# Does YOUR baby need an early bedtime?



## Steve's Wife (Jan 19, 2006)

I keep reading in all these sleep books that babies need an early betime, that they are programed to go to bed early. Well, my dd seems to be a night owl like her momma and daddy. She used to go to bed at 9, then maybe 2 months ago it became 10, then about a month ago it became 11. She usually makes up for it by sleeping later in the morning, lately 10:30ish, but I wonder if I should be encouraging her to go to bed earlier. I want to do what is best for her biologically. I'm even reading Weissbluth now b/c it's supposedly got so much good sleep info in it, even though we'd never do CIO at all. He advocates a 7:00ish bedtime just like Pantley.


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## Steve's Wife (Jan 19, 2006)

I also meant to say that occasonally when she falls asleep early, like 8:30 or 9, I'll try to make that her bedtime instead of a nap. When she wakes again, usually within an hour, I'll try to nurse her back down. This generally results in either not going back to sleep at all or waking up in the middle of the night not wanting to go back to sleep. DH got up with her at 2:00am a few weeks ago when she wouldn't go back down. Was up for an hour. I've always taken this to mean she was going to bed too early, as that's the ONLY time that happens, but some sleep experts seem to think this is a sign of sleep deprivation? Seems odd to me.


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## 425lisamarie (Mar 4, 2005)

DS went to bed at 12-1am untill he was only taking one nap a day. Ever since he goes to bed around 9:30-10pm.


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## 425lisamarie (Mar 4, 2005)

btw I think 7pm is absurd







. My kids won't sleep if the sun is still up...unless they can go down that early I wouldn't push it. Wonder what the deal is with 7pm, what makes that the magic hour







I hear of the 7pm thing alot


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## sweedma (Jul 6, 2006)

I've wondered exactly the same thing, since my ds tends to go to sleep around 9:00 and this works out well for us since my dh doesn't even get home until 7:00. The sleep books totally all say for kids to have an early bedtime, and I just don't get it. Babies don't know what time it is! My ds sleeps in until about 8:00, so he gets his hours in.

So, would they somehow magically wake less at night if they went to bed earlier? I think even the NCSS says this, and definitely Weissbluth does. What's the deal?


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## proud mama of 2 (Dec 16, 2004)

My DD has always DEMANDED and early bedtime. She just turned 2 and from the time she was born, at around 5:30pm she would get extremely fussy and required all of my attention, meaning she wanted Mama to go to bed and lay down with her in the quite of our bedroom. I could NOT lay on the couch in the living room or she would just cry, even though I would offer for her to nurse she would not until we went in my room. Then she would be content to nurse and purr her way into a deep sleep


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## Snowdrift (Oct 15, 2005)

my DD is usually ready for sleep by 7.30-8.30. She wakes for a half hour to an hour when we go to bed around midnight and wakes again around three to nurse.

Or at least that is the pattern this week...


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## mommaJ (May 3, 2005)

my DD has always been ready for bed early (7ish sometimes 8ish) we tried to move it later to fit our schedule a bit better, but to no avail. i really think they have their own body clocks, and each one is probably different. she does fall under what most books say.....the earlier she goes to bed, the more and better she sleeps. putting her down later only results in even earlier (and very cranky!) mornings.


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## JavaBean (Feb 7, 2004)

We were doing an 8:00-8:30pm bedtime with DD and couldn't figure out why she was so fussy and hard to put down. My friend said that was too late and suggested a 7:00-7:30pm bedtime. Nothing else was working for us so we tried it. It was like magic. She stopped fussing and went to bed happy. Best of all, she stayed asleep!

I don't mean that life stops at 7:00pm. I try to manage her day so she gets 3 naps (or 2.5 naps - 2 long and 1 shorty) and her bedtime is 2 hours past her last wake up. This usually is around 7:30pm. That's the routine that works best for her. Sometimes her last nap wake up is at 6:00pm so her bedtime is moved to about 7:45pm and that's OK too. Having and staying on a rough schedule for her is making bedtime so much easier.

Her morning wake up time varies between 7:00 and 8:00am, usually 7:30am, with an 11pm and 3am feeding. DS (3yo) is also an early sleeper at 8:30 at the absolute latest. His morning wake up is 7:00-7:30am and a 2-3 hour nap.

I like this schedule because it's not so tough of a transition when he started preschool. We also get an early start to the day so we are able to do more things like hit the beach or Farmer's Market.


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## True Blue (May 9, 2003)

7:30 has always worked perfectly for us, but I must say it wasn't until after the 1 year mark. My babies NEVER went to bed that early!!!

If your routine is later (DH works late, etc) OBVIOUSLY 7pm wouldn't be "prime" for your family. But for the rest of us, it tends to be the best time. FWIW, my DS wakes up between 6:30 and 7:30am regardless if I put him down at 7:30 or 9:30....so 7:30 is obviously the better choice for us.


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## AlbertaJes (May 11, 2006)

The first 2 months, DD would not settle until 2 am. She's sleep in arms, but as soon as I would put her down, she'd wake up again. Then we went camping. And literally overnight, she started falling asleep deeply at 10pm. After a couple weeks, she started wanting to go to bed at 9 (she's very clear that this is what she wants). Now she varies between 8 and 10, but usually she's sleeping by 9 or 930.


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## mama_tigress (May 19, 2006)

My 3-month-old DS needs an early bedtime. It's even been tough pushing it back with DST. He usually goes to sleep sometime around 6:30 or 7, although he's been known to fall asleep as early as 6. If he's still awake at 8 that's a bad sign--he gets extremely fussy and doesn't sleep well.

I think there's something to be said for circadian rhythms, and I'd venture to say that the majority of children probably do better with early bedtimes. That doesn't mean that all do, though. I never set out to have DS have a bedtime at 7, it just happened. When he was around 8-9 weeks old he started falling into nighttime sleep at around 5:45, and then it stabilized at about 6:30-7. I've just been following his cues though.

I think babies' bodies do know the time. And although Weissbluth's book doesn't sit well with me in some ways, I do think the basics are pretty well grounded in biology. Then again, I might disagree if I had a baby who didn't want to go to sleep until late at night


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## StrawberryFields (Apr 6, 2005)

We are having bedtime problems over here. Ds has always gone to bed at a late hour. Lately we have noticed that if he has an earlier bedtime he is better rested, less cranky, sleeps better at night, and takes better naps. The problem is getting him down for bedtime. We can rock him for hours and hours with no luck, and if he finally does go down he wakes after an hour or so and wants to get back up for the day. So all in all we are just not happy.







:


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## 4Marmalade (May 4, 2004)

Early birds here. My ds and dd both go to sleep unbelievably early. When they were tiny babies they were more like 8-9pm but overtime they both reverted to earlier bedtimes between 6-7pm. We tried to get them to sleep a little later hoping to enjoy the dinner hour more or get them to sleep in a bit more but nothing worked so we just let them set their own internal clock. If nothing else it's predictable


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## GooeyRN (Apr 24, 2006)

An early bedtime always back-fires on us. If we put her down to sleep at 7, she is up a million (well, not that many, but it seems like it!) times, and takes an hour or so each time to go back to sleep. She gets up before 6:00 am regardless of when she goes to bed. So we get our choice, early bedtime with a very interrupted sleep for us, or a later bedtime with only 2-3 short wakings. Her total sleep time at night is the same regardless of when she goes to bed. Her naps are still the same, too. She sleeps for a total of 8-9 hours in a 24 hour period, naps and night time sleep included.


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## Flower of Bliss (Jun 13, 2006)

My 2 month old DD goes to bed between 11 and midnight. She happily sleeps for 4-6 hours straight.







She'll nurse once between 4-6 am, then back to sleep for 1-2 hours, nurse again, and continue the 1-2 hour gap till about 9 am. Sometimes she'll surprise me and do two 4 hour sleeps back to back. If we go to bed earlier, she'll wake up every 1-2 hours pretty much all night.







:

She's very much a daddy's girl.







: Her face just lights up when he comes home. The rest of the day its usually just the two of us. In the evenings things get interesting. I'm not surprised she's such a night owl. She hardly sleeps at all in the evening - maybe one hour nap or two 30 minute naps.


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## mothragirl (Sep 10, 2005)

alice doesn't go to sleep til around midnight. with our schedule/lifestyle there is no way we could put her to bed at 7 pm, that is the middle of our day!


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## emma_goldman (May 18, 2005)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *mommaJ* 
my DD has always been ready for bed early (7ish sometimes 8ish) we tried to move it later to fit our schedule a bit better, but to no avail. i really think they have their own body clocks, and each one is probably different. she does fall under what most books say.....the earlier she goes to bed, the more and better she sleeps. putting her down later only results in even earlier (and very cranky!) mornings.

This is true for us, too! I guess with daylight savings, he usually wants to go to sleep when the sun goes down.


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## kwren23 (Jul 28, 2006)

our girl is also a night owl. whenever she fell asleep in the early evening and we tried to get her to stay down for the night she'd be up at 2 am ready to party. after a few very miserable nights of being up for 3 hours in the middle of the night with a cheerfully wide awake baby we just stopped trying to put her down at what most people would consider a reasonable hour. i really think your kid comes programmed with thier own sleep schedule, theyre very much in tune with thier own rhythms.

i didnt do anything differently with either of my kids in regards to bedtime and i had one that would always be down for the night between 9 and 10 and up at 8 am and now i have one who doesnt go down until at least 2 am and sleeps till at least one. while this might not be ideal for everyone i have to admit i am very pleased with my night owl... i'm a sahm and dont have any real demands on my time in the early morning and i would much rather stay up late and sleep in than have to force myself to go to sleep by ten to get a decent nights sleep. besides, often her daddy works till 10 and both of them would be heartbroken if they didnt have a chance to spend some time together!

she gets up at 1 or 2, and is happy and busy until she goes down for a nap, usually between 5 and 6 and sleeps for at least 2 hours, then shes up till two. she usually gives me a good six hours of uninterrupted sleep before she wakes up to nurse and then is up every 3 hours for boob till she gets up for good. if we try to put her to bed early she is up for a good 2 to 3 hours in the middle of the night and is then up every hour or so till she gets up and tends towards crabby the whole rest of the day (which is very unusual)

honestly i tend to think the whole early bedtime for babies is a matter of convenience more than anything, when you work normal 9 to 5 hours it works better for most people to put the kids to bed at 7. a lot of kids work well with that, and thats great, but if your kid doesnt sleep well when you put her down early do what your instincts are telling you is best. i think what really matters the most is whether your dd is well rested and getting a good nights sleep, not what time shes getting it!


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## rebelbets (Jun 6, 2005)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *kwren23* 
honestly i tend to think the whole early bedtime for babies is a matter of convenience more than anything, when you work normal 9 to 5 hours it works better for most people to put the kids to bed at 7.

See, I think the opposite is true. Most working parents I know would like for their kids to go to bed later so they can have more time to spend with them in the evenings.

My husband doesn't get home from work until 6:30, but my son pretty much demands a 7pm bedtime. It's disappointing for DH, only being able to spend 30 minutes with DS in the evenings. But our son's needs come first, and sleep is important, so we put him to bed early. DS is 10 months old.


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## royaloakmi (Mar 2, 2005)

Yes, my twins have always done better with an early bedtime . . . around 7:30 pm when they were infants.


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## mamanurse (Jan 22, 2006)

Dd absolutely will not put up with going to bed after 7. It's kind of a bummer for us 'cause we can't really go out after dh gets home due to her sleeping needs. She normally goes to bed sometime between 6 & 7. If I try to keep her up past that, then she throws tantrum after tantrum and everyone is miserable. She wakes up sometime between 6:30 and 7 am for the day and takes 1 or 2 naps a day. All in all she sleeps between 14 and 16 hours a day.

We've found that the more she sleeps, the more she sleeps, the more she sleeps.


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## JenJMP (Aug 8, 2005)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *425lisamarie* 
Wonder what the deal is with 7pm, what makes that the magic hour







I hear of the 7pm thing alot

That's when all the good shows are on, of course!
(Totally kidding! We're TV-free and my dd's here on my lap!)

ETA: I just put my 51 week old (she's not a year yet!) dd to bed at almost midnight. This is normal for us and has been since birth. If I try to put her to bed earlier, she either fights it or takes an hour nap.
I was starting to feel a little depressed reading about all the babes who go to bed between 7-8. 10 would be great! I know I'm not alone, but it's still frustrating.


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## ejsmama (Jun 20, 2006)

DS has always been early to bed early to rise. When he was younger, it was sometimes as early as 5pm - we learned to really watch his cues, and found that he slept the best when he went to bed quite early. These days, he is 2.5 and it is more like 8:00 (he still wakes most days by 6...sometimes earlier). It used to be that he would wake at 5 no matter what, so we just put him to bed earlier so he could get enough sleep, and so we could have a bit of evening time to ourselves.

I think the experts are probably right about most kids...but not all. There are always exceptions. But in my (former) profession I worked a lot of with families with small children, and found that many who thought their kids were night owls were actually missing their sleepy cues from earlier on, and then the kids got wound up and full of adrenalin and truly couldn't go to sleep until much later. Sometimes, this had been going on so long that their kids just didn't have any connection with their own sleep cues any more. So I guess I think the book advice on that topic is generally good...but certainly as with everything there must be exceptions. I think that the most important aspect of the sleep book advice is the avg total amount of sleep needed by kids (nighttime and daytime).


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## quietserena (Apr 24, 2006)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *AlbertaJes* 
The first 2 months, DD would not settle until 2 am. She's sleep in arms, but as soon as I would put her down, she'd wake up again. Then we went camping. And literally overnight, she started falling asleep deeply at 10pm. After a couple weeks, she started wanting to go to bed at 9 (she's very clear that this is what she wants). Now she varies between 8 and 10, but usually she's sleeping by 9 or 930.

Wow maybe thats what we need!







DD gets to real sleep very late - 3, 4, 5am.


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## Llyra (Jan 16, 2005)

DD naturally gets tired when it starts to get dark. So in the summer, she's maybe up until 8:30, but in the winter she's ready to drop by 6:30. I try to encourage that by waiting until she's asleep to turn on many lights in the house. I think artificial light screws up their natural melatonin cycle. When she was an infant, I think I often missed her ideal bedtime, and as a result she'd get wound up and have trouble settling. Figuring out about the artificial light, and figuring out that she was tired earlier than I thought, really made bedtime into a hassle-free experience.

I've found that the earlier she goes to bed, too, the longer she'll sleep. So if she falls asleep at 7, she'll sleep until 7 the next morning, but if she doesn't go to sleep until 9:30, she'll STILL be up at 7, so she gets better sleep with an earlier bedtime.


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