How to support a breastfeeding woman so that toddler sleep isn't entirely up to her

Never underestimate the power of encouragement and help with tasks of daily living if your partner or someone you care about is breastfeeding

Taking over all or most of those domestic chores which ground our lives is perhaps the most effective way a father or non-breastfeeding parent can support a breastfeeding woman. How profoundly this kind of practical support matters, for the wellbeing of your partner, your toddler, and your family!

Since it's normal for toddlers to wake in the night, breastfeeding your toddler back to sleep at night is a gift your partner is giving, which does tend to make sleep go as easily as possible for the whole family.

When you have a busy little toddler, it helps to become a self-compassion ninja yourself, at the same time as you support your breastfeeding partner.

Specialise in sensory motor adventures

If you're the partner or support person of a breastfeeding woman, you could become your family's expert in sensory adventures. Sensory motor nourishment is a parent's other toddler-sleep superpower (alongside the breastfeeds), and an incredibly powerful way to nurture your relationship as you bond with your toddler.

• Your sensory motor contributions might include carrying or wearing your toddler. You can find out more here.

• You can find out about the Neuroprotective Developmental Care (NDC) or Possums holistic approach to supporting your little one's motor development here.

• You can find out about maintaining heart connection as you shape your toddler's behaviour here.

Your and your toddler's sensory motor exploits will become increasingly long-range, until your little one's childhood memories are a richly woven tapestry of your shared adventures.

You can find out about doing bedtimes when your toddler is breastfed here.

Specialise in food preparation

It might be that your toddler's mother continues to provide all or much of the milk that your little one needs. By now your toddler will be eating food, both snacking and with the family meal-times. You can find out about toddlers and food here.

Food preparation and the enjoyment of food are fundamental to family life. Do you have special cultural or intergenerational food and cooking practices to pass on to your toddler? Is the work of food preparation something that you could take over and specialise in?

To care for your family's meals and food preparation is to care not only for the health of everyone's precious bodies, but to nurture your family's soul - your cultural identity, and your shared enjoyment of the social ritual of the family meal.

If you are caring for your baby in the evenings and you are not a breastfeeding parent, you and your partner may have decided that you'll use a bottle feed to tip your older baby or young toddler over into sleep when her sleep pressure is high. But non-breastfeeding parent, especially as the little one moves into toddlerhood, lean heavily on their other superpower, sensory motor nourishment. Don't look at the clock for a bed-time. Simply focus on rich and changing sensory motor adventures together (like physical play or outdoor walks) until the sleep pressure is so high that your little one drops off to sleep easily, in your arms.