Are you looking for the best sleep schedule for your 8 month old? Or wondering if your current sleep schedule might be impacting your baby’s sleep – both at naps and bedtime?
If you haven’t already set a consistent schedule for your baby’s naps, then now is the time to do it. An 8-month-old baby sleeps a whole lot better when their sleep schedule is the same each day, despite the fact that you’ll see many people suggest wake windows.
Morning Wake Up
It is always a good idea to have a consistent morning wake up time each day. This helps ensure that the day flows well and that a baby can be put down for naps and bedtime at times in line with their circadian rhythm. Your baby should be waking up between 6:00-7:00 am. Waking up before 6 am is considered too early. Early morning wakings can he fixed with good sleep habits and a top notch schedule.
Naps
Here is my suggested 8-month-old sleep schedule:
- Morning nap: starting between 8:30 – 9 am.
- Afternoon nap: starting between 12:30 – 1 pm.
We want to aim for at least an hour nap each time for the sleep to be restorative, but to be honest I recommend even more than that.
Most 8 month old babies don’t need a third nap anymore, but there may be some that still need it, and that’s okay. If a baby still needs their cat nap then it will likely start around 4:15 pm. The last nap of the day doesn’t need to be a long nap. I would suggest no more than 45 minutes and have them waking up by 5pm.
Bedtime
Bedtime should be no later than 3 hours of wake time from their last night. It is important to keep this wake window tight because an overtired baby at bedtime can make falling asleep and staying asleep difficult.
Overall Sleep Needs
Every baby will have a slightly different amount of sleep that they need. The total amount of sleep most 8 month olds need is between 14 to 15 hours of sleep in a 24-hour period. This is split up into 4 hours of daytime sleep and 10 – 12 hours of night time sleep. It is important to make sure that your baby is getting enough sleep each day as this can help prevent difficulties falling asleep, night wakings and early waking.
Night Feeding
Generally, all babies can sleep through the night without a feed before they hit 8 months old, but there are still a few that need just one feed at 8 months of age. If they are waking up for more night feedings then there is likely a sleep association and they are using the feed to help them transition through a sleep cycle.
Please note: all night feeds are generally dropped by 9 months of age at the most.
8-month sleep regression
The eight-month sleep regression is not an easy one! There are so many developmental milestones on the horizon. They are learning big skills like crawling, which opens up their little world. They are also understanding more about the world around them in general and soaking up language like a sponge. They may also be experiencing some separation anxiety. This can get in the way of falling asleep or cause short naps. All can also be coupled with the 3 to 1 nap transition, ??? ???? ?? ? ???? ???? ???? ????-?? ????? ?????????? ????. This regression is temporary and generally takes between 2 to 4 weeks to get to the other side.
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?Give your baby plenty of time during the day to practice any new skills they are working on.
?Re-look at your sleep environment. Is it dark enough, with outside noise muffled by a sound machine? Being able to see and hear the exciting things around them can impact their sleep.
?Make sure you’re putting your baby down to nap at biologically appropriate times (as mentioned in the sample sleep schedule above) so that you can ride their sleep wave. This enhances your chances of sleep success.
?Give your baby plenty of time in the crib each nap time to not only fall asleep but fall back to sleep when naps are short (1-1.5 hours of crib time can work well). If you’ve sleep trained before, this is when you can follow your previous sleep training method.
?Make use of an earlier bedtime. This helps make up for missed sleep during the day and also prevents overtiredness from causing a vicious nap strike cycle. It also helps if there has been lots of overnight waking. Overnight waking is often due to overtiredness.
Enjoy your 8 month old! I hope this sample schedule helps you feel more confident about their sleep. The key to good sleep at this age is healthy sleep habits that include a good schedule, ability to fall asleep independently at the start of sleep and return to sleep in the middle of the night and good bedtime and nap time routines.
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