Episode #148: 10 Month Old Wake Window & Sample Nap Schedules

Disclaimer: Transcripts were generated automatically and may contain inaccuracies and errors.

---

Welcome to the kids sleep Show podcast where we dive into the magical world of sleep, and all things parenting. Join us as we embark on a journey filled with expert advice, practical tips and heartwarming stories that will transform your little ones into sleep superheroes, and empower you to navigate the beautiful chaos of parenting. I’m your host, Courtney Zentz. And I’m on a mission to change how the world view sleep and provide accessible sleep coaching resources for all families to build healthy sleep habits in their home for children, and adults of all ages. As an award winning speaker, author and pediatric sleep expert, myself and my team of consultants work intimately with families around the world to teach healthy sleep habits to children and adults. I believe wholeheartedly that sleep is the foundation for which a happy home is built. So let’s sleep together. Hey, everyone,

welcome back to this week’s episode of the Kids sleep Show. I’m your host, Courtney Zentz, the founder of tiny transitions and the creator of the sleep Steps program. I’m going to take you through an educational session today all about a 10 month old. What is the 10 month old week window? What is the ideal nap schedule for a 10 month old? And how do you manage the 10 month sleep regression, and some reasons why it might be happening. So all of this is connected surprisingly. And we’re going to start with total sleep needs by age, because that’s the foundation for where we are with a child at 10 months. So the American Academy of Sleep Medicine says children between four months and 12 months need 12 to 16 hours in total daytime sleep for optimal growth. So that being said, many families really want their child to sleep anywhere between 11 and 12 hours overnight. So if you’re going to bed at seven o’clock, you would expect that they would wake up somewhere between six and eight o’clock is kind of a range, right? But it’s really anywhere between 11 to 12 hours is ideal children’s sleep in cycles. So they have several cycles that they go through after they fall asleep. The deepest and most restorative sleep for a 10 month old is that first chunk of six hours. And that’s why a lot of times parents will see the back half of the night. Lots and lots of wake ups. Okay, your kid is sleeping in cycles, the cycles are typically 45 to 60 minutes, and you can almost count to the minute that they’re passing through these cycles. So if they go to bed at seven o’clock, and they’re asleep for a 50 minute cycle, right? You might, if you’re watching on the monitor actually see them kind of moving around a little bit at 50 minutes. Now they’re not awake, but they’re sort of passing through these cycles. So your child throughout the whole night. It’s like 750-849-3010 2011 10, midnight, 1251 4233 2410, five o’clock 556 4730. You see what I just did there? That’s your child’s sleep cycles all night. So first, you want to assess if your child is still getting up overnight? Are they following those patterns, and if so, it is likely that they are used to some type of support. Going back to bed, if they’re kind of waking up through at these very patterned times. At 10 months old when they don’t need to eat overnight anymore. They generally have some sort of asleep association that we have to get rid of. So if they’re waking up at like 340, every single night and you have to go in pick them up and rocking back to sleep. And then it started to happen more frequently and more frequently where they’re needing you. That’s something that we have to sleep train away from. Okay, but I like to explain how the sleep cycles work because it also feeds into naptime. So with naps, a child at this age needs three hours of daytime sleep. So with a three hour daytime sleep and a proximately a three hour awake window, it really puts you at a situation where most children, I’ll say eight out of 10 are on a to nap schedule. At 10 months old. They need three hours of total sleep and a three hour week window. Okay, so I’m repeating that intentionally because two out of those 10 might be a daycare like mine were and as long as they’re getting three hours of sleep, properly spaced throughout the day, so maybe like 930 1233 30, right. Even though it’s a bit shorter and not as restorative, it’s still going to keep them balanced for going into bedtime without being overtired. And it still gets their three hours of sleep but I want to explain these weak windows because this part is the part many people miss. They’re like my baby’s not meant to be on two naps. They don’t seem tired. They have to take five naps at this age and all these different things for a 10 month old. It’s Like they don’t actually and I’ve done this for 10 years, and you’re missing signals, okay? Your kids either over or under tired. That’s why their naps aren’t consolidating. That’s why they’re struggling at bedtime. That’s why they’re waking through the night. Kids need a certain kind of prescription based on their age, and it comes back to hormones. Okay? Nobody ever explained this to me, when I started to become a certified sleep coach, right? I went through this training, I paid an exorbitant amount of money to learn the certification of sleep training, which is a whole other conversation. But nobody ever explained this to me. And I think partially, it’s because they didn’t really understand the science of it. They just sort of knew this process of putting your baby down, and this repetition of things that you’re doing, right. And as I started to work with more and more clients over the past 10 years, I started to notice a lot of different patterns around this particular age, right? And when you start to look at it really what it breaks down to his hormones, okay? When your body wakes in the morning, it’s creating cortisol, your highest level of cortisol, which is the hormone is between four and six in the morning, okay? It’s basically your body’s cup of coffee that it’s preparing every single day, your baby is no different. Okay? So your baby’s cortisol levels are highest between four and six in the morning, when they wake and start the day, their body’s adenosine levels, or sleep pressure is starting to rise, when that falls is when you sleep. Okay? So you’ve got this rising adenosine, lowering adenosine, rising adenosine, lowering adenosine as a baby’s going throughout the day, okay, then you have what is considered an ideal wake window. The reason that it is different by age is because essentially, it’s how much adenosine your baby can tolerate, right? Newborns can only be awake 45 to 60 minutes, right? At three months old. It’s like an hour and a half, it’s six months old, it’s like two and a half starting to get to three. And then by seven months, and really up through 12 is really when you start approaching four hours, but at seven months, you’re still at three hours, right? So it’s very prescriptive, because your brain essentially, when it gets too much adenosine, it’s like, Well, hey, wait a minute, this baby should be taking a nap. Right? Which is why it 10 months, it’s three hours. And if baby doesn’t take a nap, then the brain goes, Oh, well, I guess you’re trying to stay awake. Here’s some adrenaline and cortisol. Right? So it’s firing stimulant hormones, which is essentially a second wind, right? Like in college, we used to pull all nighters. That’s essentially what happened. Your brain was like, Okay, well, you must be trying to stay awake. So I’m going to try to help you out. Well, that’s what’s happening to babies. And then they get this flood of stimulant hormones, you try to lay him down for a nap, they freak out and cry, you don’t know what’s going on. You can’t get them to sleep their way strung out but they’re also way exhausted. And you sit there smashing your face against the couch trying to figure out what the heck’s going on, and why your baby won’t take a nap or won’t stay asleep long enough, okay? It really comes down to those hormones. You are in a delicate balance of up and down. Okay, up and down, up and down. And as long as you keep balanced with those hormones, and the baby sleeps when they should and wakes when they should and sleeps when they should and wakes when they should and you have the right awake window, the right total naptime, the right consistent bedtime, your body’s circadian rhythm gets into a rhythm as a baby, right? But if things are a hot mess, baby’s not settling independently, they’re probably not napping for a long time. Because if they’re used to support then every 40 minutes they’re waking up from a nap, you either have to hold them to get them back down the NAPS crap. And then by the end of the day, they’re a strung out hot mess, with the witching hour between four and seven o’clock because they’re so overtired. And so overstimulated and so strung out and likely hungry, because when you’re overtired and overstimulated, you don’t eat well, that you get into this whole hot mess Express going into bedtime, which also then sucks, you rock them to sleep and you hope to heck you have a decent night. That doesn’t involve 700 wakeups. Right. It is all starting in the day, you have to balance the right schedule, and a baby’s independent ability to settle to sleep, which will then feed consolidated, restorative independent naps. An easy put down babies should fall asleep independently with minimal fuss between five and eight minutes at bedtime, if you’re doing it properly. And then they should sleep through the night anywhere between 11 and 12 hours at this age. Okay? If they are not, there is likely something that you are being required to do pop in the pacifier, rocking back to sleep, pick them up and cuddle hold them all night, right? All of those different things are asleep associations that you end up having to break that sleep training, right. But if you can manage to follow, getting the independent sleep skill first, then the set bedtime of say seven o’clock, baby’s going to wake anywhere between six and seven. Their first nap of the day at 10 months old should always be 10 o’clock if you want a seven under seven schedule, and if your baby’s waking a little early, you got to force him to 10 o’clock to reset their rhythms. Okay, give him a bath, put them in the window, so they get some natural vitamin D, I always have kids at 10 months, like practice using finger foods to eat, like those little yogurt bites or something so that they’re using sensory, and that they’re trying to kind of do a new skill that keeps them sort of preoccupied from the fact that they really want to go to sleep. Okay, a bath is a great one as well, because kids love water, it’s often soothing to many children. So that’s also a great way to bridge that gap between, you know, a baby wanting to go down at 930, and you forcing them to get to 10 o’clock, because after a couple of days, forcing them to 10 o’clock where they settle independently, they should sleep one of three ways. Okay, a 10 month old sleep schedule is going to look like this 10am down for nap right after they ate, right. So if they got up at seven, they’re eaten around 945 to go down at 10 Not eating to sleep, okay, you lay him down at 10 You burpham They’re fully clean, fed and ready for rest. They are going to sleep from 10 to 11. And then if they wake at 11, they’re going to then sleep two to four. If they sleep 10 to 1130, they’re going to sleep 230 to four, if they sleep 10 to 12. They’re going to sleep three to four. Okay? And that is every child who has the independent ability to settle to sleep their bodies either going to sleep one cycle or two. And it kind of varies by kid there’s like no rhyme or reason. Some kids are naturally longer morning nappers. Some kids are naturally longer afternoon nappers. Some kids split the difference, but they all in my 10 years of sleep coaching, fall into suit with that alignment after a couple of days. Now, if baby wakes after like 40 minutes, but they did independently settle, don’t rush right in there. The second you hear them fart or move around, you got to give them a minute, to make sure that they’re consolidating, they have to understand once they have the skill that they actually wake and are actually still a bit tired. So they go back down in the nap. It’s cool, it’s calm, it’s a dark room, you’re not bothering them. They’re not overstimulated. And you’ll see after about a week of consistency with your bedtime, your overnight and these naps, that that’s the schedule they fall into, which is ideal, three hours of total daytime sleep three hours of an awake window, right. So if they nap at 10, and then they’re up always by four, they’re ready to go to bed at seven, you get five feedings in each of those feedings is spaced about three hours throughout the day. And then you can throw in some purees and such if that’s your fancy, but do it as a snack, not a meal, right, every three hours should be the meal of the milk to make sure they’re getting the right intake, that’s the most nutrient dense from the milk or the formula. Okay, so that’s a little bit more about this 10 month, week window sample schedules and what everything looks like, because it will align if you give it the opportunity, but ultimately it comes down to one timing to the independent ability to settle so keep an eye on those weak Windows track sleep, see what’s going on, watch your child. And if you have questions, be sure to reach out. We have the most amazing self paced course called Sleep steps. It’s a DIY course. But it includes something no other program on the market does and we’re excited to be able to offer it. It includes a community where my entire summer squad and me are in there every day answering your questions. Plus, every week, we go live in zoom, you can jump in and you can literally interact live with me or a member of my team asking your question. So as you’re going through the sleep Steps program, if you’re stuck on implementing something, you have the coaching, the coaching is the secret sauce and no other course provides the coaching unless you pay for it for us sleep steps is fixed easy. 47 bucks a month, you can cancel anytime. And it’s for ages zero to four, you want to sleep train your whole family for under 50 bucks, go for it, jump out to sleep steps, you can learn more at Tiny transitions.com forward slash sleep steps. This is such an amazing program. My goal, as the founder of this company 10 years ago was to create accessible quality sleep coaching that’s affordable for everyone, not just cost prohibitive private coaching, which does have a lot of white glove service, but not everybody’s going to be able to afford that not everybody wants to go down that road. So I wanted to create a program that wasn’t just like every other baby e course out there where you spend a couple 100 bucks never get to talk to anybody. It’s a glorified PDF with a couple videos and then they send you on your way Believe me, I’ve booked enough of those people as private clients after the other programs didn’t work. And I didn’t want that to be the case. So if you’re interested in some sleep coaching if you know you need to do it, but you’re not ready to dive into anything too committed, right? From a cost or time standpoint, sleep steps is a great place. It is The coolest platform, I’m a little bit biased because it was my idea. But I kind of looked at this blue ocean and said, hey, the missing piece here is the coaching. So how can we make it accessible and affordable in a way that’s available to everyone? And we did that. So I’d encourage you to take a look at sleep steps, jump out to Instagram, you can follow us at Tiny transitions. We do tons of free training out there as well. And we’re always happy to help you, myself and my team of certified sleep consultants are readily available, super knowledgeable, and happy to help.

I hope everybody has a great rest of the week. And we’ll see you next week here on the kids. One more thing before you go. Did you know that we offer the industry’s first affordable and effective, self paced sleep coaching program that includes time with a pediatric sleep expert here on the tiny transitions team. It’s the industry’s first and only membership program like this, that you can cancel anytime. And the best part, it’s cheaper than a cup of coffee every single day. So say goodbye to the ebooks and courses that are not helping your child sleep better. And join sleep steps today. The most comprehensive sleep education you need to get everyone sleeping through the night. Learn more by visiting tiny transitions.com