Actress and country singer Jana Kramer got super real on Instagram this week, posting a photo of herself crying over her son’s sleep regression.

At 19 months old, her son Jace is having a very hard time sleeping. He’s teething, he’s crying and his mama is just overwhelmed.

“This is motherhood. Exhausted, heart strings breaking and crying in a dark room just wanting their baby to fall asleep because you’re exhausted too,” Kramer captioned her teary selfie.

“I have never heard these kinds of screams from and it’s literally BREAKING my heart,” Kramer continued. “Apparently it’s the 18-21 sleep regression. (I had his ears checked and all are good now). His molars all 4 are coming in. And he throws his lovey and wubs out of the crib.”

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Poor Jana. This is so hard but we love how she’s sharing the hard side of motherhood as much as she shares the fun and glam parts of her life.

But here’s the thing—according to Motherly’s resident Sleep Expert, Rachel Gorton, sleep regressions aren’t real.

That doesn’t mean the frustration that Kramer and he son are feeling are not, but that it is a solvable problem instead of an inevitability.

“Your baby suddenly not sleeping through the night or the abrupt change in her positive sleep habits? That’s real. Your baby who decides to start protesting naps? That’s also real,” Gorton explains.

“But, let’s for a moment break down the very definition of this term. Regression is “the act of going back to a previous place or state, return or reversion.” While it might seem that your baby is returning to previous sleep habits that were less than stellar, it is important to know that they are also going through huge developmental milestones for the first few years of life—all of which can and most likely will affect sleep.”

So what does that mean for Jana Kramer and Jace?

It means that her 19-month-old is going through a transition. He’s growing and changing (hello, molars!) and it is having an impact on his sleep. But he’s not regressing, he’s growing and his mama can grow through this with him.

As Gorton explains: “Providing extra comfort and soothing through this transition is perfectly okay. Just keep it simple and try not to introduce any major changes in sleep habits, such as starting to co-sleep.”

It’s totally possible that at his age Jace is starting to have nightmares.

“This is very common once children are at the age where their imaginations develop, they are starting to explore the world, and they are stimulated throughout the day,” Gorton explains.

Kramer is already doing so much good by encouraging Jace to self-soothe with his lovey, but she doesn’t need to be afraid to comfort him when he cries or when his lovey is tossed out of the crib. Providing the comfort he needs in order to fall back asleep will help Kramer get back to sleep, too.

You may need to consistently guide [your toddler] back to bed. Even if it means you put [them] back in bed 35 times in a night, after enough consistency and communication, [they] will start to understand boundaries,” Gorton explains.

This will pass for Kramer and Jace. It’s so hard, and we totally understand how it can bring a mama to tears. But with consistency, routine sleep will come again.