Why busy parents are going to sleep coaches for their infants

Noida: Whoever coined the term – ‘sleep like a baby' – must not have had one. Ask any new parent. Babies don't sleep soundly for long.An average adult's sleep cycle is 90-120 minutes. For babies, this is around 40 minutes. Infants also don't have the ability to connect cycles as adults do – so a night's sleep for an adult is 4-6 cycles – and stay asleep for a longer duration. It's why they wake up frequently, leaving parents exhausted.But new-age parents, especially in cities where both are working, have had enough of sleepless nights. They are constantly looking for solutions, turning to books, podcasts, videos, and more recently, paediatric ‘sleep consultants'.It's a thriving market in Delhi-NCR – which is an aggregate of five cities and supports a huge middle-class working population – driven both by young parents' need to rest and greater awareness about the connection between quality of sleep and a child's growth and immunity. "Just like nutrition exploded a few years ago and everyone was talking about ‘what to eat', the focus is now on sleep," said Himani Dalmia. A paediatric sleep consultant is essentially a certified sleep coach who may or may not be a doctor. Dalmia, who studied humanities in the UK, is one such.Heena Rastogi, a researcher, said she hasn't slept properly for a year. She also lost weight and developed hormonal imbalances, all because her one-year-old daughter is a "light sleeper". "Even the slightest of noise would wake my daughter up. Our entire family's day is planned around making her sleep," Rastogi said.After struggling for a year, Rastogi started consulting with a child sleep coach, who gave her a schedule to get the toddler to burn off enough energy during the day and sleep longer at night. "It is like a mathematical calculation. It's a 3+3+4 formula that we have to follow. From the time that my daughter wakes up in the morning, her first nap should be after three hours. The second nap after another three hours, and the night-time sleep should be after a gap of four hours," Rastogi explained.While this may work for Rastogi, it's not a one-size-fits-all pattern.Dalmia said several factors go into deciding this formula, from the child's age to eating habits and activity levels. "People are realising that the way older generations used to do things – like letting the baby get tired and go to sleep – may not work anymore. Parents are looking for a more structured, well-informed method," she said.Sleep consultants in NCR charge anywhere from Rs 4,000 for an hour-long session to Rs 30,000 for continuous guidance over three months. Dalmia said four years ago, she got enquiries from 15 parents a month, a number that has now quadrupled to 60. Dalmia and a colleague Neha Bhatt also run a Facebook support group, Gentle Baby Sleep India, which offers help and advice to new parents.Amrita Saraf, an MBA who holds a certification in baby sleep and maternal nutrition, said, "Parents today are looking for sleep solutions, not just for their baby but so that they can also get appropriate rest. I help them with age-appropriate solutions," Saraf said. Decades-old methods to let babies sleep on their own are largely limited to variations of ‘Ferberisation ‘and cry-it-out (CIO). These involve leaving a toddler in a dark, cool and noise-free room, and checking in regularly, with the gap being increased gradually to let the child learn how to sleep on its own.But many believe these methods are outdated and harsh. Working mothers said they don't have that long a time to sleep-train their babies. Prajakta Dharwadkar told TOI she tried sleep training for her toddler but gave up on the third day. "I was leaving the room, as the method says, to let the baby stop crying on its own. But all she would do is cry and cry. And it kept increasing. I could not bear it and gave up on the idea," she said.Dharwadkar eventually opted for ‘co-sleeping' – a relatively less popular method that involves the parents sleeping in the same room as the baby. Shreyasi Mukerji said she spent six sleepless months after the birth of her daughter and tried to train her a few days before she had to re-join work. "I could not do it for more than two days. That's when I started looking for help and came across sleep consultants," Mukerji said.If not consultancy, there are tools and devices like automatic cradles, swaddles, sleeping bags and white noise machines.Cradlewise, an AI-powered crib, detects a baby's motion and rocks it back to sleep. Priced at Rs 2 lakh, the crib manufactured by a Bengaluru-based firm came into the spotlight after it was recommended by Open AI CEO Sam Altman. Radhika Patil, co-founder of Cradlewise, said the idea to have a crib that automatically detects a child's movements and starts rocking came from her own experience. Patil and her husband, both techies, had many sleepless nights when their first child was born a decade ago. They didn't want a repeat before the second one came along, so they made a prototype with a swing at home, and it gave way to Cradlewise. But this crib was, until recently, only sold in the US. It was launched in India a few months ago.Then, there are also apps to guide parents. One of the popular ones is ‘Smart Sleep Coach' by Pampers, the baby products brand. For an annual subscription of Rs 11,000, it offers customised sleep schedules made by ‘coaches' assigned to the user. Owing to the value that Indian parents are now associating with their baby's sleep, India also has a booming children's mattress market. Sawagata Shankhe, a Mumbai-based businesswoman who deals in baby sleep products, said parents come looking for beddings, mattresses and other specialised sleep products. "People are buying whatever they can afford to make their baby sleep longer, whether it's a swing or a sleeping bag," Shankhe said.