Newborn Sleep - The One Approach that is Guaranteed to Save Your Sanity
This is not a click baity title to sell you sleep training or a new technique to send your sweet baby off to slumberland it’s an approach that, put into regular practice might just save your sanity - whether your baby sleeps or not.
If you’ve followed us for a while we have a mantra at GentleBirth ‘control the controllables’ and it’s one of the most important approaches to labor and it’s even more important after your baby arrives. There’s a LOT we have no control over but we can control how we respond to what’s happening by changing our expectations that postpartum will happen exactly as we expect it to (stay with me and let me explain more…).
Sometimes during pregnancy and possibly even more so during the early postpartum weeks life can really suck and you feel like you want a refund. Shit happens and arguing with reality won’t make your baby sleep any longer. No doubt you’ve probably been warned that life is about to change after you have a baby but you probably haven’t realized exactly how much. Many parents find the first few weeks of new parenthood to be really hard with sleep challenges being at the top of the list – especially when it seems everyone else’s baby is related to Sleeping Beauty. You’ve probably tried a few different approaches already.
The ninja can be challenging in the early post partum and you run the risk of giving yourself a hernia.
The Secret to a Positive Post Partum - ‘Amor Fati’
Can you learn to love your postpartum experience? (Too ambitious?) Maybe we need to get to neutral first and we can work on liking it a lot more). So what is the ‘Amor Fati’ approach?
The German philosopher Nietzsche would describe his formula for human greatness as amor fati—a love of fate. “That one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backwards, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it….but love it.”
Watch this 3 minute video and to help you understand what Amor Fati is (it’s only 3 minutes….)
If you can add this approach to your mental toolkit today before your baby arrives it’s a game changer. If you’re desperately trying to find a solution to the intensity of the early postpartum sleep deprivation try it at 3am as your mind starts to gnaw into itself with visions of walking the halls with a crying baby for the next year (or two).
Just as acorns know how to oak your little human will sleep for longer periods as all kids eventually do. One of the most basic aspects of being human in this world is that nothing ever stays the same. Everything changes – the things we want to change and the things we don’t want to change. Our minds tend to judge change (especially the anxious part of our brain) as not being something good so we get more anxious. However as humans it feels so much better to keep reaching for what makes us feel happy (more sleep!) while avoiding anything that causes us any pain. This is just part of our humanness, but when we continually push against what we don’t want we expend a huge amount of energy fighting reality and making ourselves miserable. The anxious part of the brain is a bit of a control freak as it wants to guess what’s going to happen in the future it can’t handle insecurity and right now you can’t control your baby’s sleep patterns. That doesn’t mean you just become a doormat to everything that parenting throws at you but for most healthy newborns NOTHING IS WRONG with their sleep patterns… and if nothing is wrong then you can mentally relax and maybe even enjoy this time a bit more. Author Eric Barker suggests taking the Amor Fati approach in this way.
“Accepting you have a broken leg doesn’t mean you don’t go to the doctor. It means you don’t waste time complaining and don’t kid yourself that you’re going jogging tomorrow. And maybe you embrace your reduced mobility by saying this is the perfect time to catch up on reading your favorite blog”
The reality is that today your new baby’s normal sleep pattern is to sleep like a baby – and not an adult. What causes so much hardship for new parents is not this fact of biology but how we think about it. Western culture places so much emphasis on “your baby should be sleeping X hours” which often translates into self blame ”I should be able to do this”….”I’m not a good mom…”Everyone else seems to find it so easy”. There is no doubt that it can be absolute torture to be sleep deprived – but we just add more mental torture with our inner commentary of not feeling enough, not doing it right…etc. The mind can be our best friend or worst enemy - we all have that inner critic and it’s not the thoughts themselves that are ‘bad’ - it’s when we believe them that the real trouble starts.
Stop Fighting Reality
What we’re faced with something we can’t control - what’s the alternative other than embracing what we can’t change or at least muttering “this too shall pass” for the millionth time today. Can you fast forward mentally 6 months from now – 6 years from now…will everything you’re experiencing now seem so awful? Will you still think that refund on life was a good idea? Probably not – a little perspective can change everything.
Can you find a way to soften into that reality, to accept that right now this feels pretty horrible but it will change and you will get more sleep. Talk to professionals, surround yourself with support and treat yourself with kindness. This is a bloody intense season in your life but your mindset can change how you experience it. What have you got to lose?
If you have a hard time shutting down your brain when your baby does in fact sleep try the Sleep Sanctuary Mp3 in the GentleBirth App. There’s a whole section for postpartum that can help reduce stress for new parents.
What tips do you have for other new parents struggling in the postpartum?