Sleep training and travelling full time, can they go hand in hand?

Don’t get me wrong our first year as parents had many ups and downs, perhaps the hardest of all was sleep training. I read MANY articles and took much advice before, very naively I now know, entering into the training. I was led hook, line and sinker into the fact that sleep training takes on average 5 nights. WHAT A LOAD OF RUBBISH. 

I have since learnt to not read as much, to trust your maternal / paternal instinct and to do what is best for your child, who you and only you know best. Low and behold, after 5 nights I realised sleep training Mila was going to take a lot longer and I was going to have to adapt the ‘rules’ that are written all over the internet. 

One thing I do agree with however, is how freeing and life changing it is when your child masters self-soothing and is ‘sleep-trained’. We did this when Mila was 9 months old and It took us 3 weeks +, with our worst night resulting in an on/off 2 hour scream / cry session (sorry neighbours!!) so I feel you mamas and dads, out there.

Why We Started When We Did

We had not long returned from traveling for 3 months in Europe where I was previously rocking her to sleep or sitting with her in the bedroom while she drifted off holding my hand from inside the cot. I personally felt it was time to sleep train her now. I wanted her to feel comfortable to fall asleep on her own and confident too. River and I discussed it and decided to go for it cold turkey one night and to support each other for the duration of the training because it can feel relentless and like you aren’t getting anywhere in the beginning.

We turned down invites out to persevere and maintain consistency. At the time we had a base in Dubai and we decided to train her there while we were in one spot for a month or so. If like us you travel full time or regularly, perhaps you too have a base or are able to stay with friends / family when you aren’t traveling. I would advise to try plan when you have a month in your schedule where you can have some down time and be ‘home/in one place’ when sleep training. It would just make it less confusing for baba and you don’t have to think about traveling every day or moving around a lot when you know you’ll be in one place for a few weeks. If you don’t have this luxury, my advice would be to just develop a strong bed time routine and be consistent every night no matter where you are.

Our bed time routine is and has always been since she was very young, The 4 B’s.

• Bath

• Book

• Bottle

• Bed

(Since turning 20 months she no longer has a bottle so now its The 3 B’s)

If you havent heard it before take it from us, babies are very adaptable. As long as they have love around them and comfort that you’re near they are happy, ultimately. As much as we travel we always aim to carry out Mila’s bed time routine for lots of reasons

• Begins to get her ready for bed

• She knows what’s coming

• Calms her

• Ends in a good nights sleep (most of the time)

When Mila turned 1 we left our base in Dubai to travel full time with no fixed base. This has meant that for most of her 2nd year she has sleep in a different bed weekly and with the same bed time routine and the sleep training that we did at 9 months old she is happy to self soothe no matter the location.

Have you sleep trained? How did it go for you? Did you opt not to? I’d love to hear from you and learn from our community of traveling parents out there, please leave a comment in the box below :)