Help! My Baby is Overtired!

Is your baby overtired? How do you really know if your baby is overtired?

Overtiredness in babies has been getting a lot of attention lately. So much so that many parents are afraid of letting their baby become overtired. I get it. Overtired babies have higher levels of cortisol. This can lead to longer sleep latency, more frequent night waking, and earlier waking. Nobody wants to deal with an overtired baby.

But is your baby really overtired? Overtiredness is actually much less common than many parents realize. What IS common is an undertired baby. (Insert gasp).

Trying to get an undertired baby to sleep can certainly create more stress for babies and parents alike. This can include spending hours trying to rock the baby to sleep, a baby frequently taking short naps, frequent night waking, or early waking. I don't know about you, but I think I'll pass.

If you find that your baby is fighting naps, fighting bedtime, taking short naps, refusing naps, frequently waking overnight, or is waking early your baby might be an UNDERtired baby, not an overtired one. 

There is only one way to find out if your baby is undertired. Experiment. Following sleep cues instead of a schedule is the first step to try. Common sleep cues include red eyebrows, rubbing eyes, yawning, averting eyes, and blank staring. 

Other ideas include put baby to bed fifteen minutes later, adjust naps by fifteen minutes, and let go of your expectations.

That's right. Let it go.

Sometimes we can fix our babies sleep “problems” by simply (simply? Ha!) throwing out all of our expectations and listening to our babies. They will certainly tell us what they need. We just have to learn to listen.

Take wake windows, for example. Many sleep experts incite fear in parents by touting the negative effects of extended wake windows. They say that allowing baby to stay awake beyond a recommended wake period could result in negative effects on brain development. Sleep is necessary for healthy brain development, after all. But, here's the thing: wake windows are averages. They're not meant to be prescriptive. They're meant to help parents. Parents can determine approximately how long their baby might be awake from one sleep until the next at different ages.

That's why I prefer to look at one thing. Is the baby generally content? If the answer is yes, then the baby is probably fine with the amount of sleep they are getting. If the answer is no, I would recommend starting by experimenting with pushing back naps and bedtime. If that doesn't work I would investigate red flags before considering an overtired baby. A holistic sleep consult could help you get to the root cause of your baby's sleep challenges.

So, if you think that your baby is overtired, I invite you to investigate. What is your baby telling you?