It’s 3am. Your baby has just woken for the fourth time tonight, or maybe the seventh, you’ve genuinely lost count. You stumble out of bed, again, and as you sit in the dark doing whatever it takes to settle them, your mind starts to spiral.
Your mum mentioned last week that your baby “should” be sleeping through by now. A friend swears that sleep training changed her life and keeps sending you links. The Health Visitor suggested you try putting them down drowsy but awake, which sounds lovely in theory but has never once worked. Someone in your NCT group told you that if you just wait it out, it gets better on its own. Someone else told you it absolutely does not.
And somewhere in the background, the internet hums with opinions. Thousands of blog posts, Instagram reels, parenting forums, and sleep programmes, all contradicting each other, all delivered with complete confidence, all making you feel like you’re somehow doing it wrong.
You’re exhausted in a way that’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t lived it. You love your baby fiercely, but you’re running on empty, and you just want someone to give you a straight answer.
Here’s the thing: there isn’t one single right answer. But there is an approach that’s right for your baby and your family. And understanding the difference between a sleep trainer and a sleep coach is a really good place to start.
What is sleep training?
Sleep training is a term most parents have heard of, and it tends to conjure up one image in particular: leaving your baby to cry. That’s not entirely unfair, the most well-known sleep training methods (like the Ferber method, or full extinction “cry it out”) do involve leaving a baby to cry, often with limited or no parental intervention. The goal of sleep training is typically to teach a baby to fall asleep independently by breaking the association between falling asleep and parental input, whether that’s feeding, rocking, or being held.
For some families, sleep training works — no judgement here, we all must make the decisions that we feel are right for us, our baby, and our family. However, sleep training is not without controversy, and it’s absolutely not the right fit for every baby or every parent. Developmental readiness matters enormously here. Sleep training is generally not recommended for babies under four to six months, and even then, it isn’t appropriate for all babies or all situations.
It also doesn’t address why a baby is waking — it simply aims to change the behaviour around waking. Babies will still wake, just not communicate that they have woken and need any parental support.
What is a holistic sleep coach?
A sleep coach takes a very different starting point. Rather than focusing solely on changing sleep behaviour, a good sleep coach looks at the whole picture: your baby’s age and developmental stage, their feeding patterns, their temperament, your family’s routine, and your own values and wellbeing. Sleep is not a behaviour to be trained, it’s a biological process that matures over time, and a sleep coach supports that process rather than overriding it.
As a holistic sleep coach, my approach is always responsive and attachment-aware. That means I will never recommend leaving your baby to cry it out. Again, not because I’m judging parents who have gone down that route (parental exhaustion is very real), but because I genuinely believe there are gentler, equally effective ways to improve sleep that work with your baby’s development rather than against it.
Good sleep coaching looks at:
- Daytime rhythms — 24-hour sleep totals and day/night balances that match your baby’s age and cues
- Sleep environment — light, temperature, noise, and safe sleep
- Feeding — how is feeding going, could this be having any impact on sleep?
- Sleep associations — we all have sleep associations, your baby will too. Are these working for you and your baby?
- Temperament — this is the largest factor behind how our babies sleep
- Developmental context — knowing that the four-month developmental processes, or sudden changes in sleep at any age, often have a physiological explanation
- Parental wellbeing — because a plan you can’t sustain is no plan at all
Why does this distinction matter?
Because the internet is full of advice, and not all of it is created equal. When you’re sleep-deprived and desperate, it can be hard to sift through the noise, blog posts telling you to try this method, social media threads where parents swear by something completely different, and well-meaning family members sharing what they did thirty years ago. It’s overwhelming and unsettling at the best of times, but especially so when you are beyond exhausted and emotionally drained.
Knowing whether you’re talking to a sleep trainer or a sleep coach means you can make an informed choice. It means you’re not signing up for an approach that doesn’t sit right with you, only to feel guilty, second-guess yourself, or abandon it halfway through and end up more exhausted than before.
It also matters because qualifications vary wildly in this space. Anyone can call themselves a sleep consultant, it is not a protected or even regulated title. When you’re looking for support, it’s worth asking: what training do they have? Is their approach evidence-based? Do they take feeding into account? Do they align with my values and parenting approaches?
How my dual background makes a difference
As both an IBCLC (International Board Certified Lactation Consultant) and a holistic sleep coach, I’m in a fairly unique position, especially in the Berkshire, Hampshire and Surrey area.
When it came to choosing my sleep coaching training, I wanted to make sure it was rigorous, evidence-based, and genuinely aligned with my values. That’s why I completed the Holistic Sleep Coaching Programme (HSCP) . The programme was developed and is led by Lyndsey Hookway, a paediatric nurse, public health nurse, IBCLC, international speaker, and author. It is widely regarded as one of the most thorough and up-to-date training programmes available for sleep practitioners. Lyndsey’s approach emphasises respect, responsiveness, and truly understanding each child as an individual, rather than applying a one-size-fits-all method. These are values that have always guided my own work, and her depth of knowledge across infant feeding, child development, and sleep biology made the HSCP feel like exactly the right fit for me.
Feeding and sleep are deeply connected, particularly in the early months. A baby who is feeding frequently at night may be doing so for comfort, habit, developmental reasons, or genuine hunger, and the distinction matters enormously when it comes to making a plan. A sleep consultant who doesn’t have a thorough understanding of infant feeding may miss this entirely. All too often, families are told that their baby is waking frequently because they feed to sleep, ignoring that this is the biological norm and that feeding to sleep is often the quickest and easiest way to resettle your baby.
My Midwifery background also means I understand the fourth trimester, normal newborn behaviour, and the physiological reasons behind many sleep patterns that parents worry about. Often, the most helpful thing I can offer a family is reassurance that their baby is doing exactly what babies are supposed to do, alongside some practical, gentle strategies to nudge things in a more sustainable direction that is supportive of their natural development.
So which do you need?
If you’re looking for a rigid programme that promises results in three days through controlled crying, that’s not what I offer.
If you’re looking for a personalised, evidence-based support that respects your baby’s development, takes your feeding journey into account, and gives you a plan you actually feel good about, then a sleep coach is probably exactly what you’re looking for.
I offer a free discovery call so we can have a proper conversation about where you are, what’s not working, and whether my approach feels like a good fit for your family. No pressure, no one-size-fits-all solutions.
You don’t have to be this exhausted. And you don’t have to compromise your values to sleep better.
Ready to find out more? Book a free discovery call or explore my sleep coaching services.