It takes planning, asking for help (if it’s available), being a bit flexible and sometimes thinking outside the box, but it is still possible to lay the foundations for your baby’s sleep while looking after the needs and routines of your other kids.
Tips on how to get 2 under 2 to bed
Managing the bedtime routine with toddler and newborn, could be considered by some as an Olympic event. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Use some of the handy tips below to help ease the chaos at bedtime with 2 under 2.
Invest in managing your toddler’s sleep routine before baby arrives
If you can manage to get your older child into a solid sleep routine before baby number 2 arrives, it will go a long way to helping you manage double-bedtime. This is where establishing sleep routines early will pay dividends. Invest in getting your toddler to follow their bedtime routine consistently.
Beware the trap of providing your toddler with hands-on settling at bedtime, or sitting with them while they fall asleep on a nightly basis. This will put extra pressure on a household with a new baby.
Keep to your schedule
Being consistent in your approach to bedtime can save your sanity. Keep your toddler in their established sleep schedule. Your infant will follow their own Sleep-Feed-Uptime cycle, but before long should fall into a predictable pattern at which time you will be able to have a nightly schedule.
When bedtime rolls around, it’s a good idea to put your toddler to bed first. Your newborn’s schedule will likely be a bit more fluid. Once your toddler is off to sleep, you will be free to focus on your newborn.
It’s ok to have flexibility within your schedule, if things go a bit loopy, you have your schedule to help re-establish consistency and give you a framework to work from.
Create a consistent sleep schedule
When your baby is old enough to have established some consistency with their nap times, it’s a great idea to create a consistent sleep schedule for both children. A schedule will help give you markers in your day. There’s no need to think of this schedule in military terms. It can simply be a tool and a foundation from which to build and create consistency, and help form good sleep habits for the future.
Praise appropriate behaviours
Reinforcing your toddler’s good behaviour by offering them praise when they help with baby or play quietly by themselves, is often far more effective than scolding them for doing the wrong thing. Enlisting your toddler as a helper in the process rather than seeing them as a hindrance can help change the dynamic in the home from being a daily struggle, to something lighter and more rewarding.
Ask for help
When support is available, consider reaching out to your family, friends, other mums or dads at school or day care to help you with pick-ups and drop-off’s while you stay at home with your little one who’s sleeping. It doesn’t have to take a village to raise a child, but it certainly helps!
If you’re doing it on your own, or there’s a day when you don’t have the luxury of someone helping out, just do your best. If you have to wake your little one from a nap or two, it’s okay. See if they can make up their sleep at other times throughout the day or if it’s been a bad day with lots of broken sleep put them in bed that night a little earlier than normal.
Use help if you have it available
If help is available to you, use it. Wherever you can, let your partner, a grandparent, an aunty or uncle assist you if they are there. Why not let someone else give your bub a cuddle while you put your toddler to bed. Or perhaps someone else can take your toddler through their bedtime routine while you feed your baby and put them down to bed. Hands free time is invaluable when doing double-bedtime.
