Holistic Sleep Coaching: The Sleep Training Alternative You Never Knew You Needed
When you are struggling with your baby or toddler’s sleep, knowing the right path forward for your family can seem daunting.
The internet and baby books are full of strict schedules and sleep advice that conflict with parenting instincts.
You may feel like you have no other choice except to sleep train to improve your family’s sleep, but sleep training isn’t the only option.
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Are there gentle alternatives to sleep training?
Holistic sleep coaching is an alternative to sleep training that is based on biologically normal sleep, responsive parenting, and gentle, family-centered methods.
Parents reach out to me for so many reasons. Maybe your baby won’t sleep – naps are short or a struggle, bedtime is stressful, your baby wakes frequently. You may want to change sleep set ups, move away from an unsustainable way of parenting to sleep, night wean your toddler, stop bedsharing or make sure you are bedsharing safely. I work with so many parents who are tired, overwhelmed, and looking for a path different from the mainstream sleep strategies.
As a Certified Holistic Sleep Coach, Internationally Board-Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC), and Certified Peaceful Parenting Educator, I’m here to tell you that you can responsively support normal infant and toddler sleep. You can listen to your intuition, respond to your child, and ignore the fear manipulation of sleep trainers.
Take a listen to this podcast episode, What is Gentle Sleep Support?
How do I know if holistic sleep support is right for me?
Holistic sleep coaching isn’t simply a gentle alternative to sleep training, it is a completely different sleep paradigm. If you can relate to any of these statements, holistic sleep coaching might be right for you:
You are struggling with sleep but sleep training feels wrong.
You don’t know how to help your baby sleep in a way that feels right.
You are overwhelmed and full of self-doubt with all the rules and conflicting sleep information out there.
Your heart says to respond, but you hesitate because of societal pressure.
Sleep has become unsustainable and something needs to shift.
You know you want to make a change, and you aren’t sure how to gently support your little one through the process.
You find yourself googling things like “how do I get my baby to sleep?” or “why is my toddler still waking at night?”
Naps are a struggle, and it feels like you just can’t figure them out.
You know you want to parent responsively, but you don’t know how to improve sleep without sleep training.
You want someone who recognizes that every family is unique and can individualize their approach to your family’s needs.
You want someone who knows that you are the expert on your child and will work with you to find the right path forward based on your family’s strengths and challenges.
How is holistic sleep coaching different from sleep training?
I am not a sleep trainer! Sleep training approaches sleep from a behavioral perspective, removing your responsive support to shape your child’s sleep.
Child sleep, however, doesn’t work within a simple behavioral framework, and relationship and connection are key to children feeling safe and secure enough to sleep well.
Sleep training focuses on goals that are not developmentally appropriate such as sleeping through the night and falling asleep independently. Sleep training strategies focus on removing responsiveness rather than using responsiveness to support better sleep.
Holistic sleep support views sleep from a developmental and attachment perspective. I support developmentally informed sleep norms and recommends strategies that support infant mental health and secure attachment.
This includes responsive nighttime parenting and the recognition that waking at night is both healthy and normal.
What about gentle sleep training?
Gentle sleep training is still sleep training. While gentle sleep trainers may not ask you to use strategies like controlled crying or cry it out, their strategies are still mostly behavioral and focus on removing support.
Many parents and babies experience gentle sleep training as stressful and full of crying, especially those with sensitive or strong-willed kids.
Saying something is gentle doesn’t make it so.
Think about your own definition of gentle, and what you feel is not gentle. Here are a few of my thoughts around what makes something not gentle.
Gentleness does not involve arbitrary rules about when and how you can respond to or comfort your little one.
Gentle recommendations will never ask you to ignore your baby, your instincts, or your intuition.
Gentle strategies do not try and control your child’s behavior through withholding your love and support.
Simply being physically present in the room does not make a strategy gentle.
While my sleep support is truly gentle, it isn’t sleep training or even gentle sleep training. I’ll help you find the balance between supporting your child’s normal sleep patterns and meeting your own needs.
We’ll improve your family’s sleep through gently optimizing your routines and environment.
If you need to make a more significant change, I can help you do that in the most gentle and responsive way.
How do you support sleep without sleep training?
Sleep is complex and influenced by many factors. I’ll help you find the balance between supporting your child’s normal sleep patterns and meeting your own needs. We’ll improve your family’s sleep through gently optimizing your routines and environment.
This includes supporting a healthy circadian rhythm, examining your daily patterns, and focusing on what happens when your little is awake among other factors.
If you need to make a more significant change, I can help you do that in the most gentle and responsive way.
Connection will always be at the heart of any suggestion or strategy.
Working with me will give you the knowledge and confidence to approach nighttime parenting in a sustainable way that feels right for your family.
There aren’t any one size fits all sleep plans. No rules you have to follow. No strict schedules. No ignoring your instincts or your baby. Just truly gentle and responsive guidance to help you improve sleep.
How to choose a sleep specialist
The first important fact about professional sleep help is that the field is not regulated. Anyone can call themselves a sleep coach or sleep consultant.
It’s important that you know who certified your sleep specialist, and make sure you feel comfortable with their depth of knowledge and approach. I encourage you to check out the 2 certifications I hold: The Holistic Sleep Coaching Program and Infant Sleep Educator Certification (now going by a different name, but same program).
The Holistic Sleep Coaching Program co-founder, Lyndsey Hookway, is a pediatric nurse, Lactation Consultant (IBCLC), and Holistic Sleep Coach.
The lead instructor of the Infant Sleep Educator program, Greer Kirshenbaum, has her PhD in neuroscience as well as being a doula and coach.
Both programs include guest lectures from a wide range of experts to both broaden and deepen the knowledge shared.
Both certifications have a central commitment to supporting normal sleep, responsive parenting, and family centered care.
Both programs are committed to evidence-based practice. They approach sleep from an attachment-based and developmentally informed perspective.
In addition to my sleep certifications, I bring the additional knowledge I have as an IBCLC and Peaceful Parenting Educator to my sleep support.
This knowledge and experience deepens my support and brings a wider range of lactation and responsive parenting tools to my work.
My Personal Approach to Holistic Sleep Coaching
I help tired parents combine developmental knowledge with their intuition to improve family sleep. My specialty is holistic, responsive sleep support for babies, toddlers, and nursing families.
All my sleep coaching is based in biological norms, supportive of the breastfeeding relationship, and individualized to the unique needs of your family.
Addressing sleep holistically means looking beneath the surface rather than simply focusing on sleep behaviors.
I recognize that sleep is complex and multifaceted and sleep solutions need to be comprehensive. I recognize and respect your child’s temperament, developmental phase, and their unique capabilities.
While sleep is a normal biological function, many factors influence how each member of a family sleeps.
My sleep support addresses the many underlying factors that shape sleep patterns such as sleep hygiene, sleep timings, activity, sensory needs, stress, mindset, and so much more.
What not to expect from working with a holistic sleep coach.
I cannot promise to get your baby sleeping through the night because waking is a normal part of sleep development in the early years. The truth is that no one sleeps through the night at any age. Sleeping through the night isn’t the only way to improve sleep, and I can help you decrease waking and improve sleep quality.
There are no quick fixes. Change takes time, and gradual change is often the gentlest.
I cannot promise a specific timeline or guarantee an outcome. Babies and toddlers are human, and they follow their own timelines. Humans are too complex for us to predict exactly how sleep support will unfold. I can promise you knowledge, support, and encouragement as we work towards your goals.
Why is lactation knowledge important when tackling sleep challenges?
Sleep and breastfeeding are interconnected. Knowledge of the nursing relationship is important for breastfeeding families struggling with sleep.
The sleep profession is full of sleep specialists that know absolutely nothing about normal lactation.
Most sleep training advice directly undermines the nursing relationship. It can be stressful and, in many cases, even risk your supply.
As a Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) and a mom who has breastfed 2 children into toddlerhood, I know both personally and professionally what nursing babies and toddlers are like.
I know age-appropriate expectations for night feeds. I know that nursing isn’t just about nutrition; it is a parenting tool wrapped up in comfort, calming, and connection.
I understand the interconnection between your feeding goals and your sleep goals and can help you find a path that supports both and is in alignment with your parenting values.
Feeding to sleep, bedsharing, nighttime nursing are all practices I support, and you do not have to give them up to improve sleep unless you want to do so.
Signs that your sleep consultant may not support breastfeeding even if they say they do:
Calling nursing to sleep a bad habit
Blaming wake ups on breastfeeding
Suggesting that you schedule feeds
Suggesting routines like eat play sleep
Requiring night weaning
Suggesting that older babies do not need night feeds
Remember…
The world of sleep specialists, sleep consultants, and sleep coaches can be challenging to navigate for parents. There’s so much conflicting information and different approaches. I think the most important things to remember are these:
You are the expert on your baby and your family.
There isn’t one right way to do anything in parenting.
If it feels wrong, then it is wrong for your family.
If it isn’t a kind way to treat another adult, then it isn’t a kind way to treat your child.
Choose strategies in line with your parenting values.
Listen to your heart and your intuition. It hardly ever is wrong.
If Holistic Sleep Support sounds like exactly what you’ve been searching for, then let’s connect! We can see if it’s a good fit in a family sleep intro call. You can schedule your call using the button below.