and besides, sleep is really important for children. So for me I would either have a babysitter at home, or put them upstairs to bed at gps.

And yet millions of babies thrive every year without a set (early) bedtime.

You only have to watch the recent BBC Panorama programme on Sleepless Britain for plenty of evidence that that's not true Titty. But this isn't a debate on what time children should go to bed, different things works for different families. The op was asking about regularly upsetting a child's routine to suit parent's social lives.

Didn't see it. Didnit cover children around the world? Where early bedtimes are unheard of? And where children are happier and achieve better than British children?

Enough sleep is very important. Good sleep is very important. Early bedtime isn't important for everyone and there are significant downsides and health concerns in trying to make a baby/child with an owl body clock follow a lark's sleeping pattern (and vice versa).