Trying to get your baby to sleep at night can be a challenge without factoring feedings into the mix. However, when your baby's feeding schedule is the main problem of constant nighttime awakenings, what do you do about it? Whenever your baby feeds constantly at night, but not that much during the day, what are you supposed to do about that? Continue reading to find some suggestions that may help answer these questions.

Reverse cycling: what it is and why babies do it

Whenever your child feeds constantly at night but never during the day, this is what's known as reverse cycling. The why behind this is a little varied and doesn't have a straightforward answer. Babies may reverse cycle for a number of reasons. One of these reasons may be that they are extremely distracted. During the day they may be too distracted by activity and noise to be able to feed well enough to make them full. Therefore at night, when there aren't nearly as many distractions, they are able to complete a feed without any issues. However, they are still experiencing hunger from the day, which is why they require more frequent feeds at night to make up for whatever they lacked during the day.

Another reason is that newborns may reverse cycle because they have the night and day confused. Newborns don't have a circadian rhythm, so they don't know when it's light outside versus when it's day outside and which activities are appropriate for each time period.

Babies may go through short spurts of reverse cycling when they are going through major life changes kind of like a growth spurt.

Also, if you're able to nurse at night, but offer a bottle during the day, your child may be reversed cycling because they actually prefer to be breastfed than bottle fed. Therefore they feed less during the day and more at night because of that reason.

If you're working outside of the home, then your baby just may not be getting enough breast milk during the daylight hours and may be able to make up for it by nursing frequently at night.

How reverse cycling affects baby sleep

Have your child is breastfeeding every hour or two, then there's not a lot of sleep that's happening for them or you. There are some babies who are efficient reverse cyclers, meaning that they wake to eat, but they can nurse and go right back to sleep. This is especially true for babies who are good at self soothing and can fall asleep independently. Those babies don't have strong associations with nursing at night so will be able to sleep well between feedings.

Other babies, on the flip side, can be extremely awake during feedings and spend more of their night time hours awake and alert. For babies who are napping too much during the day, this is especially true, and being up at night is their way of fulfilling their required wake hours. This can also be true for newborns who are struggling with determining what is daytime and what is night time. If you have a child who is alert at night, this may flip your sleep schedule as well.

The positives of reverse cycling

Reverse cycling is not all doom and gloom. If you are a working mom, for instance, reverse cycling may actually be a bit beneficial. Moms are working full time out of the home and are pumping are actually benefiting from reverse cycling. Frequently feeding at night can help them keep their milk supply up and allow for bonding time that is lost during the day. Moms in the situation say that they can make up lost sleep by going to bed early and experiencing some naps on the weekend to try to make up for whatever they're lacking. Some moms are even able to sleep through a feeding, so they're not losing out on as much sleep.

How to reverse reverse cycling

Although there are some benefits for some moms, the majority of parents probably prefer that their children sleep at night and are awake and active during the day. Therefore, you may be seeking a way to reverse the reverse cycling. For newborns, if your child is reverse cycling, it's really because they have their days and nights confused. In order to solve this problem, keep working on your keeping your newborns days very bright. This can help them understand that there is a difference between the time when things are light and loud and when they are dark and quiet. At night, make sure to keep the rooms very dark, and feed and put the child right back to bed. This will help them understand that there is no extra play time in between feedings like you may incorporate during the day. Also remember to be patient, as circadian rhythms really don't become established until the baby is four to six months old.

For babies who are distracted eaters, you may be able to encourage the baby to take in more calories by feeding them right before a nap. This will help babies feed in a time where they are too tired to really pay attention to their external environment. Moms can also do something like wear a fun necklace or something that keeps the baby's attention somewhere in the area of the breast. Another option is to use a dark room or white noise to feed the baby so that way they focus specifically on eating and are not distracted by other things.

If you're just very busy, and unable to feed as often, one thing that you can do is set aside time to spend with your child and feed them. Try clearing your schedule for about two weeks to make a concerted effort to establish appropriate eating times in the day and the night. However long your child decides to eat is up to them, and depends on age, but if your child is reversed cycling, then you can allow a little extra time during the day to get a good feed. This will help your child feel well nourished enough to sleep more at night than they were.

For babies who hate the bottle, this can be a tough and frustrating problem. Some parents find it helpful to feed the baby in a different position than when you breastfeed period other parents find that they need to go through a trial and error process to find the right bottle and nipple that the child prefers. Others find that the mom cannot be in the room during a bottle feed and that it's best if a separate caregiver offers the baby a bottle.

For babies going through a growth spurt, there is really no fix. You just have to kind of wait out the growth spurt phase. The best bet, is to do net extra night time nursing for however long it's necessary. Trust that your baby is going to return to their normal schedule once the growth spurt is over. It might even help to sleep near your baby during this time as you know that they are going to need more milk and feedings.

If you and your baby don't fall into any of these categories, then there may be a chance that your child just has a really strong connection between feedings and night times. This means that you'll have to reverse this by making sure to do more feedings with more interaction during the day. Also, helping your baby learn to self-soothe and fall asleep in the bed independently can help as they will not be reliant on using Breast milk to help them go to sleep. Sleep coaching is an approach that you might be able to take where you train your child on what's appropriate at what times of the day.

If you're feeling pretty frustrated by the struggles of sleeping and breastfeeding, then please click the orange button below to take a free online state test and talk to one of our sleep professionals.

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