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Home › Articles › Feeding Baby › On a Schedule

On a Schedule

Does Baby Need Structure or Freedom?

By Shannon McKelden

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One decision to be made when bringing home a new baby is whether to put Baby on a schedule or keep him free from any sort of structure, letting him go with the flow. Does a schedule help or hurt? We asked two moms how they dealt with this subject and then asked an expert to weigh in.

Yes!
"I'm all for keeping babies on a schedule," says Shannon Rosenberg of Wesley Hills, N.Y. "I firmly believe that a happy baby is a baby on a schedule. I should know; I have twins. Both are very well behaved, and I truly believe keeping them to a routine has played a key role in that."

Sticking to a schedule was tricky, Rosenberg admits. "Feedings and sleep time all took place at the same time every day," she says. "If I had to run an errand during the day, it was planned around their feeding schedule and naptime. By the time my girls were 4 months old, not only were they eating cereal, they were also sleeping through the night."

Rosenberg would give them a bottle of formula right before she went to bed, and if they woke up during the night, they were only given water. "And within a matter of weeks they were sleeping straight through the night because I kept to that schedule," she says. "Now that feeding and sleeping was on a schedule, it was easier to find time to either straighten up the house or take on freelance jobs from time to time because I was getting the rest I needed at night instead of using the kids' nap time to catch up on my rest."

Sleep wasn't the only scheduling benefit for Rosenberg. "I firmly believe that all new mothers should get in a groove and create a routine that best works with her lifestyle," she says. "Not only to have a happier baby, but a calm, quiet atmosphere at home will also help to achieve a happier and stronger marriage."


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