Maintaining a calm and safe environment can help children sleep better.
However, children sometimes have more trouble sleeping and often wake up at night due to problems such as snoring, fear of darkness or sleepwalking. Therefore, in order not to get enough rest, the child may not like to go to school, get low grades on exams and exams, and may be restless and irritated, requiring more attention from parents and teachers.
- Most of the time.
- It is enough to create a sleep routine for the child to fall asleep faster.
- But sometimes.
- When the child has difficulty sleeping or wakes up every night.
- It is necessary to inform the pediatrician because the causes need to be investigated.
This sleep routine should be followed every day so that the child gets used to it and can fall asleep faster and sleep better at night:
This routine should preferably be followed every day, including holidays and weekends, and even when the child goes to sleep with his uncles or grandparents.
Bedtime is also important and that’s why it’s good to schedule the right time and set your phone to wake up at that time, when the child has to get ready for bed.
If, even after more than a month of this routine, the child can’t fall asleep quickly or continues to wake up several times at night, it’s a good idea to find out if he or she has a sleep disorder.
Treatment of the main causes of childhood insomnia, which leads to a decrease in the child’s sleep quality, may include:
When your child makes noise while sleeping, the pediatrician or otolaryngologist can guide appropriate treatment, depending on the child’s age and cause of snoring, which may include only medication, weight loss, or surgery to remove adenoid vegetation and tonsils, for example.
Snoring can be harmless when the child has flu or nasal congestion and, in these cases, treatment for flu or nasal congestion is sufficient.
Better understand why your child can snore: Your baby’s snoring is normal.
When the child momentarily stops breathing during sleep, breathes through the mouth and wakes up sweaty, this can be sleep apnea and therefore it is important to consult the pediatrician to guide the treatment that can be done with medication, surgery or the use of CPAP, which is a machine that provides compressed airflow through a nasal mask for the child to sleep better.
Sleep apnea, if left untreated, can interfere with a child’s growth and development, hinder learning, cause drowsiness or hyperactivity during the day.
Find out how apnea treatment can be performed at: Baby Sleep Apnea and Nasal CPAP.
When your child wakes up suddenly at night, scared, screaming or crying and with his eyes wide open, they can be night terrors. In these cases, parents should create a regular sleep regimen and try to manage the child’s stress so that he or she is not anxious at bedtime. In some cases, consulting a psychologist can also help parents and children cope with night terrors.
Night terrors can begin after age 2 and usually disappear before age 8, and are not harmful to the child because it doesn’t remember what happened the next day.
Know what to do in case of night terror
When the child sits in bed or gets up in his or her sleep, he or she may be sleepwalking and this usually occurs about an hour or two after the child has fallen asleep. In these cases, parents should create a sleep routine, protect the child’s room. to prevent injury and avoid very restless games before falling asleep, for example.
See other tips that can help reduce episodes of sleepwalking in children for: Sleepwalking in Kids.
When your child grinds and grits at night, so-called childhood bruxism, it’s important to consult your pediatrician and dentist, because depending on the cause, treatment may include medications, protectors, or dental plaques or dental treatments.
In addition, it may also be necessary to consult a psychologist for the child to do relaxation techniques, and parents can also help reduce the child’s anxiety and stress by adopting certain strategies, such as giving the child a warm bath before bed or putting a few drops of lavender essential oil on the pillow.
See other tips that can help you treat childhood bruxism on: How to Treat Childhood Bruxism.
When the child pees in bed he or she may develop nocturnal enuresis or nocturnal urinary incontinence, which is the involuntary and repeated loss of urine at night, usually from age 5, in these cases it is important to consult the pediatrician to evaluate a child and prescribe medications, depending on the cause of night enuresis.
An excellent solution is urinary alarms, which sound when the child starts urinating, encouraging him or her to go to the bathroom. In addition, physical therapy can help in the treatment of nocturnal enuresis, and therefore consultation with a physical therapist is also important.
Better understanding how night enuresis is treated: Treatment of childhood urinary incontinence.
Lack of quality long-term sleep can affect not only the child’s growth and learning, but also the child’s relationship with family and friends because, in most cases, they are more restless and irritable children, so it’s important to know why the child sleeps poorly and seeks help adopting appropriate treatment.