Hello October! This month is my birthday month as a mom.. 10 years of motherhood, 10 years of bliss, diaper change and 10 years of learning…sleepless nights included. Four kids in a row and you’ll know what I mean. Well, 10 years after, I can almost say goodbye to sleepless nights (uhm motherhood related but not work related haha). It was the hardest with my new born since he was colic but gets better with every child.

They say I’m a super mom, being able to handle four kids and I would always answer, “sanayan lang yan.” Of course it is not just about getting used to it, it’s more like learning from it.. observing and trying to come up with a better solution..as the qoute above said (which I got from Pampers FB Page), it’s about swimming and learning to swim at the same time. And 10 years of motherhood has taught me a lot of things like how to deal with common reasons why babies wake up at night. I know that sleep is very important to baby’s development and growth so I am bothered when the kids are not having enough sleep. Based on my experience with my four kids, the most common reason why they wake up at night are discomfort, change in routine and over stimulation or too much activity during the day.

When it comes to discomfort, my kids usually wake up because of room temperature. Most of the times, the room is too warm for them to have a good night sleep. Of course, the easiest way to resolve that is to buy a new air conditioning unit, which we did.

my happy sleepers 🙂

Wetness and diaper leakage is another form of discomfort but it was never a problem for us. When I asked a few moms I know, they say that the most common reason why their baby wakes up at night is hunger. Obviously, we all know that to provide the best possible care for our babies, specially at night, is trust a diaper brand that can protect our babies’ complete sleep against wetness.

I also noticed that when we travel or have a change in our daily routine, their sleeping patter changes too. They wake up at night feeling irritated. The same thing happens when they have too much activity during day time. Like when we went to La Union last summer and the two boys tried surfing while Chico and Sati went swimming all day. They had a hard time sleeping and woke up twice during the night.

How about you mommies? Are you keen on the reasons why your baby wakes up at night? And what are you doing to prevent them from waking up at night? 

We already know the importance of a sound sleep to the babys’ development and how a slight disturbance can wake them up, affecting the developments that happens during sleep. When it comes to sleep, we always want to make sure that our babies are having enough. We do things that we believe can give them a good night sleep. What we do not know is, there are things we may have done in the past that didn’t actually helped. That’s why Pampers put up a list of Common Sleep Myths and Facts for us to know what is really helpful for our babies and sleep practices that we should avoid.

Let’s try to discuss some of the myths and please do tell me in the comment section how you feel about the myths and if you are practicing some.

MYTH:  Diapers make no difference to babies sleep. 

Mommy Pehpot: Based on our experience, the quality of diaper really makes a difference on sleep. Using a diaper with low quality can result to leak and in turn can lead to discomfort and the baby waking up at night. In the past, I tried using  an inferior quality diaper which ends up with my kids waking up at dawn due to leakage. I noticed that when they wake up at dawn, they have a hard time going back to sleep, they also tend to be cranky in the morning. 

Aside from the baby having a better sleep if you use a diaper of superior quality, you will have a better sleep too. You don’t have to worry for leakage and you don’t to check the baby’s bottoms from time to time (which according to studies is actually a form of sleep disturbance). When you use a trusted diaper (Pampers of course) leakage worry is a thing of the past.

————0O0————

MYTH: Babies sleep longer when they’re kept up a little later.

Mommy Pehpot: I used to practice that.. letting the kids sleep later thinking they’d sleep longer..which means I can sleep longer too. I noticed that even though they sleep late, they still wake up early BUT crankier, cries easily and with little appetite. I think when babies or kids does not sleep early, they have the tendency to be overtired and overexcited.. that’s why they have a hard time sleeping longer which leads to crankiness and loss of appetite.

————0O0————

MYTH:Newborn don’t need a sleep schedule.

Mommy Pehpot: When I gave birth to my first born, I was lucky I got to read a few things about routine and sleeping through the night. I have learned that it is very important to introduce the baby to routines. It will help them a lot, specially in the sleep department, and will be more beneficial when they grow older .

————0O0————

MYTH: You can get a child to sleep through the night by starting solids early (before 4-6 months)

Mommy Pehpot: I have a very strong opinion against starting solid foods too early.. having experienced a few food intolerance, I know that starting solid foods early is not right. Trust me, it will not help your kids in the sleeping department..as the mentioned above, this may trigger food allergy and can also lead to choking. (https://www.pehpot.com/2009/02/mommy-moments-feeding-time.html)

————0O0————

MYTH:It’s okay to let your baby sleep in a moving seat or swing.

MYTH:Some children are bad sleepers.

Mommy Pehpot: My opinion for both myths is the same… it’s all about proper training.. as parents, it is our sole responsibility to train our kids to sleep and to sleep on their own. It can be hard at first but believe me, it can be achieved. You only need to patient about it. From our experience, the hardest was with 2nd born.. I had a hard time teaching him to sleep through the night because he wants to feed almost every hour. We had so many sleepless nights and the husband complains a lot.. but in the end, he was able to sleep through the night and now that he is 8, he’s a very good sleeper.

————0O0————

MYTH:Children who don’t take nap during the day sleep longer at night.

Mommy Pehpot: Because nap time is also my rest time, the kids have to nap whether they like it or not. But there are times that I need to do a lot of things, like the laundry and other household chores, and no time for nap..the tendency, the kids sleep earlier than their sleep time..like 6 in the evening, sometimes missing their dinner, then waking up at the middle of the night, hungry and cranky. 

How about you mommies? Have you been practicing some of the myths mentioned above? What do you think?