Deciding Whether to use White Noise in the Nursery
In the past few months I’ve had a number of parents reach out to me saying that they’re against using white noise in their baby’s nursery because it “doesn’t help the baby sleep anyway” or they “don’t want them to always have to sleep with white noise.” Choosing whether to use white noise in your child’s room or not is definitely personal.
As an adult, I love sleeping with white noise myself, so of course I use white noise with my own children.
There is something important to know about white noise: the purpose isn’t to put your baby to sleep.
The purpose of white noise is to prevent external environment noises from waking up your baby. The dog barking, the the doorbell ringing, a movie playing, the blender going…you get what I’m saying. Those regular LIFE sounds.
I’ve also heard quite a few parents say that they want their children to get used to sleeping with background noises because it’ll help them “be better sleepers.” This isn’t true though. Listening to a conversation as you’re trying to fall asleep or being awoken by a bark and then trying to put yourself back to sleep is so much more irritating and stimulating than just simply putting some white noise in your baby’s room. As humans, we all sleep in different ways. Some of us are naturally deep sleepers, while others are naturally light sleepers. If you have a light-sleeper and you’re trying to ‘train’ them to sleep with lots of background life-noises, you won’t see much success.
One other factor to consider is that in your home it’s probably easy to mimic a quiet, peaceful nap-time environment for your baby. However, on vacation, or at a sleepover at Grandma’s house, it is much harder to mimic a silent environment. It is easier to bring your white noise machine with you and plug it in in the new sleep environment, and the familiar noise will act as a sleep cue for your baby to know it’s time to sleep.
White noise is a beautiful additive to a sleep environment, but definitely not a necessity. When running white noise, I generally recommend having it playing as loud as a running shower. I also recommend having it across the room from your baby, and closest to the area where any noise would be coming from. Close to the door is usually the best spot for it. White noise is also one of those great sleep tools that can be used forever - similar to blackout blinds. When introducing and using white noise in your child’s room, I wouldn’t put an expiry date on your noise machine for when you stop using it. It’s very healthy to sleep with white noise & it definitely makes for a peaceful sleep environment!
If you are using white noise and it feels like you’re doing everything right, but your baby is still having a hard time with sleep, please reach out! I’d love to make a custom sleep plan for your family, or teach you how to get your baby to sleep by using my sleep course.
