Moving Your Baby to Their Own Room

Moving your baby to their own room to sleep is a huge milestone. Here are my top tips for making this transition as smooth as stress-free as possible - for you and your child!

 

When to move baby to their own room 

Historically parents have been advised to keep their baby in the same bedroom as them for the first 6 months. The reasoning behind this is that room-sharing appears to be protective against Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Quite why it has this effect isn't yet known exactly but the American Academy of Paediatrics recently began to advise that for the maximum protective benefit, little ones should room-share for at least the first 6 months but ideally the whole of their first year. Parents have to do what is right for their family but anyone not feeling ready to move baby at the 6 month mark shouldn't feel any pressure to do so - room-sharing beyond the first 6 months is not a bad thing, rather it has a continuing protective effect. It is worth noting that around 90% of SIDS deaths occur before babies reach 6 months.

 

Moving your baby to their own room will not automatically mean they sleep better

Many parents decide to move their little one as they assume frequent night-wakings are being caused by them disturbing their child's sleep. All babies beyond about 4 months old, all people in fact, wake in the night - it is a normal biological function designed to keep us safe. Rousing anywhere between around three and five times in the night is completely normal. For many little ones, when they encounter these routine and normal wakings, they require parental help to return to sleep. Moving a child to their own room won't stop them needing that help. Of course if one parent is a loud snorer that legitimately could be disturbing a little one's sleep, especially in the second half of the night where children spend more and more time in light sleep but rarely, in my experience, are parents disturbing their child's sleep - on the contrary, babies are fairly universally reassured by the physical proximity to their primary caregivers.

Your baby's sleep environment

Typically the best sleeping environment for a little one is somewhere that is calm, quiet and as dark as possible. Whilst cot mobiles can look pretty they can be stimulating/distracting, especially for those little ones with alert temperaments who are "into everything". Cots are best (and safest) when they are clear spaces, free from cuddly toys and loose covers. Cot bumpers are to be avoided on safety grounds. 

Personally I'm not a fan of light projectors etc being part of the sleep routine as for a lot of children they seem to make falling asleep harder. Babies tend not to be afraid of the dark - the womb is pitch black after all and typically in the early months babies sleep best in womb-like conditions. Even by the time a child moves to their own room it is unlikely they would have acquired a fear of the dark and so I would always start out having the room as dark as possible. 

If parents do want to have a light on at any point, e.g. whilst feeding/reading stories etc then it's worth knowing that red bulbs are less likely to interfere with sleep than any other colour (amber bulbs follow in second place). Artificial lights, and even daylight, emit "blue" light which inhibits the body's production of melatonin which is the hormone which makes us feel sleepy. For this reason I always advise parents to avoid their little ones being around screens (TV, tablet, smart phone etc) for at least an hour before bed (ideally two). This includes TVs being on in the background in the same room as the child. 

Once a child is settling down for sleep, if 10/10 is so dark you can't see your hand in front of your face then we ideally want it to be at least 8/10 dark. This is likely to require blackout curtains and/or blinds, especially at this time of year. Even if light isn't creeping in during the evenings, it is likely to do so in the early morning which can contribute to early-rising (where a child wakes for the day pre-6am). Sometimes parents need to be creative to fully block out daylight - the portable blackout blinds which attach to the windows with suckers can be a life-saver.

Whilst a quiet room will promote the best sleep, many little ones find absolute silence disconcerting. Again it comes back to the womb environment which isn't silent - there is a constant level of white noise. Also, if a baby is moving from your room he will be used to a level of background noise and so a move to total silence might unsettle him. 

White noise machines are a relatively cheap solution for creating a constant low-level hum which many babies find comforting. In addition, white noise will soften any louder or more sudden noises (think dropping something on the bathroom floor next to your baby's room!) and can help a little one sleep through household noise and/or the sound of birds tweeting away before you want to be up for the day. 

It's worth noting I'm not suggesting parents need to invest in one of the increasing number of in-cot white noise devices - whilst these can be great, a basic white noise machine or even an App playing on the iPad running constantly through the night will do the job. Bear in mind that if you do use an iPad it needs to be placed face-down to avoid it emitting blue light into your child's room!

This can be a good point to introduce an age-appropriate nighttime comforter. A little one might not take to the comforter immediately and may ignore it for a good while but it's worth persevering as there usually comes a point where a child will accept and then find security from having a "bedtime buddy". 

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