White noise?

[ddoodle55]

Morning all,

Just wanted to ask your thoughts / experience on white noise for babies? We are about to have our first baby and I'm not too keen on the idea of using white noise for a number of reasons-

• don't want him becoming completely reliant on white noise and unable to sleep without it
• when do we stop using white noise?
• study from last year linked white noise to language delays

I was hoping for some perspectives from those who have / haven't used it - I of course appreciate that millions of babies were raised without white noise and all learned how to sleep!!

Would it be unreasonable to not use it at first but introduce it down the line if he turns out to be a terrible sleeper? I know most parents these days swear by it - I don't know any mums who don't use it.

Thanks in advance x

I thought they were stupid and We didn’t use it when she was small but we were given one as a gift and she kept waking once she got bigger so we tried it out 🤩🤩🤩

We now use it every night with our 22m old
she doesn’t have it at childcare or at my mums and sleeps fine there…

Don't knock it until you've tried it is all I'd say 😂. My 3.5 year old still has white noise on low and my 1 year old has it on too. I'm actually putting him down for his nap as we speak and the white noise is on.

My 5 year old still asks for his on at nighttime 🤣 he can sleep without it too, he just prefers to have it and I like that I can continue cleaning the house etc without disturbing him! He was quite advanced with his speech so definitely no language delays here.

I wouldn’t worry about it, just know it’s an option if you need it when your baby is here.

We didn’t use it, wasn’t really a big thing when DS was a baby but my brother uses it for his 1 YO at bedtime if the house is otherwise still quite noisy so that she isn’t disturbed whilst drifting off.

I'd wait until you've actually given birth before deciding what you are and aren't keen on.

A mistake lots of us make when we think we know what having a baby will be like, but we should wait until we actually know before deciding whether we need something or not!

I used it with one of mine and he was an amazing sleeper! I swear it did make a difference (although he was pretty good to begin with)

It's actually my other dc who needs a sleep cast to go to sleep now (aged 9) 😩. She really struggles to go to sleep without it. So I don't think it causes ongoing reliance on it when used for babies. For us, it was introducing it with an older child that did it

I think your feelings might change if you’re in the thick of sleep deprivation and white noise is the difference between being screamed at vs actually being able to get them down for a bit.

We had so many lofty ideals going into having DD, but the reality was once we were in the fog on the newborn stage we were more than willing to take the path of least resistance/utilise ways to make life easier. The best advice I can give is to go in with an open mind and do what works for you.

We’ve used white noise with DD since the early days to help us through the witching hours, and still use it now as a 1yo at bedtime. She’s developmentally ahead for her age so I don’t think it’s done her any harm.

Thanks everyone for your replies!! So good to hear of older kids who used it and have no delays etc.

Totally agree with PPs that we should keep an open mind and I am totally open to the idea of introducing it later on. I think it's too easy to get caught up in this idea that you need to have everything for the baby before they are born 🙈 amazon will still exist should we decide we need a white noise machine 😂

Honestly we had near hourly amazon deliveries in the early weeks 😂

The good thing is that you can wean them off gradually by turning the volume down or moving it away, unlike say rocking them to sleep or a dummy. So don’t worry too much about reliance.

Definitely recommend, our DD was a rubbish sleeper. I can’t remember when we introduced it but we were at least a couple of months in. We tried lullabies at first but that didn’t work so we tried the white noise. She’s 2.5 now and we still use it. It’s more of a signal for sleep time now I think.
She is also advanced for language. Haven’t heard of white noise causing language delays before

We used it from day 1 it was fab. We used it all night when she was a newborn and she slept great, would wake for a bottle then straight back to sleep.

We also used it during nappy changes in the early days to keep her nice and calm and worked a treat. It's so handy to use in their bedroom during things like bonfire night, or if you have friends/family around as it drowns out the noise to stop them from waking.

We naturally stopped using it when she was about 6 months old as we just found we didn't need to anymore.

Every child is different. My eldest was fine without it. Second, game changer! Only way we could sleep. Infact I loved it so much myself, we all now sleep with white noise.

I can’t stand normal white noise but Ewan dream sheep has a heartbeat noise which is much more tolerable. It really settled DD2, she’s very advanced with her language.

DD3 sleeps absolutely fine fine without it, seems to actually disturb her.

There’s white noise available online. Experiment and see what works for your baby

With both of mine I did end up using it but didn't use it from the get go in case we didn't need it.

With my first, once we did introduce it we used it every night for 2 years. We just randomly stopped one day and it didn't make any difference at all. He also was far ahead in his speech, so definitely no issues there.

Still using second time round. No idea if when we stop we will have any issues. But I've grown quite used to it now and sleep better with it on myself!

Mine had her dream egg on until she was two, it just became part of her routine. Very advanced speech.

My first needed it, she was still a sleeper but marginal gains. Slightly slow to start talking but rapidly caught up and surpassed what typical for her age, was formally assessed

My second never did, he just slept. More marked speech delay there.

I don't see why you'd use it if they sleep fine without it and if they don't sleep... try it!!!

Love white noise! We didn’t use it for our first, we didn’t need to, she was so easy but #2 was very different, a nightmare to get to sleep and woke up at the slightest sound. White noise was a god send. When we had number 3 we used white noise but didn’t really need to so stopped, now she’s 6 she hates going to bed before her siblings and fights us, we have an echo dot in her room and she chooses music or white noise each night, it drowns out the noise of her sisters and makes it easier for us to get her to sleep without making everyone else in the house be quiet.

As for stopping it, it was a natural thing, we got to the point it was obvious we didn’t need it.

It’s also amazing on holidays or sleeping in strange places, especially if there is background noise, doors slamming music etc.. the white noise cancels everything out.