Training Your Baby into a Routine – First 3 Months

So, you are going to (or have recently had) a new addition to your family; congratulations! Enjoy the moment as it can take a while to sink in, and if you are like us being our first it is indeed extra special as everything is a new experience.

Soon after your newborn arrives into this world, unless you are well prepared or have had prior experience, you are going to be in a frantic panic to keep everything in order. Having a little one is not quite like any other experience and can be hard to plan for and tiring. We wanted to document our journey and give some tips that worked for us as first time parents in hope of helping some others that are just stepping into parenthood.

During the first months of your newborn, expect chaos and uncontrollable cries. Remember that they just came from the comfort of not having to breath, feed or move by themselves and it’s a big shock which they take a while to get used to.

*** Please note that the advice and suggestions provided here are based on our personal experience and are not in any shape or form medical / formal advice. Every baby is different. If in doubt please seek formal medical advice. ***

For easy reading, we’ve structured this post to contain the following sections:

• Benefits of a Routine
• Prerequisites
• The first few days and nights
• The first month
• Reaching the three month mark

Benefits of a Routine

We are writing this post to share our thoughts and tips on how to help your newborn into a routine. Obviously everyone is different and you may not think that your baby suits or fits a routine, which is perfectly fine! For us, we found several big benefits to having a routine for our newborn:

1. Your baby will eventually (once they are accustomed to the routine) know exactly when to expect what. A lot of the time certainty is what puts them at ease.
2. You are on the same page as your newborn, and you understand each other better and know when to expect certain behaviours (for example, if its near the time of a feed, they may cry, simply because they are hungry).
3. Without a routine, its hard for parents to plan out a day. It isn’t a walk in the park with a routine, but its certainly doable and with a lot more certainty.
4. Less crying. When a baby settles into a routine, on average they tend to cry less, as they have more certainty around what they are suppose to be doing at any particular time.
5. More sleep for parents! Obviously this is the ultimate goal, being able to sleep through the night. But don’t focus on this too much especially at the start, the training is not easy and will take a bit of time, persistence and patience. Make sure your little one gets comforted where its due, this is an important aspect of the training.

Prerequisites

To have a good go at training your newborn into a routine, you really need to consider and make sure the following is in order:

1. Both parents are in agreement and on the same page about adhering to some sort of agreed routine/pattern for the baby.
2. Your newborn is healthy. Please refer to “The First Month” section for some things to consider in more detail.
3. Both parents need to be in and pulling their respective weights. It’s simply not enough for one parent to be putting everything in place as the other will also need to be adhering to the same schedule.
4. No expectation of the training process to be easy. This does not mean you give your newborn less love, just persistence is needed at specific times in seeing through different stages of the training. You as parents will know best when to push boundaries and when to comfort and reset.

The first few days and nights

Your newborn made it into the world, congrats! Take some time for things to sink in and congratulate yourself.

For most newborns, the first night after birth is the only night where you will enjoy peace and quiet, so enjoy it while you can! As they are so tired from the whole process of the birth (like the parents), most newborns are described as “angles” in the first night. Get some well-deserved rest for yourself also as from the second night onwards things are often very different.

The First Month

For the first month or so, the words “training” and “routine” should not be referred to too often nor should there be any expectations. Remember, your little one is still getting used to breathing and eating independently and it’s hard work.

• In the first month, your primary goal should be to ensure:
  – Your newborn is able to feed properly, such as attaching to the breast or bottle without problems.
  – That they are able to sleep and breath normally at descent intervals
  – He/she responds to all normal senses such as sounds, touch, etc…
  – And that they are healthy in general and are not experiencing any discomfort

If in doubt, seek proper medical advice ASAP.

One Month On

Assuming everything is normal, as every child is different this may be less or more than a month on from the day they were born, you may be ready to slowly settle in some routines. Remember that everything given below is a guideline only; you will know best when something does not feel right and when you should stop or adapt the routine slightly to suit your needs.

In the first month, your newborn may be clingy and want to be constantly held. This is perfectly normal as they feel insecure after coming out of a very confined space and they are still getting used to breathing and doing everything in the outside world. From one month onwards your newborn should be more settled and you should now be able to slowly train them to get used to a little bit of independence. Proceed slowly and take your time, this does not and should not happen overnight! Below are some things to proceed with:

1. Try sitting them into a rocking chair and play with them instead of holding them all of the time.
2. Try to comfort them when they are crying without picking them up, and pick them up when they are not crying.
3. Attempt to feed them at set intervals. This will slowly get them into a routine, but proceed slowly with this to give them time to adjust to such schedule (our example schedule for your reference below). It is ok to have flexibility especially at the start.
4. Together and inline with the feeding routine, set quiet/sleep times as well as play times. The order should be: feed, play, sleep, repeat. It will be easy to get into feed, sleep, play however this should slowly be reordered as we do not want sleep association to occur with feeding otherwise in the long term they may be dependent on a feed in order to fall asleep. When feeding, try to eliminate distractions such as loud noises or moving objects within sight.
5. At night, the routine should be cut down to feed, sleep, repeat. When feeding at night, feed with low light and try to avoid too much stimulation so that they are able to get back to sleep.
6. Regardless of whether your newborn is fed (bottle, breast, formula), do not forget to burp them after each feed. Gently pat their back while sitting them upright and supporting their back. Attempt to burp them for a good few minutes; every newborn is different so experiment and trial! However in saying that, our personal experience is that we do not need to burp our newborn too much especially at night, and more so if they are breast-fed as they do not intake too much air.
7. If you are worried about your newborn throwing milk back up and choking at night, most of the time this should not be a concern. The natural reaction if they are lying down and they throw some milk up is to tilt their heads side-ways, which will ensure their airway remains clear. If you are unsure about this, please do confirm with your local doctors or mid-wife.
8. Set a time for your daily baby bath. This should also work together with the other routines (example schedule below).
9. Attempt to routine your newborn in the daytime first before attempting night routines.
10. In your newborn’s room, make sure you have good blinds and help them distinguish day from night. For example, blinds should be open in the day-time and room should be dark at night.
11. Try to keep your newborn’s room temperature fairly constant. We initially had ours at 20 degrees with 2-3 layers of clothes and eventually dropped it to 19 degrees with 3-4 layers of clothes. Keeping the room at a comfortable temperature ensures they are comfortable and can sleep without worrying about fluctuation in temperature.
12. It is often a challenge initially both in the day-time and night-time to have your newborn sleep by themselves. Take this slow and attempt in the day-time first. As a guideline, we would put our newborn down in the cot to sleep and observe closely. If the cries are hysterical or is constant for more than 10-15 minutes we would step in to pick-up and comfort for a few minutes before putting her back down and repeating. As parents this was really hard for us and expect a few days or even a week or 2 before they would get better. Having smart persistence is the key here and again you will know best when to step in to comfort your newborn.
13. Remember, it is ok to let your baby cry depending on the situation, however it is never ok if the cry is hysterical. When this happens, pick up your newborn immediately and give them some comfort and reassurance.

As a point of reference, below is what we started with for our newborn:

Reaching the Three Month Mark

By this time, your newborn is no longer a “newborn”. They should now be much more stable and settling into a routine. From the previous section if your baby has achieved most or all of what was mentioned, this section will then fine-tune what needs to be amended moving forward.

1. If your baby is increasingly difficult to feed every 3 hours, you may want to consider rescheduling to a feed every 3.5 or 4 hours (example schedule below).
2. Dependent on how your baby is doing, they should now be close to sleeping through the night (ours was consistently sleeping from 10pm – 6am).
3. Do not worry too much if they are still not quite sleeping through the night….your baby is only three months old (or less)!
4. You should find that your baby is now “happy” and smiling when waking up after every session.
5. You should now schedule into the daily routine some sort of outdoor activity such as a 20-30min walk. Make sure your baby is warm and snug especially if the weather is cold, but don’t be scared to take them out as they also need a bit of fresh air. Try to keep them out of cold windy conditions though and always keep their head warm (with a hat or beanie).
6. If you need to take your baby out, make sure you have a properly fitted baby seat. When out, assuming your baby is already accustomed to the routine, you should know exactly when they will feel sleepy and hungry. Do not push too much on the sleep during an outing as they may be more stimulated than usual due to fresh surroundings, however the most important thing is to keep the feeding intervals as per the routine so that they still have a point of reference of when to expect to be fed.
7. If your baby is sick, feed them as often as necessary including during the night, and more so if they are being fed breast milk. Research has shown that breast milk can produce certain levels of antibiotics on-demand in the event that the breast-fed baby is ill. Regardless, all routine and training should be halted temporarily whilst your baby is recovering from an illness.

Approaching the three month mark we evolved our routine to the following:

We hope that this post helps some new parents out there better manage their newborn. Training your baby into a routine does not mean sacrificing your love and affection towards them, so do not forget to comfort and encourage them every step of the way. We are firm believers of happy parents having happy babies.

Feel free to fire any questions for us in the comments section below and stay tuned for more posts of our journey into parenthood.