How to make your child sleep better in the night?

[schellen]

Is your girl napping well in the day? If she doesn’t, then she may be overtired by bedtime and will not be able to sleep or sleep properly. When people (not just children) get overtired, our bodies compensate by having a shot of adrenalin. This makes us energetic again but actually is not good for health as it is only a temporary measure. The best is to let her nap well in the day so that by bedtime, she will be tired but not overtired. Once her body’s adrenalin has kicked in, the only thing you can do is to slowly wind her down again. Getting her to bed immediately will backfire on you.


If this is not the case, examine her activities for the day, especially those in the late afternoon and evening. For my DD, if she does something that keeps her excited and "on high" during these times, it is very difficult to get her to sleep soundly at night. She will tend to wake up often and sometimes may get nightmares/night terrors. She is already 7 this year but her sleeping behaviour has remained the same for so many years. To prevent this, we schedule calmer activities for her nearer bedtime. Our parents also know about this so they co-operate.

My DD is also prone to nightmares if she watches/reads something scary and/or violent. This may persist even a few days after the actual thing has happened. Therefore, we are very careful when screening stuff for her to watch/read. Now that she is older, she understands and doesn’t want the nightmares so when we decline her requests to watch/read something, she doesn’t insist on it. Perhaps you can check your daughter’s exposure to media? Don’t take the G/PG rating for shows at face value. You know your child best so check the show out yourself first. Same for books. Some seemingly tame stories may have a scary illustration right in the middle of the book so we always check first. Kids’ programmes on TV may be interspersed with trailers/ads for adult shows so be wary. My DD has learned to change the channel or mute the TV and shut her eyes when that happens.

What I mentioned here may not be what your child is experiencing so the best way is to observe your child during the day as well to get an idea why she behaves like that at night. Good luck! ^_^

[buds]

One question :-


Is your child sleeping WITH you and hubs

OR

is your child already sleeping IN HER OWN ROOM?

[Jav]

Hi,


I have a slight different difficulty in putting children to sleep by themselves in their own room. My boy is 4 & my girl is 3, both of them sleep in the same room. They refuse to sleep through if I don’t sleep in between of them. My helper or myself can put them to sleep and I tried to get back to my room after they are in deep sleep but then in the middle of night, I would get all the cryings. So, in the end, I keep sleeping with them so that everyone have some peace. No matter how I tell my son, he is always so afraid to sleep without mummy. But then, I don’t prefer this arrangement as one day, they would have to go to bed their own. Anybody has any tricks or ideas to share?

[Acidica]

Bowie:

Hi, not sure if this is applicable for a 3 yo. Since baby, I always have some background sound (a mini fan) on when my gal sleep.


Keeping the room too quiet make any small noise very amplified in night time.

Maybe can try.

Thanks for the suggestion. I will try anything to get a good night sleep.

[Acidica]

buds:

One question :-


Is your child sleeping WITH you and hubs

OR

is your child already sleeping IN HER OWN ROOM?

Hi buds, my daughter sleeps with us in our room. She keep asking for me to accompany her every night so that is why she is still rooming with us.

[sunset_dae]

i think waking up in the middle of night a few time asking for milk and water has become a habit instead of need. What time is their last feed?


What i suggest is continue to pat them when they wake up to ask for milk or water. ( i tried this way and it works, DD now is 2 yrs old and wake up at 6am for milk and his last feed is 8.30pm)

u can also play soothing music before they sleep

[Acidica]

Thanks schellen for your post! I did the similar thing too like dimming the light before bed time to wind her down and no scary or violent movie before that.


She goes to nursery for 1.5 hrs in the morning and she naps for about 2 hours in the afternoon. I am not sure is it because she is light sleeper but I will try to monitor her activities like what you suggest.

Would anyone thinks that putting light lavender scent in the room would helps? Personally I like lavender very much. Make me feels good and relaxing

[Acidica]

Hi sunset_dae, I agreed it becomes a bad habit. She used to sleep with my parent in law and the habits starts then.


Her last feed is about 10pm and I going to try to play the soothing music to see if it works for her. I'm keeping my fingers cross and pray hard!

[Funz]

My girl now 6yrs old had very bad sleeping pattern up till about 4+. At 1 point, it was so bad that she will be waking up crying and screaming almost 2 hourly and will take about another 30-45mins to settle down again. And after she falls asleep, it will take me about another 20mins b4 I can get back to sleep and just when I doze off, she starts again. That dragged on for a good 6mths that both DH and my health suffered due to lack of sleep. Even in the childcare, teachers say that her afternoon naps are disturbed as well, she will wake up crying like clockwork after about 45mins into her sleep and will settle down again after about 30mins by which it is time to wake up oredi cos she takes about 30mins to fall asleep to begin with.


I tried the scientific way (making sure she gets enuf time for nap, no exciting activities, enuf wind down time b4 bedtime, establish bedtime routine, no scary movies or stories, etc) and the superstitious/religious way (ie, my mum went to the temple to consult them, kenna drink ‘holy’ water, bath in flower water, even teach her bedtime prayers, etc) nothing seem to work. Or rather, nothing seem to work fast enuf. But I think to some extent a combination of the scientific and religious way did help settle her over time.

To give both me & DH a chance to sleep undisturbed, we take turns to sleep with her at nite. And on some nites, the maid pitch in. She started getting better only when she was about 5yrs old. Looking back, we have no idea how we ‘survive’ that period but we did and these days, we treasure our sleep!

what schellen said does help in that try to give enuf wind down time. As for asking for milk or drink, you just have to try to wean her off. You can start by weaning her off the bottle in the day first. Talk to her first before you embark on the ‘project’. Tell her she is a big girl already, and big girls drink from cups. Once the bottle is out of the way in the day, then talk to her about no waking up for milk at nite. You can expect her to still wake up for the milk and protesting when you say no, but persevere and she will eventually adjust to the arrangement. As for peeing, get her to empty her bladder b4 she sleeps and get her to go another time b4 you hit the sack. And if she is not drinking any milk in the middle of the nite, then maybe she won’t wake up to pee.

Hope you will be able to find a way to improve your dd’s sleeping pattern. It took us 5yrs but these days, dd is sleeping thru the nite on her own. I still put her and ds to bed and stay with them till they fall asleep but thereafter, I am back in my own room.

[Acidica]

Thanks Funz for sharing your experience. I look forward when she can sleep on her own but I know it may take longer than I would expect. I will preserve. Now I treasure my sleep and free time when possible - things I take for granted before I have children. However with the little ones around, my world and prospective has definitely change. They have taught me alot - how to tone my temper down and how to treasure little things around me.


Having said that, I keep my fingers cross and look forward to days my DD sleeps soundly by herself and I give myself a pat for job well done