Sleeping Issues
How do YOU get your child to sleep/stay asleep?
E.A. writes:
My recommendation isn't specifically for nightmares, but sleep / emotional issues in general. We love the meditation CD's by Christiane Kerr ("Enchanted meditations for kids" etc). They are short-ish meditations, during which she instructs children how to lie and bed and relax their bodies, and then tells a magical story (mermaids, magicians, unicorns, etc) in which they visit a special place and then return. There is a CD for bedtime also, and one for teens (same stuff, minus the unicorns :) She emphasises kids' needs for feeling safe. When my children were ages 3 - 10 we started putting them on at bedtime on a CD player between the 2 rooms. Sometimes we would put on relaxation music instead (there was a debate on words or no-words!). We still do it, 2 or 3 times a week. It's just so relaxing and lovely. A 15 y.o. who babysat for use recently asked to borrow it. (By the way, if you want to see more reviews / descriptions of the CD's go here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=christiane+kerr&x=0&y=0 there's just more people listening to her in Britain, as she is British! But you can buy her in the US too.)
Chana W. writes:
I can't say anything "worked" in that it solved the problems completely, but I can list a few things that have helped, or were recommended by others:
Melatonin - ok, that's an obvious one - we never gave it (just my own fear of meds - but the truth is that it is completely natural -melatonin is the hormone that is produced by the body which helps one fall asleep, so supplementing seems like the obvious choice. There are no side effects and it washes completely out of the system). For those who fall asleep on Melatonin but then wake up during the night - there is the slow-release version you can ask the doctor about.
Weighted blankets - especially, but not only! - for sensory children. The weighted blanket helps soothe a child and get him/her into "sleeping mode".
Routine - supposedly an obvious one, but make sure you stick to a really rigid one - some kids need a really set routine to ease into sleep. Try to keep to the same hours, same routine exactly - don't even switch the order in which you kiss the kids good-night. The more set the routine - the easier it is for our sped kids to feel comfortable with it.
A large doll/stuffed animal - for those who insist on sleeping with Mommy.. sometimes the reason is because of a sense of disorientation - sleeping alone in the big bed is scary for some kids. Holding on to a large stuffed toy can be very soothing.
Limit caffiene and sugar before bedtime - as much as three hours before bedtime - do not allow any caffiene or sugar - it can make a huge difference for some kids!
Music - for those who dont' need "silence" - music is such a relaxing tool - use it! My only warning would be for the really "rigid" kids - if it's going to cause problems on Shabbos when you can't have it on - dont' start with it!
Hope this helps..
.
R.S. writes:
Rewarding good behavior worked for us.
Every night I gave my daughter 3 pennies (she was much younger you might have to use quarters). Everytime she got out of bed she had to give me one, whatever she had in the morning were hers to keep. The alternative is when he gets to a certain number say 30 coins they can be traded in for a bigger prize.
I like this idea because the child is still in control. If the dream was really super bad he can still come get you it will just cost him 1 coin.
My friend did this with her 7 year old and it took him 2 weeks to sleep through the night again. She said it was the best .75 she ever spent on a night's sleep.
R.F. writes:
Firstly, what I did with M., my one child with a tendency towards anxiety, that really helped was to sit with her and say kriat shma and then after she'd said shma and hamalach hagoel I named for her the angels that stood around her bed to protect her all night while she slept and told her that Hashem never sleeps and he's protecting her all night long. One of the scariest times for kids is at night because they feel unprotected while it is dark and everyone else is asleep and may not be able to come in time to "save them" whether from monsters under the bed or from whatever else they have nightmares about. If they know and understand that Hashem is awake even when everyone else is sleeping and He is On Guard and protecting them all the time they tend to feel much more secure than if they feel they must depend on [very fallible] parents in such dangerous times as nighttime :-)
The second thing that seemed to help someone [not me] was what a babysitter did once for one of my cousins. My cousin said that she was seeing floating heads (?) in the dark and couldn't sleep, so her babysitter wrote a note to these scary heads and told them to go away and never come back and she put it on the door. Well, according to my cousin this solved the problem and her "heads" never came back. I offer no further comment on this except for to say that my cousin, who is older than I am, still mentions how effective it was, so I guess you can't argue with success :-)...
I personally am very against behavior modification such as giving rewards or punishments for this issue, because it makes the child feel bad and like they are doing something "wrong", when in truth they are really scared and just doing what is natural to them and rather inconvenient for us. The answer is to Solve The Problem causing them to feel so scared and insecure and then they will naturally sleep in their beds and not have need to come to you or wake you in the middle of the night.