It is 4:08 am. The boy is jumping up and down in front of the dead TV and laughing at his reflection. I generally encourage this approach to life but I am tired. Who can lend me some chloroform? The boy will not sleep.
I’m looking for something beyond conventional wisdom. I’ve tried all that. His diet is above reproach.
He likes to stay awake for 22 hours and sleep for 12. A 34 hour cycle does not jive with the rest of us. He’s 33 months old and has an exquisite attention span so I don’t think he’s Hyper/ADD/etcetera.
May I suggest a finishing school for the lad? I went to the Welmont Academy when Mumsy had had her fill of my childish antics, and I’m a better man for it.
Have you tried melatonin? You can buy it in liquid or chewable tabs. It takes a while to build up in the kid’s system, but I found that melatonin, combined with really consistent bedtime rituals, worked wonders for our nonsleeping girl child.
Of course, I lost so many brain cells from sleep deprivation that I might be remembering a dream I had once.
With all due respect to EM, I would be very cautious about giving my child any kind of medication (even natural, even OTC, etc.),—- especially that which “builds up”—- without checking with a trusted doctor and/or doing a lot of research. You might end up doing more harm than good by messing with the child’s brain and body chemistry. From what I’ve read about melatonin (admittedly not a lot), there is some controversy and very little testing has been done on kids without some sort of neurological disability already diagnosed. Beeeeee careful!
I had a poor sleeper (never slept more than 4 hrs until she was 5 years old) who I put on my schedule. When it was bedtime, she was allowed to keep a bedside lamp on and read (from age 2 onward, and she’s almost 16 now) ... when she got tired, she’d fall off and until she did, she was required to stay in bed and have only books and stuffed animals for fun/entertainment.
She eventually came into our schedule ... also became quite the reader! :)
Good points, Lumina, about the melatonin. Our developmental pediatrician recommended it, and at the time (8-10 years ago), there wasn’t much research on the subject. But I do remember it helping.
We do the same as you regarding schedules now. My girl’s in bed by 8:30, and she’s allowed to read until she feels ready to sleep. She is not allowed to get out of bed until 6 a.m. Except for bathroom, water, etc. Often now she’ll get in bed at 7:30 or 7:45 so she has more time to read before falling asleep!
So it sounds like it is more about convenience for the parents’ schedule, than for the child’s over-all health? Or are the light-sleeping youngins’ hurting themselves by not sleeping enough?
Both parents here have childhood memories of being wide awake long after bedtime and we recognize the behavior. The big difference between us and the boy is that he wants us awake to experience his joy, whereas we tended to watch the stars or read by flashlight.
We can put him to bed and think everything’s fine, only to wake up to a blasting stereo or 4 red-hot burners on the stove. He can remove doorknob covers and unlock deadbolts and doors with random objects. He can leave the house at will. He can knock Cheerios and whole bags of dog treats off the top of the refrigerator with a broom or the 3 piece extension for the vacuum. The dog has allied against us since the Hair-pulling Treaty of 2008, and odds are even that this mighty coalition will usurp our very reality.
It is dangerous to sleep when he does not. All the pain we inflicted on our own parents is being repaid, with compound interest. This is the lesson of offspring and we are fools to endure it.
Sometimes I rant. There are non-parents present and they must be readied.
“convenience” is a relative word ... when training a child into the family sleep patterns, it’s (trust me) for the child’s own good. a parent who has lost sleep cannot make a living, cannot make rational discipline decisions and cannot be present like kids needs them to be. that said, there were many concessions i made to my child for her own betterment because the alternative seemed more a matter of convenience ... for instance, we had a family bed. this was for two reasons: one, it made her more secure to share our bed when she was lonely rather than wile away those lonely hours crying alone. also, it was safe for me to go to sleep because we were situated such that in order for her to leave the bed, she had to crawl over me, thus waking me up. no child can be allowed to roam a house freely at that age without parental supervision, you’re right.
being in her own bed carried more privileges (stuffed animals, books) and so it became more of a preference (on her own terms) as she grew older. she started choosing her own bed every night by school age and it never became a discipline problem. she simply wanted to be “grown up” and was ready, after the security of knowing i was there and WOULD come if needed, to try sleeping alone.
it’s a matter of discipline ... and i don’t mean punishment, but “discipline” in the true sense of the word ... teaching. kids have to be trained into the ways of the world. the more choices you give them, the more willingly they are trained. just make the choice you WANT them to make much more appealing than the one you want them to avoid.
if you let a child decide your sleep patterns now, you are on a slippery slope to letting them control way more than they should ... i understand the confusion, guilt, etc. but there is nothing wrong at all with letting your kid know that you are the most important one and that you are in charge. they actually take comfort in that.
