My 10 week old daughter has been sleeping really restlessly for the last few nights. She seems to hate being swaddled.  Her arms flail around and she lifts her legs. I’ve tried winding her a few times but she didn’t seem to have wind.  I’ve basically got to hold her down so she doesn’t wake herself up.  She makes noises, grunting and groaning.  I’m exhausted now after nights of this. How do I get her to sleep peacefully?

I’m afraid you cant stop your daughter grunting and groaning!

When babies sleep they go through cycles. There are 2 sleep states that we all experience when we are asleep. The first is light sleep (also know as REM sleep) and the other is deep sleep (Non-REM sleep). When babies are in a light sleep they can trash about, talk, etc. When they are in Non-REM sleep they are quite. REM sleep is where babies make sense of their world. Babies regularly wake up for a few moments when they are changing from one sleep state to the next. The real baby sleep problems when the child is unable to get back to sleep by themselves and need help. A baby spends about 50% of their time asleep in a REM state. This usually occurs between 11pm and 5am, this is why many parents are up during these hours at night.

If you try to quiten your child while she is in an REM sleep you may end up wakening her up, which will then lead to her being confused and often needing help to get back to sleep. This leads to a negative sleep association which is the root of most sleep problems in babies. If she wakes herself up there is a much better chance of her falling back to sleep by herself. You need to be very careful how you handle this, as what you do now may effect how your child sleeps in the future. There is nothing wrong with what she is doing, if your child was in pain or uncomfortable she would cry. When your baby is making grunting and groaning noises in REM sleep she is simply dreaming.