This post is in partnership with Coterie but all of the opinions within are those of The Everymom editorial board.
There’s really nothing that can prepare you for the first few months of sleepless nights with a newborn. My mom friend and I recently joked that we both severely underestimated how much sleep we could survive off of before kids. Surely, if we managed college all-nighters and late nights out on the town in our early 20s, we could totally hack staying up with a baby. Oh, how epically wrong we were.
Everyone warned me during my first pregnancy, “Rest now before you never sleep again!” I rolled my eyes at those comments every time. While they weren’t entirely untrue, they didn’t actually provide any insight or advice on how to cope with sleep deprivation. I needed support more than anything when my first kid avoided sleep like it was the plague. I can’t count how many times I deliriously Googled “best baby sleep hack” during a 2 a.m. feeding. If you’re reading this because you’re doing the same, then please take comfort in knowing you’re not alone. And this stage won’t last forever, even though it really feels like it.
Now that we’re on baby number two, I can attest that babies do, in fact, learn how to sleep. However, every child is different, and the how can vary from kid to kid. But one thing they all have in common is their need for comfort and routine. These are the two things I focused on this time around, and it’s made a drastic difference in our 13-week-old daughter’s sleep. She sleeps up to seven-hour stretches and 12 hours total each night—I know, crazy. The unexpected hero for achieving a dreamy, full night’s sleep? The cloud-like, extremely absorbent diapers from Coterie. Here’s why I think changing diapers made my daughter sleep longer stretches (and stick to the end for our in-depth nighttime routine).
The magic behind our blissful nights
Newborns crave closeness, comfort, and warmth, just like the womb. Imagine leaving a cozy cocoon where your every need is met around the clock to enter a cold world with new, uncomfortable sensations. Reframing my baby’s needs like this helped me understand why newborns sleep best snuggled next to us. While I can empathize, a mother also needs her rest—and sanity—in order to successfully tackle the next day. I did hours of research and found that Coterie diapers offer superior softness and comfort, as well as enhanced absorbency (up to 70 percent more absorbent, actually). It only took a few newborn blowouts to convince me to make the switch when she was 2 weeks old. The contrast in diaper quality is mind-blowing.
Perhaps this is the best way to describe how Coterie diapers compare to my previous experience: I passed down tons of my son’s clothes to my sister. During the process, I threw out a solid 20 percent of onesies from his first year because of those infamous faint yellow-brown stains. That’s a lot of blowouts. My daughter has not had a single code brown since I switched to Coterie. Not one. They manage to be this absorbent while still using clean ingredients and TCF (Totally Chlorine Free) pulp, which means that the plant-based pulp in their diapers isn’t bleached with chlorine. It’s something that gives me double peace of mind knowing how long she wears them at night. Plus, Coterie is offering 10 percent off your first order of $40+ when you use code EVERYMOM at checkout!
Additionally, their diapers are so soft. I mean really, really soft. I genuinely think they feel good to her. With such great absorbency, I am able to pop into the nursery for a nighttime feed without having to truly wake her up with a jarring diaper change. This was a huge issue with my son, and I am absolutely thrilled with this major upgrade. I also personally really love the subscription service—it’s one less thing to worry about as a slightly overwhelmed working mom of two.
You know that scenario when you reach for a diaper only to find one left, so you’re running to the nearest store to grab a small pack to tide you over? But the store just happens to be a pharmacy, and the diapers are astronomically more expensive. Well, that hasn’t happened to us one time with our Coterie subscription. I can guarantee I’ve saved money by not panic-buying diapers at expensive convenience stores when we’re out. I keep a nice stock of diapers and can customize the timing of deliveries, the size of diapers, and what I have delivered (i.e., if I want to add wipes or an extra diaper pack for daycare).
Our tried-and-true nighttime routine
Our sweet princess turns into a pumpkin during witching hour—poor thing (and poor us). While using Coterie diapers is our ultimate baby sleep hack, a consistent routine also makes a big impact. Our nighttime routine goes like this:
- 5:00 p.m. give a relaxing bath
- 5:15 p.m. move into nursery for a massage, diaper change, and jammies
- 5:20 p.m. turn on sound machine with dim light and start feeding
- 5:45 p.m. rock and snuggle
- 6:00 p.m. lay her down in crib drowsy and turn dim light off
Her older brother has independent screen time during her bedtime, so I usually make dinner for him before we start, and he pops in and out to either “help” with bath time or sit with us during her feeding. With so much fussing in the evening, I cannot stress enough how comforting it is to know that I can lay her down extra early. Her early bedtime offsets some of her overstimulation and over-tiredness from a chaotic day at daycare. Following a consistent routine every night also helps signal to her body that it’s time to fall asleep and stay asleep.
We have our night shift down to an art at this point, and I love it. Her first stretch is about seven hours, so she wakes up around 1 a.m., and this is how it goes:
- Make her bottle
- Quietly enter her room
- Turn dimmest light setting on her sound machine
- Gently scoop her up and feed her
- Burp and rock for about 1 to 2 minutes
- Lay her back down drowsy
She will then sleep another 5 to 6 hours. A total dream. The key is to avoid fully waking her up, which is largely in part to skipping the diaper change. Changing my son during wakings would jar him and make it so much harder to fall back asleep. We totally eliminated that issue, and it’s been a huge success. She’s cozy, blissful, and dry all night. Because of Coterie’s superior absorbency, she never has any leaks overnight and wakes up absolutely refreshed, feeling like a new gal (and so does mom 😉).
This post is in partnership with Coterie, but all of the opinions within are those of The Everymom editorial board. We only recommend products we genuinely love.
