A mother has revealed a most unusual way of making her young child sleep through the night.
The first-time mum, aged 31, felt like she was “losing her mind” as her 10-month-old daughter continued waking up before 5am.
But after the Northern Irish mother decided to use bin bags to stop light entering the nursery, dramatic changes followed.
“I couldn't believe it,” the mother told Belfast Live. “The first night she slept until 8am - she had never done that before.
“I thought it might have been a fluke, but she's sleeping to at least 7.30am every morning now - it’s amazing.”
The mum said the spark of inspiration came after speaking to a friend who told her that babies sleep better with complete darkness due to melatonin - the sleepy hormone.
She said: "We had blackout curtains in her nursery but I did notice one morning when I went in, there was still light getting in through the top - above the curtain - and when I thought about it, the room was a lot brighter than I'd expected.
"I didn't really want to spend a fortune on new blinds and curtains in case they made absolutely no difference to her sleep so I decided to think outside the box and look for an alternative, and there it was right in my cupboard."
The mum said she decided to use black bin liners on the window to make the room darker and, to her amazement, it worked.
She added: "I put the bin liners up over the edges of the nursery room window where the light was getting in.
“I didn't even care what the neighbours must have thought as I was desperate to get more sleep.”
