Not a few new parents were made confused with babies who slept constantly, or just woke up a few hours a day. Unlike older people, babies need a longer sleep time. Baby sleeping needs may vary depending on age. How Much Do Newborns Sleep?
Sleep has an important role to grow a baby. It is because, the body’s metabolic process works when the child sleeps. Newborns even have longer sleeping hours. But you don’t have to worry, because it’s normal happening. As you age, the sleep time that a child takes in a day will also decrease.
So, How Much Do Newborns Sleep?
How Much Do Newborns Sleep? There is actually no definite benchmark about how long a newborn baby sleeps in a day.
A pediatrician, David Geller said that in the first days of his life, the average newborn baby slept for 16 hours each day. But it’s also different for different conditions. Some babies sleep less than 16 hours, or even more than 16 hours.
The baby wakes up just for a short break to lactation and let you change the diaper. When the diaper changing, some babies can even fall asleep as well.
Baby sleep patterns also change from day to day. Let them sleep as much as they want. Provided that you keep them in the wake, so that your baby do not lack nutrients. Do not forget to change the diaper regularly even if the baby is sleeping.
There is certainly a reason why newborns sleep longer. While inside the womb, the baby spends a lot of time sleeping because in there, it is surrounded by warmth and is lulled with your voice. So it is natural if at the beginning of his life in the world, the child sleeps longer, because he also needs to adapt,
Basically, the habit and sleep duration is different from one another. It depends on a wide range of factors, one of which is the age of the infant itself.
In the early years of his birth, it is certainly babies have the longest sleep time. However, at the age grows, the baby’s bedtime will begin to diminish. Not only that, a baby sleeping habit that You apply also determines the child’s sleep habit.
Therefore, You are expected to play an active role to form baby sleep patterns correctly.
Read also: Temazepam 15 mg: Benefits, How To Use, and Side Effects.
How Much Do Newborns up to 1 week of age sleep?
In the first weeks of birth, babies tend to sleep for a total of 16 to 18 hours per day. The sleeping hours are mostly done at night. However, they will wake up every few hours to breastfeed.
Read also: 20 Bad Effects of Less Than 6 Hours of Sleep.
Sleep needs of babies based on age
To answer the question How Much Do Newborns Sleep?, the following is an explanation about the Sleep needs of babies based on age.
Generally, newborns will spend 8-9 hours to sleep during the day and about 8 hours at night. However, in every bedtime, infants will usually sleep less than 2 hours, then re-awaken both during the day and night. For more details, below are the description of baby sleeping needs.
Infant 0-3 months
Most newborns do not have a nap or night pattern. This is because at that age, babies are still learning to adapt, distinguish day and night. In general, newborns will sleep 16-20 hours in a day. However, babies will wake every 2-4 hours for breastfeeding.
In the first 12 weeks, newborns will begin to adapt for day and night sleep. At the age of 3 months, baby’s bedtime will be reduced, which is 14-15 hours a day.
Infant 3-6 months
In this age range, babies will sleep for 10-18 hours a day, with an average of 14 hours a day. Just like newborns, babies of this age will be also woken up to nursing.
Although baby sleep patterns can vary, but generally infants in this age range will have to nap three times. To help the baby to fall asleep, he also needs the help of older people to make him feel comfortable. For example, by being carried or soothed.
Infant 6-12 months
When entering the age of 6-12 months, the infant will need to sleep approximately 14 hours a day. During the day, the baby will sleep for 1-2 hours, while in the evening it will usually sleep between 6 p.m. – 10 pm.
In the evening, the baby will usually take up to 30 minutes to get asleep. Babies will also often wake up at night, requiring the help of older people to get back to sleep. About 1 in 10 babies will do it about 3-4 times in one night.
Read also: How Long Can A Person Go Without Sleep? Here are 4 Health Facts.
Knowing How Much Do Newborns Sleep will be very useful to adjust the sleep time, also for you, especially new parents to adapt to a baby’s bedtime. As babies grow older, set the correct sleep hours. For example, it’s already in the bedroom at 07.30 pm, or put it to sleep when he was looked sleepy. If this is a familiarity, then the child will have a good sleep habits, his sleep will be a quality, so that the growth can be optimal.
