When siblings wake each other up

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When siblings wake each other up

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If your 3-year has been sleeping through the night, maybe it's only been 3 months or 6 months or hopefully a year, and now you want to sleep coach your 6-month old. A lot of parents are scared. Oh no. We finally got our 3-year old sleeping well, and we're frightened to sleep coach the baby, because now every time they wake up, they're going to wake up the older one and we're going to go back into this same problem that we have, which inadvertently what the parents will do is they'll rush in and pick up the 6-month old to quiet them so that they don't wake up the 3-year old, and then they create a sleep problem with the baby that they then have to address. So I'll tell parents that, you know what, I don't want you to worry about it, because there's no way that we can guarantee that the 3-year old will wake up. Again, I'd rather you just divide and conquer. So one of you go into the baby. The other one just go into the 3-year old and say, it's okay sweetie. We're teaching baby how to sleep through the night. Night-night. Don't lie down with them and start your old crutch. Reassure them and leave. And let's say you're alone. And you don't have two parents to go in and divide and conquer and the baby wakes up in the middle of the sleep coaching at night. I would go into the 3-year old and say, I know the baby's awake - because hopefully you've already told them that you're going to sleep coach the baby. And everything's fine. I'm going to go check on the baby. And then just preempt any problems from there and then go attend to the baby.

Watch Video: When siblings wake each other up by Kim West, LCSW-C, ...

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Kim West, LCSW-C

Psychotherapist & Author, The Sleep Lady's Good Night, Sleep Tight

Kim West is a mother of two and a Licensed Certified Social Worker-Clinical (LCSW-C) who has been a practicing child and family social worker for more than 19 years. Known as The Sleep Lady by her clients, over the past 12 years she has helped thousands of tired parents all over the world learn to listen to their intuition, recognize their child’s important cues and behaviors, and gently create changes that promote and preserve his or her healthy sleep habits. 

West has appeared on the Dr. Phil, Today Show, NBC Nightly News, Good Morning America, TLC’s Bringing Home Baby  and CNN, and has been written about in a number of publications including The Wall Street Journal, Associated Press, Baby Talk,  Parenting, The Baltimore Sun, USA Today, The Telegraph, The Irish Independent and the Washington Post. West hosts the sleep section of The Newborn Channel, played in maternity wards in hospitals across the country. West is the author of The Sleep Lady's Good Night, Sleep Tight: Gentle Proven Solutions to Help Your Child Sleep Well and Wake Up Happy with Joanne Kenen. She is also the author of 52 Sleep Secrets for Babies and The Good Night, Sleep Tight Workbook.

Kim received her master’s degree in Clinical Social Work from Simmons College in Boston, Massachusetts. She lives with her family in Annapolis, Maryland.

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