Dohm Sound Machine: How White Noise Changed My Life

Don't let his cute looks fool you: when this little guy was born my nights were turned upside down. He was born early, and came home on a heart monitor--a heart monitor that was prone to very frequent false alarms. Couple this with what naturally happens to every new mother (you earn your "mom ears") and I was on high-alert the entire night.

Sure, he woke up every few hours. All newborns do. But what happens when you can't will yourself to go back to sleep after these wakeups? I'd lay in bed all night just anticipating either a false alarm from his monitor or him to start whimpering.

I dealt with the lack of sleep and overall anxiousness for the eight weeks that he slept in our bedroom. I thought the situation would improve after we moved him to his own room. I was sorely mistaken.

Enter the baby video monitor. Where before I'd be woken up by every peep the baby made, now I was woken up by every peep the baby made coupled with my room being illuminated as if it was two in the afternoon! This is a fantastic monitor (that we still use to this day, with my second son), however it only added to my skittishness during those early days.

I knew I had to find something to help me sleep better, as I was living my days in a fog.

My husband had this brilliant idea: since white noise tends to lull babies to sleep, maybe it would have the same affect on an adult (me!). Also, the white noise might also help to mask out some of his little coos that occurred throughout the night - it wouldn't cover it completely (which was good, I still needed to hear him, obviously), but it might help me not wake up if he was simply tossing the turning.

The "DS" in the product's title stands for Dual-Speed. Marpac does make a Dohm in a single-speed that's a bit less-expensive, however, I wanted the option to be able to crank up the white noise if I needed it.

There were a few reasons why I decided to try the Dohm to help me sleep through the night:

1. The noise is a pleasant "whirring" sound, rather than something more descriptive (I don't want to listen to birds chirping all night!)
2. It's extremely highly rated
3. It supposedly lasts forever

I immediately fell in love with the Marpac Dohm DS Sound Machine! It helped to keep me asleep when the baby was fidgeting, and when I did have to get up to feed him, I was able to fall back to sleep quickly.

In fact, it worked so well that...

I BOUGHT TWO!

After a week or so of enjoying my Dohm, I purchased a second machine to put into the baby's room.

He was always pretty good about re-settling after he woke up, but the Dohm helped to lull him back to sleep when he wasn't really needing to get up. Baby sleep patterns are pretty erratic and they shift from deep to light sleep throughout the night (like us). The white noise helped to put him back to sleep during those periods of light sleep so that we both could sleep better.

As you can see in the video above, the level of sound is adjustable a few different ways. Some people have said that this noise machine is actually *too* loud, but I have to wonder if they maybe just don't know how to adjust the sound level.

The best feature of the Dohm Sound Conditioner is that the sound is super, super smooth. I used to use my phone with a white noise app on it. Aside from the fact that the sound had a produced, fake sound to it, it often skipped. With the Dohm, you can rest assured that the sound will play all night long.

The Dohm is one of the best products I've bought for both myself and my baby -- three years later, I'm using both machines for baby #2.

If you're looking to sleep better yourself, this machine is great. Couple that with a machine for your newborn and you'll both be sleeping through the night in no time at all!