Welcome to Alfie's
​sleep program 

 

Here you will find information and supporting links to help you through the journey for better sleep.

You will be able to visit this site whenever you need as we work together, and you will be able to revisit any task, recordings and information up to 8 weeks after the end of our program on 28th September 2021 (there was a pause on the program from 11th to 31st of August)

To protect your information, I will erase this page on 23rd November 2021

We will have up to one 30 minute video call per week, where you can ask questions, we can catch up on progress and challenges, and I can share ideas and suggestions. 

​You can also send me a message on WhatsApp or email. Please note it may take up to 24 hours to get a response.

Here is the zoom link for all calls: 
https://us04web.zoom.us/j/72996292515?pwd=akZzVXRmUExRV2gwMkRVTXZFeEJRZz09

​Meeting ID: 729 9629 2515
Passcode: 9as93L

28th July 2021

 Dear Alexandra and Dan.

You have already made great progress with Alfie's sleep since you first contacted me. 

As you know, I work differently to other sleep consultants. My approach is very gentle and respectful of children's development. I also hold parent's mental health very close and for many parents, my gentle approach is what enables them to improve their child's sleep in a way that feels right for them. 

Over the next 6 weeks I will guide and support you to work towards your goals. We are also going to work out what is realistic, and age/developmentally appropriate for Alfie and I find that it helps to tackle sleep in small steps, so that it doesn’t become overwhelming. 

You told me that you would like :

• For Alfie to, more often than not, sleep in chunks of sleep waking for 1-2 feeds.
• Guidance on: how long he can go awake, ​how to drop the third nap, how long to keep him awake between the last nap and bedtime.
• Moving away from rocking to sleep and at first to rock briefly and then stay asleep

It is likely that in order to achieve these goals, we will need to work on: 

• Distribution of naps and working towards dropping the 3rd nap
• Timings of bedtime
• Actively moving on from rocking to sleep to a different sleep support tool

 Probable reasons for your current sleep situation 

Some of the common reasons for sleep problems include discomfort, health problems, feeding issues, allergies, faulty sleep hygiene, too much or too little sleep in the day, emotional needs and wanting to connect. There are of course other reasons, such as habits, problems with limit setting, and unrealistic expectations.

Having had a look at your sleep diary and spending time talking to you about Alfie and your situation, my guess is that your current issues are multifactorial but may include:

•  Sleep timings 
• Total amount of sleep and how/when this is achieved 
• Sleep habits 
• Developmental changes 
• Normal (but hard) child behaviour 
• Alfie's individual sleep needs

The reality is that there is always something that could be improved with sleep.

You’re doing an amazing job of parenting respectfully and responsively, and your sleep situation is not only normal, but common. You have not done anything wrong, and Alfie is not broken. However, you’re describing a situation that has become unsustainable, and so we can work to address and optimize these areas to hopefully improve Alfie’s sleep. 

I look forward to working with you closely over the next few weeks, and moving you and Alfie on in your sleep story, without using techniques that might affect attachment, trust and connection. 
Thank you for choosing to work gently – you will never regret it! 

We are going to start by revisiting the quick wins.

You have already adjusted many of these points and you have started seen many improvements. It is a good idea to come back to this information from time to time and see if something should be optimised. I have added one or two new ideas!

Naps and total sleep

After analysing Alfie's sleep diary, I strongly believe he needs around 11 to 12 hours total sleep per day. This means he is likely to need up to 9 hours of sleep in the night and the remainder during the day. 

As he grows and drops all his naps (at around 2 years old) he will then consolidate all his sleep needs at night and will sleep for the full 11 hours at night.

This will have an impact on the 7 to 7 expectation of sleep, as you can guess!

So I am working from the assumption that he needs around 11 hours total sleep, 2 or 3 naps in the day and perhaps in the process of dropping to 2 naps.

Whenever children are dropping a nap, sleep becomes a little messy during the day until they are ready to completely transition. Therefore we will be testing different timings and it is normal for Alfie to need an extra full nap, or a cat nap (very short nap)  every few days. And perhaps an earlier or later bedtime as well. 

There will be quite a bit of back and forth while he is dropping the nap and while we adjust the distribution of his naps so to optimise night sleep.

Here is a first suggestion for naps:

• Cap day time sleep to 3 hours
• Adjust nap timings - try nap gap 1 (after waking in the morning): 2 ½ h; nap gap 2 (between nap 1 and 2) : 3 h; nap gap 3 (between nap 2 and bedtime): 3 ½ h
• If Alfie needs a third nap, see if bedtime needs to shift to 30 minutes later or so to allow at least 3 hours awake before bedtime.

The idea is to make the gaps between the naps longer as the day goes on. 

2nd August 2021

Wins: 

• Overall most nights have consisted of one 4-5.5hr stretch
• Longer gap between last nap and bed works well
• First and second naps tend to be 1hr minimum, and usually 1hr20 on average. (still often needs the third nap)

Suggestions:

• try and cap the first nap to 1 hours long and leave him sleeping for as long as he would like on the second nap
• keep on working on these naps for another week
• The next step will be to work on encouraging him to sleep not in your arms. As you say, he is sleeping in the night - but you are not!

5th August 2021

“survival mode”! You have been quite unwell since Sunday night so haven’t started any of the new sleep things yet but will start as soon as you feel better.

7th August 2021

You reported that Alfie had a difficult time from bedtime until midnight made particularly challenging as Dan was working that evening. Alfie then woke up at 3am and self settled until 6am (brilliant!).

We agreed that  what is happening is that his sleep pressure and his circadian rhythm is not aligned. So he needs a slightly earlier bedtime, but the third nap is getting on the way for that to happen. 

11th August 2021

Sleep plan assessment form and diary sent

Alfie is really unwell this week, he need extra sleep and extra support.

We have decided to pause the program until Alfie is feeling better. Once we resume work, there will be 4 weeks left of the program.

​In the mean time, keep with as much of the bedtime routine as you can.

31st August 2021

Wins:

• Dropped to 2 naps (most days)
• Following the predicted 11 hours of total sleep needed

I would suggest the next steps to be:

• Separate feeding from sleeping (for most of the time)
• Dream feed at 10pm (ish) and at 3pm (ish) (if the second feed is needed). The feeds may happen at the time he wakes at night if he wakes earlier, as on the diary you sent me.
• Go to him at night before it escalates. Feed and work on separating feed from sleep. End with being down beside him, with hand on him and pretending to sleep

​Alfie is on the lower spectrum of sleep need - 11 hours in total. So if he is sleeping 2 hours in the day, expect him to sleep only around 9 hours in the night (he does need his naps though!). As he grows and drops all naps, all the sleep will happen at night and you will have a longer night.

What we want to do is to make the times you are awake in the night as short as possible - A quick feed and short soothing. For this you will need to separate the feeding from the falling asleep, if not for all feeds at least for most. 

A snapshot of what is happening:
Alfie has the third nap if he wakes up early and only has short naps throughout the day.
Bedtime is at about 6-6:30pm, occasionally needing a later bedtime.
He is sometimes sleeping right through to 6am!
Over the last week he’s responded well on the odd occasion to you laying down beside him. On other occasions he just dances in the cot. He’s not upset but he doesn’t settle either.
You noticed that Alfie needs more sleep, very likely because he is now walking and running and burning off loads of energy.
You are continuing with all the quick wins and taking Alfie outdoors 2-3 times a day.

Tasks for this week
- slightly increase the nap gaps
​- keep going to him and doing a dream feed at around 10pm. 
- carry on going outdoors. Also give lots of opportunity for him to run, walk, climb, pull and push heavy objects.
- In the night, go to him before the crying escalates too much, so it is easier for you to soothe him and go back to sleep
​- start working on separating feeding from sleeping

3rd September 2021

Separating feeding and rocking from sleep

You are going to start with what is working now for falling asleep - the base technique. Your goal is to move from this base technique to your goal - not rocking or feeding to sleep.

The next step is to go from your base technique to a different soothing technique that moves you a little closer to your goal. You will take a few small steps towards your goal.
So you will move from rocking to sleep, to cuddling to sleep, to sleeping in the cot.
I will give you some suggestions to help guide you onto the next steps, but it is completely fine to go with your instincts when planning which steps to take. Feel free to adapt this plan by adding or skipping steps as you go along.

The steps you take can be very small or not, depending on your child accepting the new soothing technique and on what makes sense for your family.

>> Think of these steps like shifting gears in a car. You should always be in a specific gear, not in neutral to move forward! <<

There is likely going to be some back and forth between the last step and the new step. So if your child fusses in the new step, you can move back to the last soothing technique (the last step) for support and then go back to the new step. But try and make sure your child falls asleep with the new step to get them into the habit of drifting off to sleep in the new way.
>>>>For example: if your baby will only fall asleep while rocking and your new step is to sway to sleep, you can first attempt to only sway. If your baby fusses, you can rock until they are calm. Once they are calm, start swaying again. You may need to go back and forth a few times but try to have your baby fall asleep while swaying. <<<<<
Eventually this new step (swaying to sleep) will become your new starting point, the new base technique, and you can encourage your child onto the next step.

>> I suggest that you stay on each new baseline technique for 2 - 5 nights before moving on to the next step. <<

Here is an example on how to move from rocking to sleep. You can follow the same thinking for feeding to sleep - once Alfie has finished the feed and is “butterflying” you can go back and forth between feeding and rocking and so on. 

Step 1: Rock to sleep ---- to --- Sway to sleep
Step 2: Sway to sleep --- to ---- Standing still and patting to sleep in arms
Step 3: Standing still and patting to sleep in arms --- to --- Pat to drowsy in arms and sleep in cot (this can take longer than 5 days as it is the biggest step, but Alfie is sometimes doing this already )

• You can follow this plan at bedtime and all other wakeups at night for fast results. 
  
• You can follow it for bedtime and up to a time you agree between yourselves for a mid speed. After the agreed time, you will just do whatever works to soothe back to sleep.
• You can follow it just at bedtime for the most gentle but also slowest speed.
  

13th September 2021

Wins: 

• Great week! several nights Alfie slept all the way through from about 6/7pm to 5/6am.
• Dream feeding is working really well.
  
• Worked on reducing the amount of rocking and instead doing swaying
  
• There haven’t been any battles getting him to sleep recently
  

Tasks for this week

•  Do the same habit stacking as for the nights. Move from rocking to swaying then from swaying to tapping standing still etc
  
• Keep moving forward from the swaying. To reach your goals you will need to keep going forward, be that at home or on holiday
  
• For the holiday, try and keep the same bedtime routine as much as possible 
  
•  Try and not use the sleep app for a few days as see how it goes
  

16th September 2021

Wins:

• Stopped using the sleep tracking app! 
• Worked out that Alfie needs help transitioning from “active daytime mode” to “sleep mode”
  
• Alfie is sleeping through most nights

24th September 2021

Suggestions for tonight:

• Alfie needs extra support during holiday
• Encourage a power nap at around 6pm
• Move him to your room
• Late bedtime, cuddles and feed in bed
• Firm cuddles and arms & legs squeezes
• Once you transfer him to bed, stay low near the cot for a while. he may wake up and look for you. if you are there, he should relax and go back to sleep 
  
• If wakes at night, go to him quickly and perhaps bring to your bed

This is holiday mode! Once back at home, go back to usual routine

2nd October 2021

Wins:

• Enjoyed the second half of our holiday!
  
• Co-slept each night and although that’s not ideal for sleep quality for you, it meant you weren’t stressed and just accepted that on holiday things would be different.
  
• Alfie transitioned fine back home
  

6th October 2021 - end of program

Dear Alexandra and Dan

It was great working with you in the last months. You have made some incredible progress with Alfie's sleep situation through hard work and some consistency. I hope you can find some time to celebrate your achievements!

What were your goals? 

You had many goals. You have worked hard and tried to keep to the sleep plan I suggested as much as possible through the incredible leaps in Alfie's development (can you believe he is walking so well?!)

Your main goals were:

• For Alfie to, more often than not, sleep in chunks of sleep waking for 1-2 feeds.
• Guidance on: how long he can go awake, ​how to drop the third nap, how long to keep him awake between the last nap and bedtime.
• Moving away from rocking to sleep and at first to rock briefly and then stay asleep

Alfie had many ups and downs, teething, holiday, learning to walk, dropping a nap...  but even with all these factors that unsettle sleep, you have achieved 2 out of the three goals and when you were working on the third goal, (moving away from rocking to sleep) Alfie had many great nights.

I believe one of your main achievements was to manage to stop using the sleep app. From doing this, you can now adjust the awake windows, length of naps and bedtime in a way that responds to Alfie's needs with less stress. 

For you to achieve all your goals, It is important that you work as consistently as possible on moving forward from rocking to sleep.  You can find the step by step earlier in this plan, on 3rd of September. Remember that you will be taking several small steps towards falling asleep in the cot, therefore at first Alfie is likely to fall asleep while rocking, then while swaying, then while standing still until finally you will encourage him to go down awake and he will fall asleep with you next to him outside the cot. Patience and consistence is key!

I also believe Alfie really does need some extra support from time to time when he is experiencing something new. Alfie seems to be the best of both: very physical and happy, and also sensitive to the environment. This is a great trait mix but it also means he needs extra support from time to time to be able to better manage and process all the changes. As you know, this is really hard work as sleep is the first thing that suffers during these phases. 

 You are doing a fantastic job in supporting Alfie's development in a responsive way! 
​

It has been a pleasure going through these weeks with you and seeing all the improvements emerge. I hope you found the program has helped you all to understand Alfie's sleep needs better and to develop some tools you can use for the times ahead. 

As Alfie grows and his sleep changes, if you need further support I offer a one-off video call and soon will be adding a more affordable top up call to the services page. Here is the link for more information https://www.calm-sleep.com/services.html​ 

Lastly, I would be very grateful if you could share a review here   and/or email any feedback that will make the service better for future parents.

All the best
Karina​

 © 2021 calm sleep 
​ Privacy Policy