Why and how newborn babies' sleep patterns change
During pregnancy, your baby slept most of the time, with sleep cycles lasting around 40 minutes; after birth, newborns often have a period during which they are a little more awake and alert. While every baby is an individual and will have different sleep needs, all newborns have a small stomach – around the size of a walnut – so will need to wake regularly for feeds throughout the day and night.
Is there an 'average' amount of time my baby should be sleeping for?
Newborn babies tend to sleep for around 16-18 hours a day, but this is likely to be in short bursts so it probably won't feel like that long to you! Your baby has not yet developed circadian rhythms that contribute to the pattern of sleeping more at night than during the day.
Although sleep can vary from day to day, you will find that you begin to notice a pattern in your baby’s sleep, with more predictable periods of being awake and asleep.
Sleep patterns: the differences between adults' and babies' active and quiet sleep periods
Babies don't have the same sleep patterns as adults. When we sleep, we have periods of rapid eye movement (REM) sleep and periods of quiet sleep. During REM sleep, our conscious brains are active and it is during this time that we dream; during quiet sleep our brain and body rests and recharges. Adults have cycles of sleep that last about 90 minutes, falling quickly into quiet sleep and then moving into REM sleep, with a balance of around 20-25% REM sleep and 75-80% quiet sleep.
For babies, REM sleep is known as 'active sleep' as their brains are busy during this time and they will be more easily awakened during these periods. Babies fall first into active sleep, then after a period into quiet sleep, but they have shorter sleep cycles with more active or REM sleep than adults.
As a parent, this mismatch in sleep cycles will make some night wakings feel harder than others, because of the point you are at in your sleep cycle when you're woken.
Sleeping through the night – why it's a bit of a misnomer
It's worth bearing in mind that the expectation about ‘sleeping through’ the night from a few months old is relatively recent, arising in the 1950s and 1960s, with ‘sleeping through’ based on a baby sleeping for a 5-hour period between midnight and 6am.[5] A recent survey by the Lullaby Trust[6] showed that 59% of parents of children under 1 said that their baby slept for less than four hours at a time, so the idea of ‘sleeping through’ is certainly less realistic than it sounds.
Longer sleeps will come...for both of you!
Your baby might not ‘sleep through’ for some time, but in the coming months their sleep patterns will change with gradually longer periods asleep and awake, and longer periods of sleep at night. Sleep remains important for brain development, growth and wellbeing throughout your child’s life and into adulthood, so thinking about a bedtime routine might help to develop habits for the future. It's also important to think about your own need for rest and sleep, so think about how you make sure that you get rest whenever you can. One study suggested that giving mothers of newborn babies personalised advice about their own sleep led to an average of one hour more sleep and greater wellbeing.[2]
Whether you have access to personalised advice about your own sleep or not, hang on in there. We know sleep deprivation is tough to cope with, but try to remember that this phase for you and your newborn will look very different in the months to come. Try to enjoy the slightly topsy turvy way that sleep is for now, and use those precious feeding times to let your body rest and rejuvenate.
References:
[1]. Addyman, C (2020) The laughing baby: The extraordinary science behind what makes babies happy. London: Unbound.
[2] Byrne, E. (2021). How to build a human. What science knows about childhood. London. Souvenir Press.
[3] No Author (undated) Normal sleep development [Online] Available at: Normal Sleep Development – BASIS (basisonline.org.uk) (Accessed 22nd September 2021).
[4] No Author (undated) Health Care Professionals Normal sleep development. [Online] Available at: Normal Sleep Development – BASIS (basisonline.org.uk) (Accessed on 22nd September 2021)
[5] Moore, T & Ucko, C. (1957). Night waking in early infancy. Archives of Disease in Childhood. 32: 33-342.
[6] No Author (undated) Coping with sleep deprivation as a new parent. [Online] Available at: Coping with sleep deprivation as a new parent – The Lullaby Trust (Accessed on 22nd September 2021).