How to Put Your Baby to Bed Without Waking Him, According to Science
Each of my three children had difficulty falling asleep for different reasons. You never fall asleep in a crib, only with your parent. The others fell asleep more easily, but if you were holding them during this time, good luck getting them into bed without waking them. But a team of scientists has tested a walking-sit method that they say may be the best way to get a crying baby to calm down, fall asleep and stay asleep.
None of the components of this method will seem innovative to caregivers, but they put them together in a sequence that I don’t think I’ve ever tried in the same way. (In contrast, Lifehacker author Rachel Fairbank says this method is a lot like the way she used to put her baby to sleep. I think some of us are slower to learn this method.)
How to put a sleeping baby to bed
Here’s the procedure. You start, in particular, with a crying baby.
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Walk with your baby until he stops crying. They should be asleep in about five minutes.
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Here’s the most important part: sit with your baby for five to eight minutes . This allows them to fall asleep while they are still in contact with you.
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Then put them in their crib.
Why this method works, according to science
The researchers admit that their study “is exploratory in nature and needs to be confirmed,” so no one is promising that this is a magic sleep spell. But it is consistent with several observations they made that most caregivers of infants would likely agree with:
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Humans (and other animals that bear young) have a “transport response” that calms babies when they are moved.
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Crying babies fall asleep quite reliably when they are walked with. (Happy, alert children don’t do this.)
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Babies wake up when they notice they are being separated from their caregiver.
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Putting your baby down “either interrupts or deepens” his sleep.
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Babies enter a deeper sleep stage about five to eight minutes after first falling asleep, which makes them more likely to stay asleep when you put them down.
Putting it all together, the walk-then-sit protocol should have a fairly high success rate. Please note that this sequence is intended for crying babies, not alert ones, so it may not be worth using as part of your regular bedtime routine.
It also probably goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway) that if your baby has a reason to cry, take care of that first. If they are hungry or in pain, they won’t necessarily sleep through the night just because you walked them. But if your kids tend to fuss and cry when all they want is a nap, it might be worth a try.