How To Tell If You Have a High Sleep Needs Baby or a Low Sleep Needs Baby

How to know if you have a high or low sleep needs baby.

Last day of this sleep week.  I hope it has been helpful.  Today we have one last post.  Have you heard people talk about their babies being high sleep need?  Or low sleep needs?  This is a thing actually.  Just like grown-ups, some babies need more sleep than others.  So if your friend’s baby takes long naps and sleeps for twelve hours a night while yours seems to get by on a lot less, don’t stress.  It is possible your babies have different sleep needs.

My kids are all on the high end of sleep needs.  Ben is almost five and still falls asleep during his quite time a lot of days.  And Ali and Sammy nap for two and a half hours every day before going to bed for 12 hours each night.  (Don’t hate me if you have a low sleep needs baby.)  It is nice, but the downside is all three of my kids held onto their morning nap until they were 18 months.  That’s a long time to have to be home every morning.

So how do you know if your baby is high or low sleep needs?  And how should you handle that? It can be a bit tricky if you have both types, but once you recognize the needs of your baby I think handling naps and night sleep will be a lot easier.  Emily from Journey of Parenthood has had both high and low sleep needs babies, so she knows what she is talking about.

She writes:

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Sleep issues can be frustrating and it can be tempting to just say “I GIVE UP!” I’ve learned over my years of parenting that sometimes there are sleep struggles simply beyond our control. Enter in the high sleep needs vs low sleep needs baby.

When I think back to my first child as an infant I wish I’d known about high sleep needs and low sleep needs. I wish I’d been able to tell myself that Kye wasn’t sleeping because his body simply didn’t need the sleep.

Both types of sleep needs children still NEED sleep, but high sleep needs babies tend to be on the higher end of the sleep spectrum whereas low sleep needs one tend to be on the lower end of that sleep spectrum. Babywise even accounts for this as it provides a range of what is an appropriate amount of sleep at a given age.

I took me until my THIRD child to FINALLY realize and recognize the differences between a high sleep needs and low sleep needs baby. Having that knowledge has made a WORLD of difference.”