Now that you have your completed sleep log, what did you notice? What surprised you? Were there any patterns? Did you make any changes, consciously or unconsciously? Armed with this baseline information, the next step is to work on some tweaks that will help get you back into dreamland more quickly. Following is a checklist of healthy sleep habits (known as sleep hygiene). Go through and put a check on all the ones you are already doing. Now pat yourself on the back. Keep those up. Now review the ones you are not currently doing. There's your to-do list. Look at the next couple weeks as your sleep boot camp. Get strict with this. You're about to do some intensive training and teach your brain that these habits mean it's time to get sleepy. Keep the log going so you can measure change.

☐ Turn off screens one hour before bedtime. I mean it. The light mimics daytime light and messes with your circadian rhythm. No smart phones on the nightstand. No looking at your phone while you nurse. You can use them for an alarm but they need to be across the room so you’re not tempted to look at them.
☐ Have a bedtime and a wake up time. Even though you’re up multiple times, have that time when you’re in your pajamas and in bed.
☐ No caffeine after 1:00 PM. No ifs, ands, or buts.
☐ Limit alcohol to one drink a day, if you must have any, and no alcohol after dinner. Alcohol can help you fall asleep but it leads to fragmented sleep. Your sleep is already fragmented by baby, let’s not make it worse.
☐ Move your body to the point of sweating at least 20 minutes a day. It’ll help you sleep, I promise. But no exercise within two hours of bedtime or it’ll keep you up.
☐ Hot baths – taking a hot bath 20 minutes before bed time can help relax you.
☐ Keep the bedroom a moderate temperature, quiet, and dark. Or, use a sleep mask and earplugs to create quiet and dark (use one earplug if you need to hear baby).
☐ Have a light bedtime snack, such as a slice of cheese or a small bowl of cereal. Having a little something in your belly can promote sleep. Avoid being full or hungry.
☐ Save the bed for sleep and sex. You want to train your brain to associate the bed with these two activities only.
☐ Limit daytime naps to 15 minutes, if you must nap at all. Set an alarm. More daytime sleep will lead to lighter, more restless nighttime sleep.
☐ Expose yourself to light in the day. If you live in the gloomy Pacific Northwest, consider investing in a full spectrum light for the dark days. Light during the day and darkness at night helps regulate your body’s circadian rhythm.
☐ If you can’t sleep for more than 20 minutes, get up and do something else for 20 minutes and try again. Don’t lay in bed not sleeping.

In the third and final post, we'll discuss sleep robber thoughts and how to combat them. 

​“Sleep when the baby sleeps.”
 
Maybe the most heard piece of advice I received as a new mom. Then when I couldn’t, I added it to the list of ways I was failing as a mother. I’m not one of those people that can fall asleep anywhere, anytime. I’m not one of those people who can just sort of lean their head over and nod off, even in the noisiest and busiest places. I envy that ability. I don’t have it. And I didn’t magically acquire it when I became a mom. When my baby slept during the day I would try to lie down and get a little bit of shut-eye. Nope. Never. Not one time. My body is totally awake during the day, no matter how little sleep I got the night before. Thank you, circadian rhythm of steel. Okay. I can deal with that. I tackle the laundry or cleaning when the baby sleeps, or just park it on the couch and zone out at the TV for a while.
 
But at night, what I really cannot handle, is not being able to fall back asleep after a night feeding. Those precious nighttime hours that are already disrupted by feedings. Especially in the early weeks when the baby is only sleeping an hour or two at a time, the pressure of using those scant couple hours to sleep is so huge. So when I put my angelic sleeping babe back down and get myself settled back in to enjoy a beautiful snooze, and instead I lie there wide awake, I want to scream, “WHY, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS HOLY AM I LAYING HERE AWAKE?” Go to sleep! If I go to sleep now, I might have two hours of sleep. If I go to sleep now, I might have 1.5 hours of sleep. Oh no, oh no, oh no. Please let me fall asleep. Just fall asleep already! Tomorrow is going to suck. I’m so tired, why can’t I fall asleep?!?!?! You know, those types of relaxing thoughts.
 
What can you do when you find yourself in this position of not falling asleep after a night feeding?
 
Step 1: Keep a sleep log.
 
It’s some work but the data will really give you good information about your sleep patterns and research shows that the act of logging helps create change. It’s best to keep it on your nightstand and fill it out when you wake up for the day. Create a table with column headers as days of the week and the following row labels: Date, time you got into bed, approximate time you think you fell asleep, how long were you up in the middle of the night adding all the times together to make one number, the time you woke up for the day, the time you got out of bed, your total time in bed (using the previous data),  your total time asleep (using the previous data), and then in the final column rate your sleep quality Poor, Fair, or Good.