The post-vacation sleep struggle: It’s like the hangover no one warns you about when you become a parent. Traveling messes with everyone’s sleep, but toddler sleep and travel? Takes it to a whole new level.
But maybe there’s something more we can do to conquer it! I’m here to share my review of the Smart Sleep Coach App by Pampers, a baby sleep app which helped me get my toddler sleep back on track.
Just when you think you’ve cracked the sleep code with your little one, every trip throws a wrench in things. You come back from your vacation to a cranky toddler and sleepless nights, leaving you to think “what vacation?” mere days after your return.
We’re all about relaxing the rules and toddler sleep routine when traveling as a family. But we’re just as adamant that it’s critical to reestablish those bedtime routines with your child on your return.
Have you ever thought about using a sleep support app to do so? The Smart Sleep Coach by Pampers App was just the reset button I’d been searching for.
This post was sponsored by the smart sleep coach by pampers app. But rest assured, I only recommend products I’d use myself.
What is Smart Sleep Coach?
The Smart Sleep Coach app was launched by Pampers to give you a “sleep coach in your pocket.” It’s an easy to use app that curates a sleep schedule for your baby or toddler, backed by science, and designed by pediatric sleep consultants and pediatricians.
You start with a 3-minute quiz about your baby’s age, sleep habits, and the sleep issue you’re trying to fix, and you get a calendar that tells you exactly what schedule to follow for naps and bedtime. No second guessing, and no more needing to remember to count the minutes between naps (we’ve all done it.)
Instead, a nice alert pops up on your phone based on the calendar to tell you when to start looking for sleep cues.
The app also contains other helpful tips that are perfect for new moms, giving you a helpful and expert-backed checklist of things that can help you get your much needed rest. Blackout curtains, a sound machine, a separate sleep space–these are all things that get your toddlers sleeping, and all things the Smart Sleep Coach flags.
My Honest Review: Using The Smart Sleep Coach App to Reset Toddler Sleep After Travel
Many new parents are quick to download apps that help track sleep cycles and feeding times at home. But you drop the schedule the minute you enter your hotel room. And once you’ve got your daily routines going, you tend to stop using the apps to reinforce them.
If you’ve got wanderlust and kids, those same apps can be a lifesaver when you return from an adventure.
Traveling with my toddler, for example, always resulted in early wakings, even if we stayed within the same time zone. Without fail, we would get our sleep under control before our trip, and then jet off on an adventure, only to return to a 5am wake time. It felt like we could never, ever catch up on sleep during the entire year from 12 to 24 months because we were traveling a lot.
I was exhausted. But we didn’t want to stop traveling. And we didn’t want to stop enjoying sunsets and the odd evening out while on the road, either, so we were quick to bend our sleep routines.
And let me emphasize, here — I wouldn’t change that for anything. When we encourage other families to travel with toddlers, we always recommend that you leave the rules you have at home for baby sleep, relax on the road, and try to enjoy the break.
Our problem was, when we returned from a trip, we had to re-motivate ourselves each time to enforce a sleep schedule. And that sleep scheduling keeps changing during the toddler year, so we didn’t even know which sleep routine we ought to be enforcing. Sigh.
It turns out, we were putting our toddler to bed way too late after trips!
When I put our toddler’s data into the Smart Sleep Coach App, and emphasized that early morning wakeups were our problem, the app suggested a bedtime of nearly an hour earlier! And even more surprising, Smart Sleep Coach encouraged much earlier naps, to prepare our toddler for an earlier bedtime.
With our older daughter, early naps had often been the key to vacation fatigue. But we’d completely forgotten that strategy with our toddler son. When the Smart Sleep Coach App reminded us, and told us exactly what time that nap should start, it took away all the stress of wondering what to do.
Other parents face different problems, of course. For some, travel brings on frequent night wakings. Or, if toddler travel beds or travel sleep cribs don’t work for you, maybe you indulge in co-sleeping with your toddler in your hotel bed. Whatever sleep habit might get you through those nights away from home, the Smart Sleep Coach is an easy way to get back in the game.
My one issue? Your baby needs to be under age 2 to start using the app. I would love to see Pampers find a way to help me tackle post-travel sleep for my big toddlers too.
For now, if your toddler is under two, Smart Sleep Coach can get you back on track.
If you haven’t already done so, head over to the app store and start your 7-day free trial of the Smart Sleep Coach by Pampers now. Then keep it in your back pocket as encouragement to book that next plane flight, knowing you have a tool to recover on the back end.
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