In this article, you will receive 13 concrete pieces of advice from sleep coach Hanna Bergenkull about introducing new sleep routines for children. If you haven’t read the article “When you want to get your messy sleep in order”, we recommend that you do so first.

1. Reflect on the fact that your child expresses different emotions
As a parent, it is easy to interpret any negative emotion your child expresses as “sad crying”. But the fact is that children who have passed the age of six months instead often express various forms of dissatisfaction.

• Sad/miserable – your child cries and is sad because they are tired or cranky.
• Dissatisfaction – comes in several variants such as whining, angry and grumpy.
• Furiously angry – “I don’t want to!”

2: Learn to Listen, Interpret and Respond in Different Ways
When your child is sad, ask yourself “should I act now or can I wait and see if they manage to get out of this feeling on their own?”. Being a parent is an interaction between helping and waiting to help/resolve the situation. If you want to improve your sleep, you need to alternate between helping/supporting/distracting and waiting for your child and seeing if they can get out of the feeling of dissatisfaction on their own. If your child is crying, you need to act and comfort your child.

3: Do they have all their emotions?
To live means to feel and to express emotions. Consciously learning to listen and interpret our children’s signals opens up an interaction between protecting, helping and waiting and letting our child cope with smaller challenges on their own.

We will continue to protect and help. We must continue to comfort and show care. But we also need to let our children have time to try things on their own, even if it means that our children express dissatisfaction in various forms a little from time to time.

4: Check that your child is fully healthy
Before you decide to introduce new routines around sleep, you should be sure that there is no physical obstacle such as allergies, ear-nose-throat problems (such as apnea), reflux and so on.

5: Dark bedroom at night
Because light, including daylight and light from lamps, sends signals to the brain to reduce the production of melatonin (which makes us tired), children with disturbed sleep or who wake up too early in the morning need to sleep in pitch black bedrooms (up to about two years of age).

Children older than two begin to understand that there can be dangers in the dark and may need a little light to find their way around the bedroom. One idea is to shut out all daylight and leave the door to the bedroom slightly ajar, a gap of ½ cm is sufficient, and to have a weak lamp on somewhere outside the bedroom.

6: Set start date
Take out the calendar and see when it is practical to introduce new routines. Doing so takes some time and with great care I recommend that you focus on the change for two weeks. You will see an improvement with sleep within 2-6 days.

If you do not see any change within a week, there may be something missing and then it is wise to pause, read and think, and then continue your efforts.

7: Use Food and a Sleep Timer
An important part of getting sleep in order is to follow a clear schedule that is adapted to your child’s age. Fixed times for eating and sleeping affect the circadian rhythm so that your child is sufficiently hungry when it is time to eat and sufficiently sleepy when it is time to sleep.

Also introduce daily outdoor activities into the schedule, preferably one hour in the morning and in the afternoon. Daylight and being physically active positively affect the circadian rhythm and sleep.

8: Physical touch – important when introducing new routines
Massaging, carrying in your arms, scratching their back, rhythmically buffing their bottom or gently patting their head are examples of physical touch. What suits your child best depends on their personality and age. Physical touch is there to help your child out of feeling sad or feelings of dissatisfaction and is important when introducing new routines.

9: Leave when your child is aware that you are doing so
Educators at our nurseries remind us parents to say goodbye when we leave our child – even if it evokes strong emotions. Making your child aware that you are leaving gives the child an increased sense of control, and from that control, their sense of security grows stronger. Separation anxiety diminishes, a sense of security grows and calm sets in.

Aim to leave the bedroom before they fall asleep. Announce that you are leaving by repeatedly saying, for example, “sleep well – see you tomorrow”.

10: Your Voice – a bridge between you and your child
Always talk about leaving the bedroom and make your child aware that you are leaving. Use your voice as a mantra and repeat the same thing a few times in a row. Then be quiet and listen to how your child responds and reacts. After a while, if you feel it is necessary, you can remind them that you are still outside the bedroom.

11: The interaction between physical touch and your voice
In the first week (and especially the first 2-4 days) when the new sleep and getting back to sleep routines are introduced, it is important to, when necessary, be generous and quick to go to your child and help them back to sleep.

In parallel to working with the physical touch, you can work with your voice. Aim to gradually reduce physical contact and let your voice take over more and more.

12: Patience
Replacing established routines with new ones takes time and requires both determination and patience. Many families get in touch with me and tell me that they have experienced a very positive development, but that laying them down and waking up again have become more frequent. Try to be patient and if you trust your gut, my advice is to continue with the new routines you have introduced.

13: Find ways to reduce stress levels 
Finding ways to help yourself lower stress and reduce anxiety can help you improve your sleep. A relatively simple way is to practice conscious breathing for a little while every day.

How you do it doesn’t matter, but I really want to encourage you to take a moment every day for yourself – and when you don’t get the time that day, accept this. Tomorrow is a new day (or maybe the day after is…)