What it is
Day-night confusion is the newborn who sleeps all day and is awake all night. It happens because babies are born without a body clock. In the womb, your movement rocked the baby by day, and your stillness at night let him wake and kick. His own rhythm, run by the hormone melatonin, does not switch on until around 8 to 12 weeks.
What's typical
Most babies have some version of this in the first two to three weeks. Nights are the long awake stretch, often with a lot of feeding. By six to eight weeks, most babies sleep one longer stretch at night, around four to five hours. It fades on its own. Nothing you did caused it.
What's known
The AAP and pediatric sleep researchers describe the newborn body clock as developing, not trainable. Light is the main cue it reads. Bright days and dark nights are the one thing shown to help it set a little faster.
What helps
- Open the curtains in the morning. Keep daytime naps in normal light and noise.
- Keep nights boring: dim light, low voice, feed and change, back down.
- Wake the baby to feed if a daytime nap passes three hours, until she is back to birth weight.
- Sleep when it is offered, even at 10 a.m.
When to call someone
- Nowa baby who cannot be woken for a feed, or who is limp or gray.
- Todayfewer wet diapers than expected, or a baby who sleeps through most feeds day and night.
- At your next visitthe pattern has not budged by eight weeks, or you cannot function.
Who helps
Tools: Postpartum Prep Checklist
Related
- Newborn sleep and safe sleepBaby Basics
- Sleep deprivation: what it does and how to survive itPostpartum: Your Body
- Sharing nights: shifts and systemsSupport, Home, and Village
- Cluster feedingFeeding Your Baby
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Sources
- American Academy of Pediatrics, HealthyChildren.org — Sleep patterns in newborns
- NHS — Helping your baby to sleep
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