From Sleepless Nights to Sleep Consultant: Dani's experience with her two kids sleep struggles & how it led her into a new career

Oct 12, 2024

5 min read

We also had the joys of toddler sleep challenges

I've had my own struggles with sleep since my teenage years. I've struggled with the constant jetlag of shift work, and long story short, night duty really knocked me about. My biggest fear of motherhood was the lack of sleep I knew I'd be in for.

The kids sleep (and lack thereof)

My girl, baby #1

Unfortunately, my first born didn't sleep. The NICU nurses were absolutely confident there was NOTHING wrong with those fiesty little lungs of hers (that is, once she decided to start using them)! She was (and still is) a strong willed little firecracker, and she let us know when she wasn't happy. I read the entire internet trying to figure out how to fix her sleep - I was desperately sleep deprived; so was her Dad. We tried everything. I knew she was overtired; at one point I'd lay next to her during naps doing anything to resettle her to get her to sleep a full nap. In hindsight, I 100% should have contacted a sleep consultant - it would've made it clearer, much sooner, that we needed to investigate her allergies further. In the end, we tried various techniques to help support her learning to sleep (which is commonly needed when newborns are focussed on their sore little tummies instead of learning 'how to sleep' while they're young).

I love a gentle approach in helping babies/children sleep, but I equally understand the desperation parents feel when the sleep deprivation has hit a level of torture (and when a childs temperament, like my daughters, simply fights against the gentler options). Getting her to sleep changed our lives. I could function, my relationship improved significantly, and my little girl was a much happier little munchkin all round, once she was finally sleeping!

My boy, baby #2

He was the complete opposite to my first. From our first night in hospital, he slept. Midwives, family members, old ladies in the street, all comment on how 'chill' he is. He'd yawn, so I'd put him down in his bassinet and he'd fall asleep - no matter what was going on around us. Sometimes I'd look over and see his eyes hanging out of his head, so overtired, but it was no issue - he just slept. However, we hit the 4 month regression at the same time as many very significant stresses happened in our lives, and on top of that, his allergies turned out to be even more extensive than my daughters. One thing led to another, and for MONTHS on end he (and therefore I) was waking 1-2hourly overnight. Once we got on top of his allergies, we reached out to a sleep consultant for help - despite being in the middle of my sleep consultant studies, my sleep deprived brain absolutely could not do it by myself. We had 2 weeks working together, so were able to start gentle & adjust our approach based on his response; we broke the feed to sleep association, got him linking his sleep cycles instead of waking 1-2hourly, we got his naps back on track, and got him eating more of sleep supportive foods (albeit also with the help of snipping his tongue tie).

I can not put into words how much this helped our family. I became a whole new person once I got some sleep back, which also meant I could get back to getting my study done, and my life back!

We also had the joys of toddler sleep challenges

At the same time, I volunteered myself and my daughter as clients for a fellow sleep consultant student. With all the stresses in our family, I was worried about her bedtime struggles & overnight wakes; I wanted to make sure I was doing the right thing for her & her emotional wellbeing. We had SUCH a good experience. I loved how positive the recommendations were. It took into account some medical problems we were going through at the time, had us utilising daylight to support her circadian rhythm, making sure we were really spending quality time with her, used a play based approach, and lots of positive reenforcement.

We also altered her sleep 'schedule' slightly, and the sleep consultant gave me lots of little tips & tricks that all came together to make naps & bedtimes something to look forward to rather than a dreaded power struggle.

I think supporting toddlers sleep is going to become my favourite age group to work with!

My passion to support & educate mothers.

These times were a struggle to say the least. My biggest support through my firsts newborn challenges was my daughter's osteo Simm. To be honest, I was a little unsure about taking my child to an osteo, as I'd always worked with physios, and was a very 'medical' minded person. It wasn't just Simm's 'osteo' work (although it did have INCREDIBLE results for my daughters feeding & saved our breastfeeding journey); but what got me through was the emotional support, when I'd rock up to appointments half asleep, covered in vomit, with a crying baby, (probably crying myself too half the time, but honestly it's all a blur now), but her kind voice, her knowledge on all the 'little' things that were simply too overwhelming to navigate.

That was what really got me through & has motivated me towards a new career path which includes being a support for other Mums.

It was also the education Simm gave to me, to help me understand the nitty gritty of what was happening. I remember bringing my daughter in, thinking she wasn't feeding/latching properly, as she was fussing & I now had mastitis. Simm moved appointments to fit me in that day, checked over Mia (who was fine), and she had the ultrasound machine ready to treat my mastitis (again, being very 'medical' I hadn't heard of this treatment, but it is undeniable how much it helped). She taught me so much about mastitis that day; new research had flipped the recommendations for treating mastitis - Simm was telling me the opposite of what my maternal child health nurse had told me only a few months prior (later on, my MCHN also confirmed the new evidence/treatment advice). With Simm's kindness, she welcomed me to ask further questions, and she happily sent a copy of the new study to me via email that day!! (I swear her education that day saved me from needing antibiotics when I got mastitis at 6 weeks pregnant with Blake over the Easter long weekend and nowhere was open for ultrasound therapy).

THIS is what I want to give back to Mums. The support, the education, and empowering families with knowledge. And most importantly, SLEEP!! Kids are hard. The healthcare system is hard, even for the best of us.