Getting a handle on life after welcoming a newborn is nothing short of an uphill battle. From sleep deprivation to figuring out what bedtime routine works best for your family, to juggling household jobs like normal, there's a lot to get a handle on in a few short months.
That's why child sleep consultant Chris McFadden, of The Daddy Sleep Consultant, is sharing his tips for helping baby and parents settle into a routine better and faster together.
Speaking on The Jennifer Zamparelli Show on RTÉ 2fm, he said the biggest trick to working out the kinks early on is "really getting that day and night regimen in place".
"Lots of babies come out with their day and night upside down, they've been used to being rocked to sleep in mum's womb during the day when mum's been on the move, and when mum has settled down for the evening or the night and trying to get some sleep herself, the baby is often a little bit more active."
Parents can start correcting this by "trying to wake them up a little bit more during the day", Chris says. "Not too much because you don't want to make them sick. But when you know they've been sleeping a little bit too long do try and spend time trying to wake them up. You can put them into a lukewarm bath, for example, to try and stimulate their body and get them awake."
Baths can be a great way of creating a divide between the "boisterous daytime noise" of the house in the day, versus the "calm and more dimly lit part of the evening". No bath? No problem: he says you can do the same by "moving from a light room to a darker room".
Chris says he's not a fan of the separation method of letting a child cry it out, saying, "I'm a big believer of staying with the child until they're ready for independent sleep".
"So many parents often have a negative view of sleep training and sleep consultants, but it doesn't have to be. There is so much we can do, not just around sleep training itself but changes to the routine and tweaks we can make to other things.
"It's about still being with your child, comforting and soothing them whilst they learn to go to sleep themselves."
New parents are often bombarded with advice and opinions on how to parent, especially when it comes to co-sleeping. While not for everyone, Chris has tips for it.
"No judgement from me, it's not something we do in our family. I actually had to do it one night last week because our baby is suffering a little bit, we had to see an osteopath and had to do it for a few hours. It seemed to be the only way it comforted them.
"My only advice is if you're going to do co-sleeping, then do it in the safest possible way. There are safe sleeping guidance on the HSE website.
"I can understand why parents want to do it, if they're feeding them at night it's an important way to survive. And that's what parenting at this stage is.
"Be mindful that once a baby starts coming into your bed it can be very difficult to break that pattern because they're so used to that warmth and comfort of you being right beside them. It can make independent sleep that bit more difficult."
Chris says that the role of dads has changed massively in recent years. "I was born in Donegal, [my dad] was a Donegal man as well, I don't think he ever changed a nappy. He was a labourer in Glasgow, it wasn't his thing to be doing that.
"Things have changed, cultures have changed. I can start to see a lot more dads in Ireland be involved, which is great.
For new dads, it can be hard to figure out how to help amid such change, but Chris says: "Taking aside the fact that we've situations where there are single dads, where they are the primary parents, dads can get involved in many ways.
"Even in Ireland, there's still a lot of bottle-feeding families. Bottle feeding is what we do in our house. I feed sometimes 50%, sometimes 100% of the night because I get back to sleep a lot easier than my wife. Even if you don't, there's nappy changes, there's taking the baby in the morning when mum needs to get a little bit extra sleep.
Getting a routine in place, as well. Where mum is primarily focused on feeding, on baby's wellbeing, dads can look at how can I get a structure in place? A bath time and bedtime routine. It can help everything going on."
Listen back to Jen's full chat with Chris above.
