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Hi! We'd Love to Connect.

It’s our mission to help parents find sleep solutions through responsive parenting practices while building connected relationships. We’re passionate about helping families improve sleep without resorting to sleep training.

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Thoughts on how we set mothers up for feeling like Thoughts on how we set mothers up for feeling like a failure ... 

Thoughts? 👇
This is the conversation I most want to change, an This is the conversation I most want to change, and it has nothing to do with whether anyone should bedshare.

A mother who has been told never to bring her baby into bed still has to feed at 3am. So she does it sitting up. On the sofa, or in an armchair, because she's being careful.

And then she falls asleep, because she's been awake for nine months.

Sofas and armchairs carry a substantially higher risk than a prepared adult bed. The baby can wedge between cushions, or slip face-down into the gap at the back, or fall. UNICEF UK's position is explicit: if there's any chance you might fall asleep, a prepared bed is far safer than a sofa or chair.

Which means the advice to never bedshare, given without anything else, has been producing exactly the outcome it was meant to prevent.

The honest version is this. You may fall asleep feeding at some point, whatever you intend. So set your bed up safely in advance, even if you never plan to use it. That is a precaution, not a plan.

Comment SAFELY and I'll send you how to set your space up.

safe sleep • bedsharing • co-sleeping • sofa sleeping • night feeding • newborn safety

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Some thoughts after 8 years on Instagram... Some thoughts after 8 years on Instagram...
Follow @islagracesleep “How do I put my baby dow Follow @islagracesleep 

“How do I put my baby down without waking them?” has probably been typed into Google by millions of exhausted parents with one arm trapped underneath a sleeping baby.

And so many of the answers immediately turn it into a behaviour problem.

You fed her to sleep.
You held her too long.
She has a sleep association.
You need to teach her to sleep in the crib.

But think about what actually happens during a transfer.

One second your baby is against a warm, breathing, moving human being she can smell and feel.

A few seconds later, she’s lying on a cool, still mattress.

Of course some babies notice.

There are physical pieces too. Young babies have a Moro reflex, and changing their position too abruptly can trigger that sudden arms-out startle. The temperature and sensory environment change. And then the person they were touching moves away.

So instead of treating the transfer like a bad habit you need to break, try making the transition less abrupt.

Lower her bottom and legs first and her head last. Keep her close to your body as long as possible. Once she’s down, stay bent over her for a moment with a steady hand on her chest instead of immediately standing up and walking away.

And remember that your baby recognizes you through sensory cues: your touch, smell, voice and face. Closeness is incredibly familiar to her.

None of this guarantees a successful crib transfer.

That’s important.

Because sometimes you can do every “trick” perfectly and your baby still opens her eyes the second you move.

That doesn’t mean you did the transfer wrong.

And it certainly doesn’t mean you created a bad habit.

Sometimes your baby simply noticed that the warm person she was sleeping against isn’t there anymore.

You can make that transition gentler.

You can’t make your baby stop noticing you.

And I’m not sure we should want to. 💙

Send this to the mom who has attempted the crib transfer four times tonight.

Comment FAMILYBED if you want more on gently transitioning from contact sleep or bedsharing toward the crib.
Follow @islagracesleep for all things normal infan Follow @islagracesleep for all things normal infant sleep ❤️
I want to be careful with this one, because it gets misheard in both directions.

I’m not making a harm claim.

My objection is simpler:

What are we actually measuring when we say sleep training “worked”?

Babies wake. They’re supposed to wake. That’s part of normal infant sleep.

But much of the research used to demonstrate sleep-training success relies on parent report. And a parent can only report the wakings they know happened.

That creates a problem.

A baby who wakes and is settled is quiet.

A baby who wakes, calls, gets no response and eventually stops calling is also quiet.

From the next room, both babies look the same.

So when a parent reports, “My baby stopped waking at night,” we have to be careful about what that actually tells us.

Did the baby stop waking?

Or did the baby stop waking the parent?

Those are not the same outcome.

And this isn’t just about cry it out. The same question applies whenever success is measured by whether a baby stops signalling for a parent overnight.

This matters because waking isn’t inherently a sleep problem.

Babies wake because they move through sleep cycles. They may also wake because they’re hungry, uncomfortable, cold, wet, in pain, or because something physical is disrupting their sleep.

I don’t want our only question to be:

“How do we make the waking stop?”

Sometimes the better question is:

“Why is this baby waking in the first place?”

And if you sleep trained, I’m not telling you that you harmed your child.

And if your goal was for you to sleep through, sleep training may have worked (at least temporarily until they are sick and you feel like you should respond). 

I’m asking us to be much more precise about what the evidence can actually show.

Because a quieter night for the parent does not necessarily mean the baby stopped waking.

Sometimes the baby is still waking.

They just aren’t waking you.

Comment GUIDE and I’ll send you my free guide to getting a five-hour stretch without sleep training. 💙

Thoughts? Share 👇

sleep training • baby sleep • cry it out • self soothing • night waking • infant sl
Follow @islagracesleep We spend a lot of time th Follow @islagracesleep 

We spend a lot of time thinking about what a caregiver will do with our child.

Will she respond when they cry?
Will she follow our routines?
How will she handle naps?
What will she do during a meltdown?

But there is another piece I don't think we talk about enough:

What state is the adult in while she's doing all of those things?

A dysregulated adult has a much harder time lending regulation to a dysregulated child.

And caregiving can be incredibly regulating work.

A baby who has cried for forty minutes. A toddler who has said no to everything since breakfast. A nap that will not happen. Two children needing you at exactly the same time.

Knowing what to do matters.

But so does understanding what is happening inside you while you're trying to do it.

That's why an entire part of the Attachment-Based Care Certification is about the caregiver herself, not just the child.

Because responsive care isn't simply a list of things you do.

The person doing the caring matters too.

Comment CARECOURSE and I'll send you more information about the Attachment-Based Care Certification.
Follow @islagracesleep If someone new is going t Follow @islagracesleep 

If someone new is going to care for your baby, her first job isn't to get your baby to like her.

It's to let your baby see that you do.

We tend to do the opposite.

A new nanny or caregiver arrives and immediately everyone turns toward the baby.

Say hi!

Look who's here!

Do you want her to hold you?

We try to speed up the relationship.

But attachment doesn't need to be rushed.

One of the things I teach in the Attachment-Based Care Certification is matchmaking: helping a child form a new relationship through a relationship they already trust.

So when a new caregiver arrives, I want her to connect with you first.

Talk to you.

Sit with you.

Let your baby watch you smile at her, welcome her and feel comfortable with her.

Then give your baby room to become interested in her.

She doesn't need to reach for him immediately.

She doesn't need to win him over.

And she doesn't need to prove on day one that he will happily go to her.

You are the bridge between them.

This is also why, whenever possible, I love having some overlap before a parent returns to work rather than making the first real day together the same day Mom disappears for eight hours.

There is so much we can do to make the beginning of a new caregiving relationship gentler.

And this is exactly the kind of thing I wanted caregivers to actually be taught.

The Attachment-Based Care Certification is for nannies and in-home caregivers, daycare and nursery educators, and family members such as grandparents or aunts who regularly care for a child.

It's not about teaching someone to replace you.

It's about helping another person build a relationship with your child through the security that's already there.

Comment CARECOURSE and I'll send you the information about the training.

Send this to a mama who needs it ❤️
Follow @islagracesleep You’ve heard me talk abou Follow @islagracesleep 

You’ve heard me talk about attachment, responsive care and baby-led sleep for years.

But I realized there was an entire person in this conversation we weren’t preparing:

The person caring for your child when you aren’t there.

So I created the Attachment-Based Care Certification.

It’s a 22-module, approximately 10-hour, self-paced online training about the part of caregiving that traditional childcare education often misses: the relationship a child is building with the person caring for them. 

And I want to be really clear about who this is for, because it is not only for nannies.

It’s for nannies and in-home caregivers who want deeper education in attachment-based, responsive care.

It’s for daycare and nursery educators, with an additional group-care guide covering the realities of ratios, multiple children, different staff, shift changes and group naps. 

And it can be for Grandma, an aunt or another family member who regularly cares for your child. For family caregivers, I recommend beginning with the parent book included with the certification and letting that open the conversation.

Inside, we cover attachment, co-regulation, temperament and sensory needs, emotion and tears, limits and counterwill, the caregiver’s own regulation, transitions into care, routines, infant sleep and naps, feeding, touch and carrying, and how to work respectfully inside another family. 

And if you’re a parent purchasing it for your caregiver, you are part of the process too.

The certification includes The Person You Are Handing Him To, a 39-page parent book that follows the same six parts as the caregiver’s training, plus a 19-page Week One Conversation designed for you to complete together. 

This isn’t a general nanny qualification or a replacement for first aid, CPR, background checks or any licensing required where you live.

It’s the layer on top.

The part about who this person becomes to your child. 

The Attachment-Based Care Certification is now open.

Comment CARECOURSE and I’ll send you all the information.

Send this to a mama who is heading back to work and wants to do the transition in a way that honours att
Follow @islagracesleep Feeding releases cholecys Follow @islagracesleep 

Feeding releases cholecystokinin, which makes both of you sleepy. It also triggers prolactin and oxytocin, which settle and bond.

Sleepy baby. Sleepy mother. Both calmer. That isn't a habit anybody accidentally created. It's the mechanism, and it has been for as long as there have been babies.

A newborn falling asleep at the breast isn't forming a bad pattern. She's being regulated. Heart rate, digestion, temperature, safety.

So when someone tells you there's something wrong with that, what you're hearing isn't sleep science. It's a cultural discomfort with dependence, aimed at the one stage of life where dependence is the entire plan.

And here's the practical part most people miss. If your baby already does one longer stretch, she's surfacing and resettling without feeding. She isn't missing a skill. She has it.

Comment GUIDE for the free guide on getting a 5 hour stretch of sleep without sleep training ❤️

feeding to sleep • nursing to sleep • bad habits • normal infant sleep • breastfeeding • baby sleep
Follow @islagracesleep Your chest warms when she Follow @islagracesleep 

Your chest warms when she's cold and cools when she's warm. That's thermal synchrony, and it's a measurable physiological exchange rather than a nice feeling.

Your heartbeat gives her a rhythm her nervous system has known since before she was born. Your breathing regulates hers. And the pressure of being held is proprioceptive input, which is the same mechanism a swaddle or weighted product is sold to replicate.

Four things. All free. All happening while somebody tells you that you've created a problem.

This is also the principle behind skin to skin in a NICU. We call it life-saving in a hospital and a bad habit in a living room.

Nothing is being spoiled. Something is being regulated.

Comment CONTACTNAP for the free guide on understanding contact napping + how to make changes when it is no longer working ❤️

contact naps • baby only sleeps on me • thermal synchrony • normal infant sleep • responsive parenting
Follow @islagracesleep Two things happen in that Follow @islagracesleep 

Two things happen in that half second, and neither is a habit.

The Moro reflex is a startle response every newborn has. The sensation of falling backwards sets it off, arms fly out, and she wakes herself. It fades around four to six months and nothing you do speeds it up.

And your chest is roughly 36 degrees. A cot mattress is room temperature. Going from one to the other is a significant thermal event for a body that can't regulate its own temperature yet.

What actually helps: lower her feet first and head last so she doesn't feel the falling sensation. Stay bent over her with a hand on her chest for a slow count of ten before you straighten up. And warm the mattress with your hand or a warm water bottle you remove before she goes down.

None of that is a trick. It just removes two real physical events from the transfer.

Comment CRIB for my free guide on the family bed to crib transition + more information on the crib transfer ❤️

newborn sleep • Moro reflex • baby wakes when put down • contact naps • normal infant sleep • baby sleep
Follow @islagracesleep I'd like to propose a com Follow @islagracesleep 

I'd like to propose a completely different use of the phrase.

Because here's what I see in nearly every family I work with. Everything feels out of control, so a mother reaches for the one thing that looks controllable, and it's the wrong one. It's her baby's sleep, which was never really hers to control, instead of her own, which is.

You can't train a four month old out of her sleep architecture. You can absolutely train yourself to stop fully waking, to take the long stretch instead of missing it, and to protect the sleep you do get.

Nobody suggests this, because there's no product attached to it. It's free, it's yours, and it's the only variable in the whole equation you actually own.

I have a guide on getting a five hour stretch even when your baby is still waking. Comment GUIDE and I'll send it to you.

As someone who is also trained in adult sleep, there is so much we can do to maximize our own sleep if we take the focus off our baby and start prioritizing the things we can control which is our own sleep ❤️

maternal sleep • sleep deprivation • new mom • postpartum • night waking • bedsharing • motherhood
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ABOUT
Isla Grace

At Isla Grace, we’re passionate about helping individuals and families optimize sleep across the entire lifespan. From supporting parents with baby sleep challenges to guiding adults toward better rest, we take a holistic, medication-free approach. Using the Baby-Led™ Sleep Approach, Lauren and her team of worldwide Sleep and Well-Being Specialists empower families to get better sleep without relying on sleep training methods. We offer a range of courses and one-on-one coaching, all based on the latest science and research, to help you achieve restorative, personalized sleep solutions for every stage of life.

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ABOUT
Isla Grace

At Isla Grace, we’re passionate about helping individuals and families optimize sleep across the entire lifespan. From supporting parents with baby sleep challenges to guiding adults toward better rest, we take a holistic, medication-free approach. Using the Baby-Led™ Sleep Approach, Lauren and her team of worldwide Sleep and Well-Being Specialists empower families to get better sleep without relying on sleep training methods. We offer a range of courses and one-on-one coaching, all based on the latest science and research, to help you achieve restorative, personalized sleep solutions for every stage of life.

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  • Become Affiliate
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  • Become Affiliate
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Baby-Led™ Sleep and Wellbeing Specialists

  • Sleep Coaching with Lauren
  • Sleep Coaching with Lauren

Sleep Courses

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  • Sleep Without Sleep Training

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