Am I the only person who doesn't have a routine for sleep?

[TheCatsMeow]

I see and hear people saying "x time is nap time" or writing out schedules for when their babies nap and I'm floored by it. Starting to doubt myself because I don't do this at all.

DS sleeps when he's tired, I can tell when he's tired and put him down then. He might have one nap he might have three, he might sleep for two hours it might be less than 5 minutes.

We don't have a bed time either, he goes up when he's tired or when I want to watch the TV lol

He sleeps through apart from if he's ill and is fine, but I'm starting to think I'm doing it "wrong" as everyone else seems to have a time table?! I can't imagine doing that because I'm not one for routine but if everyone's doing it maybe it's me?

I'm the same with weaning, sometimes he has 3 meals sometimes he doesn't, it depends

Is there any reason not to do this?!

[TheCatsMeow]

Thurlow I think that's the thing, I don't have a routine for myself. I don't eat regularly (which is probably not great) or sleep at the same time, and don't have a set pattern to my day I just decide on the morning if I'm gonna go out, stay in, I just take everything as it comes. So I've done the same with my baby but I do wonder if that'll stay the same or not

[imwithspud]

I think, and obviously I don't know your baby, but based on my own experience, a pattern will form as your baby gets older. You may find that actually, having some sort of structure (with room for flexibility) benefits your baby more than not, especially as they grow and become less 'portable' for want of a better term.

[LillyBugg]

I'll just get on with my day and feed him/let him sleep as he asks for it.

I think this is really easy to say at 5mo when baby is portable and sleeping on the go is easy. Our 'routine' appeared at about 8mo and just happened from what DS wanted. Now he is bigger (16mo) he wants to sleep from 1pm -3pm. But he doesn't sleep well on the go. So I try to be home for this time. Which means our routine is built around this. It's not easy for me to 'just go with it' anymore because if he doesn't sleep, he is miserable and the day is long and hard.

Basically I'm agreeing with the many other posters saying that your lack of routine and ability to just go with the flow is a reflection of your child's age.

[TheCatsMeow]

You might be right, in a way I hope not because it would drive me mad having to schedule my days around naps

[imwithspud]

You'll get used to it I'm sure. It's better than a screaming, overtired, tantrumming child.

[TheCatsMeow]

I'm trying to watch his naps to see if there's any pattern but it really does seem to be that there isn't. He's had 2 today whereas yesterday he didn't. Maybe as he's older it will change, I am keeping an open mind

[LillyBugg]

spud has got it in one.

I found it hard when it was two naps I had to schedule. It felt like the whole time was taken up with either napping or eating. We went to one nap at around 14mo and it's been much more manageable. He now only has two or more naps when he's poorly. Like today

[Thurlow]

Yes, one nap was definitely easier. I imagine the majority of kids settle into a nap after lunch at a certain age. Then you get a nice hour or two to sit down with a cuppa!

I'm genuinely interested, I appreciate that you are not a routine person yourself and don't like the idea of it, but when your DS starts nursery and school he will need to go to bed and get up at the same sort of time?

[TheCatsMeow]

Thurlow I assume my DS is like me, and doesn't need the same amount of sleep each day. Some days he's more tired than others and as long as he's not up until ridiculous hour I'm not fussed about a specific bedtime.

[Pyjamaramadrama]

The lovely thing about small babies is they are portable, especially the chilled out, will nap anywhere ones.

There will come a point though when you will have to have some structure. Toddlers tend to have one big nap midday, they also need to eat regularly. School age children even more so as they'll need picking up from school, they need to eat at a proper time and have a bedtime.

It all happens gradually and you just get used to it.

[RudeElf]

If it works for you OP then no need to change it. Personally i loved my babies routines and it made it really easy to spot when they were out of sorts because they were resisting what they normall did. With DS2 i was less routined and i struggled tbh. But i am the sort of person who needs a routine in order to function.

[Pyjamaramadrama]

Meow you might find he's roughly having the same amount of sleep over a 24-48 hour period just at different times? For example my ds nap routine goes out the window if we go out for the day, but he might catch up over the next day at home.

My ds is 7 months and he's only really started to have a nap routine since about 5.5 months.

[TheCatsMeow]

pyjama that's what I'm trying to work out. He just slept for 40 minutes so I'm going to see if there's a pattern to how long he sleeps

He's easy to tell if he's tired though so normally I go by that

[NickyEds]

it would drive me mad having to schedule my days around naps

It won't. You just gradually get used to it. You'll decide it's important after one enormous meltdown, or sleep regression or growth spurt.Or at the very least when you return to work.

I'm not sure why routine is so frowned upon on mn really. When ds was tiny there were a few mums who said that they had no routine at all.....except for a bath, story, milk.......and of course breakfast.... a nd lunch....and we do nursery so they give him his tea....bob's your uncle, they had a routine.

It's not as if you simply can not do anything when your dc have a routine.They are generally flexible to a degree and can actually help doing stuff because you know you can get through X activity without your toddler getting spectacularly grumpy!

My ds is now two and even the most free spirited mum I know has a routine for her toddler.

Also, at 5 months you're still just about in easy sleep territory-it's much harder won when they're 8 months and can move about!

[JonSnowKnowsNowt]

It depends a bit on your personality, I think. I am a bit of an introvert and NEED some alone/off-duty time to myself. Bedtime is definitely a routine in this house, so I know when I'm clocking off and can concentrate on my own things!

It also definitely benefits my DC (who are all primary-school-age). I don't enforce 'lights-out' time, only bedtime, so they can read in bed till they feel sleepy. (I think that reading, unlike screen-watching, makes you naturally sleepy, so they don't stay up too late.) They are all really good readers, with a wide range of books they're interested in, and they look forward to that time to read to themselves. But perhaps they're just introverts like me!

[Thurlow]

I assume my DS is like me, and doesn't need the same amount of sleep each day

We were ready for DD to be a truly terrible sleeper as DP has suffered on and off from insomnia all his life but... no, nothing like him. She can sleep for England, and sleeps like the dead.

Babies to have personalities, of course they do. It's just in 4 years of bodging my way through parenting with the help of MN has taught me anything, it's that nothing stays the same, and things change in a surprising way very quickly!

[Pyjamaramadrama]

I think it's because when you mention routine, people think of a fixed time schedule, like a rigid 4 hourly feeding schedule.

Parenting is ever changing, with a newborn you're tied to the nappy bag, with a toddler you're tied to the naps with a school aged you're tied to the school runs, but you can go back to spontaneously going out with no luggage and eating on the go.

[TheCatsMeow]

JonSnow I'm an introvert too, but I can generally get alone time because I live in a house with family members so it's not always me doing the putting go bed or feeding.

Nicky is it frowned upon? It seems positively looked at when I've read things.

[NickyEds]

I always get the feeling that routines are frowned upon, yes. As Pyjama says I think some people hear "routine" and assume that it's forced thing, imposed on little babies where in reality I think they can be very organic and revolve around meeting a baby's needs without too much fuss.

[TheCatsMeow]

I did assume that it was put on by parents but i don't think it's seen as negative. I think that it obviously works for a lot of others!

[FATEdestiny]

is it frowned upon? It seems positively looked at when I've read things.

The probable reason for that is that I post on most threads on the sleep board . I encourage and value a routine, baby-led routine that is. So I would mention routine whenever relevant on any thread. Not just me actually, there are several of posters with similar attitudes who post a lot on sleep threads.

Go back a year or two and the tone on the sleep board was very different - favouring the attitude of just putting baby in a sling with ready boob-access and getting on with your day. Likewise co-sleeping and constant boob access at night usually followed by controlled crying your toddler. Such posters are still around and when baby sleep related posts appear outside of the sleep board 9 times out of 10 this will be the general attitude on the thread.

When I first started posting here the genuine advise perpetrated on the sleep board that baby will BF to sleep and sleep on you until they are toddlers and then you have the choice of either carrying this on until school age (the baby-led way) or doing some distressing sleep training involving lots of crying (the parent led way).

These were touted as the only options. It never seemed to occur to anyone that if you took a different attitude early in baby's life, that baby could learn to sleep independently while still little without any crying whatsoever. I genuinely don't think people used to believe me when I first started posting, but it's the way I've always done it.

I remember the very first sleep thread I posted on was a long thread about the value of sleep consultants, in particular someone who hired a consultant to advise her with a 5-day old newborn. I piped up 50-odd posts in and said I'd be your sleep consultant for free - use a dummy and put baby down to sleep from birth. Easy peesy. I was absolutely flamed.

[mrsmugoo]

Whatever works for you - you might find this changes over time.

My DS was very much a routine baby - he put himself in one as he was tired the same amount of time after waking, slept for the same time each nap and went the same amount of time between feeds and hated having to go longer. I just organised my day around when I knew he would be tired/hungry...much to the judginess of my SIL who would roll her eyes at me and tell me not to be such a slave to my routine.

[TheCatsMeow]

just putting baby in a sling with ready boob-access and getting on with your day

This is pretty much what I do although bf failed so he has a dummy or a bottle in the sling.

Fate that's interesting. DS does sleep independently, he always has (I take medication that means cosleeping would be dangerous) and he's never had a problem with it. I do feed him to sleep though.

[Jw35]

Why would it just be you? No you're not the only one my baby hasn't got a routine as such either. She sleeps great too!

[imwithspud]

FATE I wasn't around on mn with my first but your examples of feeding to sleep and doing things 'baby-led' was me down to a T with my eldest. I frequented another forum which 'promoted' the same kind of approach and was all "they work it out in their own time. Yes they do, but you do have to give them the opportunity to do it. DD1 ended up being a terrible sleeper and yes we did end up sleep training because I was losing the plot, felt and still feel awful about it. But I feel I went about it all wrong anyway.

I did it differently with dd2, fed to sleep occasionally (unavoidable when they're really small) but also given the opportunity to self settle, obviously picking her up if she cried etc. She's nearly 8 months old now - has been a much better sleeper thus far and we've now reached the stage where I can pop her in her cot and leave her to it. Something I couldn't achieve with dd1 until sleep training. Of course it could just be because they're different babies but it's been a much more pleasant experience this time round and I can't help but feel it's because my approach is slightly different too.