How to improve sleep for high needs babies and toddlers

I have an ick when I see a parent who is clearly struggling with their baby’s sleep and asking for support, and they get comments like “It’s perfectly fine to let them wake or sleep whenever they like as long as their needs are met. It’ll get better when they’re older.”

I know these parents mean well about giving comments like that, and their baby is probably NOT a highly sensitive or spirited child.

Parents whose baby appears to be high needs, sensitive or persistent will feel like most of the sleep advice out there seems more realistic for easy going babies.

They question whether their baby is comfortable, if there’s something wrong, and why no two days are the same.

I understand their struggle because I have a highly sensitive and spirited child, too. Sleep was not easy with her and she can be persistently demanding if she wants something!

How do you know if you have a highly sensitive or spirited child?

There is a wide spectrum of this trait. But here are some signs:

They don’t whimper or fuss, they scream bloody murder to let you know what they want and don’t want. Making it difficult to soothe them to go to sleep.

Unpredictable. What works well today may feel like a fluke because it might not work again the next day. Naps are short, and they wake up and go to bed at different times every day. It can be very frustrating for parents who prefer to have a rhythm to their day.

Super sensitive to bright light, loud sounds, or clothing texture. You probably need to darken the room, keep the noise to a minimum, and dress them in pajamas without the labels, tags, or rough seams on the inside.

Multiple night waking's. They tend to have shorter sleep cycles and are prone to waking up fully in between these sleep cycles. Finding a strategy that addresses short sleep cycles might be challenging.

Can’t put baby down. If you have a smaller baby, they are attached to you throughout the day and will only be calm when they’re in a sling, carrier or being carried in arms. If you have a toddler, they’re extra clingy and get anxious when you try to pry them away or leave their bed side.

Need a lot of reassurance. They often need a significant amount of help and sleep aid to fall asleep. Putting them down awake will be challenging and parents often have an elaborate soothing routine to help their baby to sleep.

Should you sleep train your baby then?

If you’re a parent of a highly sensitive or persistent child, and you’ve found certain techniques that will help them sleep peacefully - even with a lot of sleep associations like contact napping, stroller naps, rocked/bounced to sleep, feed to sleep - don’t let anyone tell you that it’s not ok and that you should sleep train your baby.

However, if you feel like your baby has outgrown all these techniques that used to work but not anymore these days, then find ways to improve their sleep (and please don’t think it’s the cry it out or Ferber method because these usually won’t work for your baby, in my experience).

How long does it take for your baby to “get it”?

You do have to keep an open mind and expect that your little one will take a much longer time to adapt than those easy going babies, but there are gentler, kinder and more attuned ways to sleep train your highly sensitive or persistent child.

Some methods involve the gradual parent wean method, shush pat, and habit stacking (where you layer in a new sleep association before you remove the undesirable sleep association).

More importantly, emotional support for your baby is very much needed as they probably won’t easily handle big changes to their routine and the sleep association that they’ve grown accustomed to gain comfort and depend on to go to sleep. That means they will cry harder and longer.

Don’t assume that just because your child isn’t settling into a new sleep routine in a ‘x’ amount of days, that it won’t ever work.

But to give you an idea, whichever method you pick and do consistently, you should be seeing a big progress and improvement within 3-5 nights. Not perfect sleep and sleeping through the night though. You’ll see a remarkable type of improvement in night sleep. However, for naps, it will take about 4 weeks to become solid.

If by night 4, you don’t see any progress, you might want to reevaluate the method, or just take a break and try again later.

The key is to not see yourself as a failure if you don’t see any progress. With highly sensitive or persistent babies, you need to learn to be flexible and responsive to their needs.