Podcast

Nina & Josh: The 6-Week Check-In (Season 6 Finale) S6|E167

In the much-anticipated Season 6 finale of Sense by Meg Faure, we welcome back regular guest Nina Clark for a 6-week check-in on her newborn, Josh! Nina shares the joys of Josh’s blossoming social nature, including those heart-melting early smiles, and the realities of managing a six-week-old alongside her toddler, Max.

Meg Faure offers expert advice on navigating this key developmental stage:

  • The 6-Week Fussies: Understanding why babies often experience a peak in fussiness and sleep struggles around six weeks.
  • Daytime Nap Dilemmas: Strategies for handling tricky daytime naps when baby seems to have FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) and resists settling.
  • Carrier Conundrums: Discussing why some babies might resist inward-facing carriers and exploring alternatives.
  • Soothing with Deep Pressure: The benefits of tight swaddling (done correctly!) and weighted blankets for calming more fractious infants.
  • Decoding Overstimulation: How to spot early signs of overstimulation before crying starts, and tips for adjusting baby’s environment to provide necessary downtime.
  • Creating the Perfect Sleep Setup: Advice on using white noise and aiming for an 80/20 rule for naps in a quiet, dark space to foster good long-term sleep habits.
  • Nature vs. Nurture: A look at how a baby’s inherent sensory profile and their environment contribute to their social development.

This episode is packed with relatable experiences and actionable tips, making it a perfect listen for new parents navigating the early weeks or anyone who enjoys an honest chat about the realities of motherhood.

Guests on this show

About Our Guest:

Nina Clark is a boy mom of two, born and bred in South Africa. She recently returned to Cape Town after a solid stint of nearly nine years living in London. While abroad, Nina founded Nightire, her successful sleepwear and bedding business crafting functional yet fashionable bedtime gear from 100% organic bamboo. Now juggling entrepreneurship with raising a toddler and a newborn, Nina joins Meg Faure on Sense by Meg Faure to share her honest and relatable journey into motherhood times two, including the transition back to South Africa and navigating life with a second baby.

Episode References and Links:

CONNECT WITH MEG FAURE
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For episode feedback & suggestions, or to nominate your self or a friend to appear as a guest on the show, please email [email protected]

[0:00 – 1:21]
Meg Faure: This week on our must-listen podcast episode, we are thrilled to welcome back our regular guest, Nina. She’s a fabulous mom to two delightful little ones, Max and Josh. And as always, Nina brings her genuine warmth and incredible insights into the world of motherhood. Josh is now hitting those famous six-week milestones, and Nina’s really got this. She is just loving watching her little one blossom into a social butterfly, just like his big brother, Max. And I have incredible insight and advice for managing this phase of having a six-week-old, along with a toddler. So what are you going to learn today? We’re going to have a look at why babies at six weeks do struggle a little bit with sleep, and how to handle those tricky naptime naps, and how to handle those tricky daytime naps. And then we look at the magic of deep pressure techniques. So things like tight swaddles and weighted blankets, and how they can soothe little ones who are a little bit more fractious. And then also, Nina asks about how to spot those early signs of overstimulation before they actually start crying, and then how to actually adjust the baby’s environment accordingly. I also give her tips for creating the perfect sleep setup, and how to also stay flexible through real life. So if you’re a new mom navigating the early weeks with a newborn, or just wanting a relatable chat about the realities of early parenting, don’t miss this episode. Nina’s candid experiences, along with my advice, are sure to leave you feeling empowered and ready to tackle this phase with confidence.
[1:21 – 2:04]
Announcer: Welcome to Sense by Meg Faure, the podcast that’s brought to you by ParentSense, the app that takes guesswork out of parenting. If you’re a new parent, then you are in good company. Your host Meg Faure is a well known OT, infant specialist, and the author of eight parenting books. Each week, we’re going to spend time with new moms and dads just like you to chat about the week’s wins, the challenges, and the questions of the moment. Subscribe to the podcast, download the ParentSense app, and catch Meg here every week to make the most of that first year of your little one’s life. And now, meet your host.
[2:06 – 2:30]
Meg Faure: Welcome back, moms and dads. Always lovely to have you join us here every week on Sense by Meg Faure. And today is one of our favourite episodes in that we get involved with one of our regular moms. And we have been tracking the life of little Josh, who started off as Tiny. That was his first name. And now he’s been formerly named Josh. He is the baby of Nina. And Nina, it’s just lovely to have you with us.
[2:32 – 2:34]
Nina Clark: It’s always so good to chat, Meg.
[2:35 – 2:37]
Meg Faure: How old is our big boy now?
[2:39 – 3:00]
Nina Clark: So Josh is six and a half weeks at the moment. Let’s round up to seven. But I definitely feel like he’s hit the six-week sleep regression this week. So yeah, he seems to be bang on track with what is to be expected of him at the moment.
[3:01 – 3:30]
Meg Faure: Yeah. It’s such an interesting thing. It’s a global phenomenon. In every single population throughout the world, 80% of babies have almost no crying for the first two weeks. Crying then starts and fussing and sleeplessness starts. It ramps up until about six weeks. And it drops down. And by 12 weeks, we turn a corner. And it’s such a funny thing because it is just so universal. It just happens everywhere. So he’s right at the peak of probably where his fussing is going to be and his irritability.
[3:32 – 6:00]
Nina Clark: Yeah. I must say, thank goodness. I don’t want to speak too soon. So let me touch wood. But at the moment, there’s no major crying spells. So I think the longest we had was maybe five minutes. And he and I were both like, what did we do? We were so not used to it. But otherwise, he just seems to struggle to settle, I suppose. And especially during the day, especially if there is anything happening around him. I don’t know if this little boy has just got a whole lot of FOMO, but he just doesn’t really want to sleep. But one day, he was literally awake for hours and hours and hours. And I mean, he would maybe have like a little five-minute sleep on the boob. And then if I would take him off or try and put him down, he would just be awake again. So I think that’s more so than, thank goodness, screaming or being visibly irritable. He’s actually in pretty good spirits. But it just means during the day, there’s a lot of time needing to do things with his head racking. Yeah. But interestingly, so this is something I wanted to chat to you about today. He’s not really a carrier baby. And I think it is because, this is my theory, that for the first month, we had so many people around. We literally had family around every single day. So Oma and Opa, Granny, Grandpa, everybody was holding him. And I was saying to Pete, I feel a little bit like Joshie’s waiting. It’s because I feel like I’m just feeding him and then someone is taking him because everybody wanted a piece of him. And so he wasn’t really carried in the carrier because there wasn’t really a need for it. And now when I try and put him in, he’s okay when he’s like a little bit sleepy and maybe needing to sleep in the carrier, which doesn’t really happen that often. But if he is awake and I try and put him in, there’s no chance. This boy just pushes with his like fairly strong arms away from my chest. The head is going everywhere. He’s like wanting to see what’s going on. And so I think maybe it’s when he’s still forward facing, he’s not going to be a carrier baby. And hopefully then later on, when he can see out, I can just carry him around. But yeah, it’s making things a little bit tricky because I’d love to be able to just put him in, be hands-free and keep playing with Max or doing my thing, but he is not allowing that.
[6:00 – 6:02]
Meg Faure: Out of interest, which carrier are you using?
[6:05 – 6:28]
Nina Clark: I started with a wrap, with like a Noo Noo Pie type thing. And I think that’s also where I was a little bit, you know, I dropped the ball on the carrier thing because I just didn’t feel like doing the admin of the wrap. And then I started going over to the BabyBjorn, which we had left from Max’s day. So I’m trying that one.
[6:29 – 6:33]
Meg Faure: But not facing outward yet because his head support isn’t there yet.
Nina Clark: Exactly.
[6:34 – 7:48]
Meg Faure: Yeah. Yeah. You know, it’s quite interesting. I think you definitely do get babies who don’t like to face inwards, probably because what’s going on in the sensory level is very, I mean, they don’t have the interest of looking outwards and it’s kind of very containing. And so sometimes, and maybe our social butterflies are a bit like that, they start to like to look outwards and be engaged outwardly. I mean, I’m going to be very interested because we’re going to track him over the course of the year to see where he emerges, but he could be a social butterfly in that situation. You know, I think it’s still worth trying a different carrier. There’s actually a carrier, I’m going to try and reach out to them and see if we can get you one. And that’s the SnuggleRoo carrier. And it’s just such a lovely carrier because it’s got the soft texture of the wrap carrier, but it’s got almost the structure and the support of the BabyBjorn, but it’s much softer. I think that maybe that can make a difference. Let me see if I can get you one because, yeah, I mean, I do think carriers are just, I mean, like for exactly the reasons you said, that you get hands-free, that you get all the vestibular input, but you’ve still got the sensory. I mean, out of interest, how is he with, do you ever massage him after bath?
[7:50 – 8:04]
Nina Clark: We do, yes. And he’s happy with that. I mean, if he’s not happy in general, the massage probably also won’t go well, but if he’s happy, you know, he’s chilled before the bath, he’s happy in the bath, all of that, he’ll happily lie there and get massaged.
[8:04 – 8:08]
Meg Faure: And how is he with breastfeeding?
Nina Clark: Great.
Meg Faure: Great. Okay. All right. Yeah.
[8:08 – 9:34]
Meg Faure: Then it probably, you know, because I asked those two questions because sometimes babies don’t like inward facing carriers if they’re more sensory sensitive. So it would be kind of two camps I would be thinking of. One is that he is a sensory seeker. So he wants to see out. And the other one is that he’s sensory sensitive and doesn’t want to be that close to your chest. And, but then he would be fighting at the breast and he wouldn’t like baby massage. So my gut is that, you know, the fact that he’s liking all of that other sensory input means that he’s probably not sensory sensitive. And also, you know, our sensory sensitive babies are, they sleep for like 20 minutes stretches. They never stretch their sleeps. They are extremely fussy in and out of your arms. And he just doesn’t, they’re definitely doing three hours of crying in a day and he isn’t doing all of that. So I don’t think he’s obviously not sensory sensitive, probably a social butterfly. And, you know, it’s interesting because you say that he doesn’t cry much, but he actually is needing a lot of input in actual fact, you know, there’s, it sounds to me like there’s very regular holdings, feedings kind of care. And that if there wasn’t all of that happening, there would be a lot more crying happening. So he seemed to be quite sensory needy and maybe a little bit of a sensory seeker and seeking engagement, seeking, you know, your, your involvement socially and emotionally all the time and sensory. And that probably points to him being a social butterfly. Did you ever find out or ever work out what Max is out of interest?
[9:36 – 10:12]
Nina Clark: I actually didn’t. I mean, I, I remember, I remember sort of, um, you know, going through all the different, um, types, uh, when I was, um, you know, listening to, to your podcast and especially, um, Max’s journey when my Max was going through all the things. Um, but I never really went and, and, uh, worked it out. So I need to do that just out of interest. I mean, from what I can, you know, off the top of my head, he is a total social, but that might not be just because he likes to talk to everyone. I’m sure that’s a different story altogether.
[10:13 – 10:43]
Meg Faure: Yeah. Well, I mean, your, your social butterflies, I mean, it’s very difficult at six weeks old to establish it because they’re just not engaging socially much, but certainly for Max who’s now nearly three or, you know, he is three, isn’t he? Yeah. Um, you would be able to I mean, there, there are the life and soul of the party. They don’t like being left out of things. They have FOMO every opportunity at four months old. It’s quite classic that they’re very smiley and make eye contact with and flirt with absolutely everyone. Was that the type of baby that Max was?
[10:44 – 11:38]
Nina Clark: Absolutely. And, and interestingly, as you’re describing that, it kind of feels like Josh is very similar. So he, I mean, he started smiling two weeks ago already, but now he is full on just smiling at absolutely everyone. And his niggling starts when he can’t see anyone. So as soon as someone leaves the room, as soon as someone leaves his eyesight, I mean, you know, and I don’t know how much of it is nature or nurture. I’d be so interested to know, because I don’t know if we sort of created the monster by, you know, being around him, holding him the whole time, not letting him, as you say, you know, like as soon as there’s like, then someone’s picking him up, someone’s, you know, there’s the touch, there’s the holding, the eye contact, like getting him involved in what we’re doing and not letting him sort of just, I don’t know, be with his feelings or whatever it is, and how much of it is nature.
[11:39 – 13:29]
Meg Faure: Yeah. So very interesting debate. So it does sound to me like he’s heading in the direction of a social butterfly, and it’ll be very interesting for us to watch and see how that compares to Max’s journey. Because it’ll be, at some point, you’ll be able to say, okay, one is more or less than the other. But the question about whether or not it’s nurture or nature is very interesting. There is definitely a component of nature. And particularly if you and Pete are very social, gregarious, love, you know, love being open about people. And I mean, I do follow you on Instagram. And I see, you know, that you are social, you’re very much like our family has always been, you know, you love the village, and probably are loving the village immensely with this baby, because you’re in your village, whereas last time you were in London. So yes, I do think that probably there’s a certain amount that’s nature, like just in your genes, in Pete’s genes, in your family’s genes. And so that’s, that’s going to be what comes out for both your boys. But then, of course, there’s also the nurture. And that is that, you know, he’s probably having a little bit more of a social life than Max did in London, when you were a little bit more isolated, I’m guessing, maybe less of a support system around you. And so there’ll also be that playing a part as well. And then we do wire our children for needing more stimulation, in exactly the way that you just said, you know, there’s always somebody to entertain, and there’s always somebody who’s going to pick him up. And, you know, so I definitely do think that all of those three factors will definitely play into building a social butterfly, I think your risk with a social butterfly is not giving them enough downtime. Because our babies, if they’re having a huge amount of sensory stimulation during the course of the day, are likely to sleep not as well at night. So at six weeks, I would be expecting him to be having maybe a feed close to midnight, and then another feed between midnight in the morning, and then another one early morning, four or five in the morning. How many night feeds is he having?
[13:31 – 14:00]
Nina Clark: Yeah, I would say that’s about right. So I am now sort of trying to go to bed at the same time as Max. We’re trying to first put Joshie down, then Max at about eight, and I’m getting into bed with him, so I can just have a really nice long sleep window. And then I would say Josh does a feed at about 11, 12, as you say, something in between that two, three, five o’clock in the morning, that’s when I usually start my day, because then I can’t sleep again, and then he’ll stretch it until maybe seven. So that sounds about right.
[14:01 – 14:07]
Meg Faure: That’s incredible. And are there, in between each of those feeds, 11 and the two or three and the three and the five, is he sleeping?
Nina Clark: Yes.
[14:09 – 14:38]
Meg Faure: Okay. So he’s doing incredibly well. I mean, when you tell me that scenario picture at night for a six-week-old, I would say that he’s spot on and he’s doing really well. And now what will happen is that that 11 or 12 feed will move until 12 or one, and then your three will move into four, and suddenly you’re coming right down. So if you can keep going like this, you’re going on a very good trajectory towards your 17-week sleep regression, which is the next kind of, how do we manage that, which we’ll talk about at a later stage.
[14:39 – 15:48]
Nina Clark: Amazing. Yeah. And I must say, I do actually think he feeds really well because he actually doesn’t even really cry at night when he wakes up at those times. It feels like he sort of just niggles. I mean, I basically, I mean, I think my boobs are also ready at that point to get a little bit of relief. So I almost just whip him up and put him on and he feeds for however long it is, a couple of minutes, and then he falls asleep again and then I put him down. So it isn’t, you know, it’s not like a jarring wake up. He’s not massively upset. Do you find that the only thing about him that is so frustrating is he’s definitely louder of a sleeper than Max was? My gosh, there is just this like, and I think that again, it is the, it’s that point where now his tummy is developing. I can’t remember whether we spoke about this last time, but you know, there’s a lot more discomfort in the tummy area. So there’s groaning and moaning and pushing and you can see he’s getting red for a lot of the night, but it doesn’t seem to really wake him up or disturb him or like, you know, make him incredibly upset.
[15:48 – 16:12]
Meg Faure: So, so, so I’m interested in that because there’ll definitely be mums who would be reacting to that. I call it iffing and butting, that kind of eh-eh-eh. So what are you doing? When he’s doing that, you leave him, and when he cries for a feed, how do you differentiate? What are you doing?
[16:14 – 16:51]
Announcer: This episode is brought to us by ParentSense, the all-in-one baby and parenting app that helps you make the most of your baby’s first year. Don’t you wish someone would just tell you everything you need to know about caring for your baby? When to feed them, how to wean them, and why they won’t sleep? ParentSense app is like having a baby expert on your phone guiding you to parent with confidence. Get a flexible routine, daily tips, and advice personalised for you and your little one. Download ParentSense app now from your app store and take the guesswork out of parenting.
[16:53 – 16:58]
Meg Faure: And when he cries for a feed, I mean, how do you differentiate? What are you doing?
[16:59 – 17:23]
Nina Clark: Yeah, so I’m mostly just leaving him. If he keeps sleeping through it, then I don’t pick him up. If he is doing that, and then sort of just becoming a little bit naggy, and I wouldn’t even say it’s a cry. It’s more just like an eh-eh. I mean, I guess it is a cry, but it’s not a bawling his eyes out situation. Then I’ll pick him up straight away and sort it.
[17:23 – 17:31]
Meg Faure: And during that iffing and butting, are you awake? Is he in your room? Or is he in another room, and you’re able to kind of sort of sleep through it?
[17:32 – 3:04]
Nina Clark: No, he is in our room still. He’s actually in his little Moses basket. I tend to be able to sleep through some of it, not all of it. I’m sleeping with earplugs in at the moment. Yeah, so that tends to help a little bit with some of the minimal groaning. But yeah, so this is the other thing that I really wanted to chat to you about because throughout the past couple of days, I’ve been trying to do a bit of research into this regression and what to do and all of that. Constantly it says the first thing is swaddle your baby. We’ve been trying to swaddle him since the beginning, but he just seems to hate it. And to be honest, he actually tends to sleep quite well with his arms out. It doesn’t seem to wake him up. I don’t think that that is the thing that wakes him up, the startle reflex so much. It feels like, and again, last night we actually tried to swaddle him, and I would just hear him like fighting against it the whole night. And then as soon as he’s unswaddled, then he’s okay. Then there’s a bit of groaning. I can tell that that’s a different groaning where he’s just trying to get stuff out of his tummy versus groaning to push himself out of the swaddle. Whereas Max, we burritoed him like it was, you know, going out of fashion and he loved it. So it’s so weird how it’s so different.
[19:04 – 20:31]
Meg Faure: Interesting. So interesting. And a lot of moms will actually express that. So look, I think, I do think the deep pressure is very important. And I think there’s three ways that we can get that now. And it could actually help with that kind of iffing and butting and then little bit of sensitivity that’s happening between feeds. The one way is swaddling. If you hadn’t told me that you burritoed Max, I would have then been saying to go onto my YouTube site and go and look at how to really wrap them up like a burrito. But the fact that you’ve done it once before successfully tells me that you probably have ticked that box and know what you’re talking about. But a lot of first-time moms, the reason their babies are not enjoying swaddling is that they’re simply not doing it tightly enough because there’s, you know, you need to really be quite tight. The minute a swaddle is loose, it can actually be more irritating. And you might be experiencing that because it’s hot in Cape Town at this time of year, you might not actually be swaddling as deeply as you need to. So I would probably just do one more revisit of a really tight burrito swaddle with arms in. Second thing I would suggest is to maybe do an underarm swaddle, arms out and just really tight around the abdominal area and legs tucked up. We never swaddle babies with their legs straight because we need their hips to carve out the acetabulum. So kind of fold that bottom of the blanket up against the feet, so the little knees are folded up towards his tummy and go really, really tightly around and see if that helps. And then the third thing is to get hold of a weighted blanket. Do you have one of the Nurture One weighted blankets?
[20:32 – 20:41]
Nina Clark: I don’t know. I have the Nurture One pillow, but I don’t have the weighted blanket. I’ve seen it multiple times and keep thinking maybe I should just get one.
[20:41 – 21:52]
Meg Faure: Would you? I would get one of those. And then what I would do is I would put him on the Nurture One cushion, just straight into the Moses basket, on his back with the weighted blanket over his tummy. And, you know, if you can’t get a Nurture One weighted blanket, moms, I mean, you can use even like a little cherry pit bag or a little weighted thing that you get that you would normally warm in the microwave and pop on your shoulders, but don’t warm it. And you can even just put that across the tummy. And that place you’re wanting to get is kind of the top of the tummy, bottom of the oesophagus. That’s where you want it to sit. You don’t want it too high up over their chest because that just gives them the right amount of a little bit of extra weight. And if there is a little bit of reflux, which is not a disturbing level of reflux, it also just stops to, you know, kind of hold those milk curds down as well. So I would try that deep pressure. And the other one that you mentioned, which I just think is such a lovely thing, it’s my favourite milestone, and that’s smiling. And, you know, smiling is that milestone that you can hang your hat on. It happens for 90% of babies at six weeks on the dot. And then you get this little cluster of babies, very often your social butterflies, who smile early. And so I was quite interested. He smiled, it sounds like at four and a half weeks.
[21:53 – 22:13]
Nina Clark: Yeah, yeah, he did. He did, but it is, it’s just becoming, and it’s amazing how much more you like your babies when they can just start giving you those signals back, you know, and when they just become more solid and it’s incredible how, yeah, suddenly they just become a little bit more, more fun to have around.
[22:15 – 22:39]
Meg Faure: No, it’s true. And it’s such an important milestone because it opens up the gateway for serve and return, which is that, you know, he makes a signal, you make it back, you know, so a smile and a smile, and then you pause and then you smile back and he smiles back. And it’s just, it’s such an important neurological wiring that goes on for engagement when they start smiling. So it really is wonderful that he’s smiling so beautifully. Did Max also smile early?
[22:41 – 23:11]
Nina Clark: Gosh, I cannot remember. I’m going to need to go and check my diary for that. Meg, I wanted to ask you something just very quickly before I forget, because it feels like I forget everything nowadays, but you mentioned something about with social butterflies and, you know, he potentially is one, but the stimulation and not overstimulating them. At this point in the game, where are we, would you say, in terms of like level of stimulation? What should we be preparing? What not?
[23:11 – 28:05]
Meg Faure: With the amount that he is being handled and with the freneticness of your home and your life with a toddler and the fact that you guys do have a very active, socially engaged village around you, mums and dads and family coming and going and friends, he is probably getting more stimulation than the average baby does, you know, because the average baby would have a much more, and particularly first time babies in more isolated villages, as it were, they would not be having as much interaction. So I would, and by the way, I love that. I think that social interaction is perfect. So don’t change that. But I would say anything more than that, I would not be focussing on. So things like putting him under a mobile for 10 minutes within each awake time so that he gets some visual stimulation does not become as important for a baby like him or to be able to put on background noise and sounds and stories and music, again, not so important for him. Giving him a baby massage suddenly not as important because he’s being handled so much, you know. So I think, you know, I think stimulation, you know, kind of scheduling and stimulation becomes quite important when you’ve got a mum who is a very serene mum with a very settled baby in a very isolated social situation or a mum who’s depressed or, you know, when things are much more muted, then we actually do say, you know, I talk in one of my books, which is called “Your Sensory Baby.” And in that book, we talk about this goodness of fit between mum and baby and goodness of fit between the environment and the baby’s personality. So if you’ve got a baby who’s a very settled baby not seeking stimulation or a very fussy baby not seeking stimulation and a parent who isn’t really in an environment or within themselves who’s stimulating their baby, then I do like to say to mums, you guys need to schedule in some stimulation in every awake time. So for those mums who are listening to this who identify with that, maybe a fussy baby, you know, sensory sensitive baby or slow to warm up baby and a settled mum or mum who just isn’t very socially engaged, you have got to schedule in time. And that would mean within each awake time and his awake time will be going towards an hour but now there should be 10 minutes when he’s in his calm alert state, which is the state where low body movements, eye contact, maybe some smiling. In that state, there should be some stimulation scheduled, which can be going under a mobile, going for a walk in the garden, lying him on a blanket underneath some trees to watch the leaves, giving him a baby massage. All of these are things that I do think need to be scheduled in for babies. When you’ve got a very much more frenetically busy world, which potentially, I mean, I only see snapshots of you from these podcasts and snapshots on Instagram, but potentially if your house is very busy, lots going on, I don’t think there’s any need to schedule in anything. I mean, just having Max land next to him and give him a bump on the arm, it’s stimulation, you know? So I don’t think, I think there you’re needing to watch more for overstimulation. And so with overstimulation, there’s kind of three things I’d be looking for. The first thing I would be looking for his signals where he starts to just look away. It’s a great signal to watch for where he looks away from you or from Max before he starts to grizzle, just the looking away, that’s a very subtle signal that says, oh, I’ve probably had enough. And if I saw that signal, I would either put him in a carrier facing outwards now because we know he doesn’t like facing inwards, or I would actually take a blanket and put it underneath some trees and what I call nature’s mobiles and just give him some downtime away from the busyness. So I really would watch for those signals or even just take him to your bedroom. He’s not rolling yet. So put him in the middle of your bed while you get changed where he’s not staring at anything. He’s not being stimulated. He’s just lying there doing nothing. And moms tend to get a bit nervous about babies doing nothing, but actually it’s a good thing. So that’s the first thing would be watch for the signals and give him a sensory break. The next thing I would be watching for with him is I would be watching your awake times quite carefully because it’s with these babies that don’t give you signals of tiredness. And then by the time they get to the end of the awake time and you’ve missed it, they’re then into that kind of brain profile of releasing neurotransmitters to keep themselves awake. And then they’re very difficult to get to sleep then at that point. So there’s lots of rocking and holding and shushing and feeding to get to sleep instead of them just managing to fall asleep without all of that holding. So that’s the second thing is watch those awake times. And then the third thing is just particularly in the late part of the afternoon and the evening, just trying to give him some sensory downtime. Look, the fact that he’s actually sleeping so well at night means I’m not as worried about that. But for many babies like this who’ve had very social days, they end up really fighting nighttime sleep. And then they have a lot of a long crying patch just before bedtime, which obviously he isn’t doing. So less of a point, but those are kind of the three principles I’d look for. Look for the signals, watch the awake times and make sure the end of the day is not overstimulating.
[28:07 – 28:57]
Nina Clark: Okay, got it. Thank you. And I guess just a quick segue on that or a question that I have leading off of that, sensory stimulation. I mean, also in the same vein, the potential sort of bit of a sleep regression that he’s going through at the moment with just struggling to settle for sleep during the day, not so much at night. What should I be doing as soon as I sort of see it is now an hour, he really needs to go down? Would you suggest that I remove him from areas where there is stimulation? So try and get him back into the, well, it’s not really a dark room, but darkened room, quiet, that he’s back in his little bed every single time? Or should I still be trying to lean into trying to get him to sleep in different places, not too quiet, so that he’s not too used to just like the perfect environment the whole time?
[28:57 – 31:19]
Meg Faure: No, I personally like the perfect environment the whole time. And the reason I like it, so there are two arguments and I understand them both, but the reason why I go for having them in a quiet space in an 80-20 rule, 80% of the sleeps during the day is that long-term they tend to be better sleepers. So, you know, by the time he gets to six months, he’ll be down to three sleeps, nine months, two sleeps, and at a year he’ll be down to one sleep. And at that point, you actually really do want him to be in a safe space because it is a good trigger to say, right, it’s sleep time, you’re off to sleep. You know, you’re not at a year of age, it’s really difficult if your little one is always needing to be driven around the block in order to fall asleep or be in a car to sleep. So you want them to really get used to having that safe sleep space. The reason I say 80-20 is that there will be those 20% of naps that will not happen. So you’ll be taking Max to play school. You’ll be going down to Pick n Pay. You’ll be dropping your child, your nanny, off at the bus at four o’clock in the afternoon, whatever it is, and they will have a cat nap in the car seat. And that is absolutely fine. But by and large, getting him to sleep in a darkened space, quiet space at this age is good. You can add in a bit of white noise into the room because white noise is a great, it mimics that kind of white noise that you’re getting when he’s sleeping in the middle of the lounge. But at the same time, it’s something that can be left in the bedroom for all sleeps once he’s a little older. And the other reason why I like the 80-20 rule is that right now the 80-20 means that probably one or two naps will be taken on the run or on the go or in the lounge, and then the rest will be in the nursery. When he gets to six months old and he’s having three sleeps in a day, so six to nine months, they’re having three sleeps in a day, it means that one of those sleeps can actually be on the go. And then one that I often say from six to nine months old is actually that late afternoon one. So like four o’clock sleep because you can actually pop them in a carrier, go for a walk, put them in the pram and go for a walk on the promenade or whatever you’re doing, or sleeping in the car when you’re going to, you know, fetch somebody from school or whatever. So, you know, I think 80-20 for day sleeps is a good rule of thumb.
Nina Clark: Brilliant. Okay. Thank you so much. I’ve made so many notes.
Meg Faure: Oh, it’s such a pleasure. I love your questions. I think other moms really will be enjoying the way that you ask them as well because it’s accessible, it’s practical, it’s really super. So thank you so much, Nina.
[31:20 – 31:29]
Announcer: Thanks to everyone who joined us. We will see you the same time next week. Until then, download ParentSense app and take the guesswork out of parenting.

Meg faure

Meg Faure

Hi, I’m Meg Faure. I am an Occupational Therapist and the founder of Parent Sense. My ‘why’ is to support parents like you and help you to make the most of your parenting journey. Over the last 25 years, I’ve worked with thousands of babies, and I’ve come to understand that what works for fussy babies works just as well for all babies, worldwide.