If our idyllic watercolour illustration caused you to laugh hollowly, you are not alone. The BBC reports that British children are the most sleep deprived in Europe. Getting on average 7 hours a night when 9-11 is the recommended amount. One common concern we hear from parents looking for a good nanny is that they ‘aren’t really coping with the bedtime thing’.
Why don’t children go to sleep?
A – There are a number of reasons and it’s important to check that there’s nothing underlying a child’s sudden inability to settle (changing school, friends moving away, loss of family pet etc).
B – The next consideration is the child’s bedroom:
- Is it warm enough? Most people overheat a child’s room which can reduce sleepiness. 18-22 C is ideal
- Is it too light? Tab top curtains can be the enemy of sleep. Especially if your child’s room faces streetlights. Blackout curtains can reduce both light and noise encouraging good sleep
- Is the bed comfortable? If a child is trying to sleep with 87 soft toys and an iPad in bed? A kaleidoscope nightlight casting patterns across the ceiling? it’s likely to be overstimulated. Make sure the room is dim, cool, and if you can’t make it silent, use a white noise machine while you establish a new sleep pattern. Even teens can benefit from some sleep hygiene!
C – Then, look at the wider picture:
Is your child eating stimulating food just before bed? Caffeinated drinks, too much sugar or even a dinner eaten too late to be properly digested can all contribute to restlessness at night. Work with your nanny to ensure that dinner is served early enough for children not to have indigestion. Also make sure they aren’t ‘topping up’ with sweets or fizzy drinks that will keep their systems buzzing long after you are slumped in a chair in exhaustion!
How to get your child to sleep
Regardless of the child’s age, you need to set a bedtime routine:
- A minimum of an hour before the ideal bedtime. Remove all digital devices from the environment: no phones, TV or computers (ideally this includes adults in the same room as the child!).
- Half an hour before bed, a warm bath, preferably in low light conditions, helps the body to move to sleep mode. Then it’s natural to put on nightwear, which is another cue to the wind-down to sleep.
- A snack such as a small cup of warm milk and half a banana can deliver extra sleep cues. Milk contains tryptophan, an amino acid which triggers sleep. It’s also found in bananas which additionally contain potassium and magnesium, both natural muscle relaxants.
- A bedtime story should be read in low light and not be too exciting.
Be consistent
The most important thing is to be consistent about the routine and apply it every night. Regardless of success or failure in the early weeks. It takes a while to break habits and it’s easy to ‘give in’ to a child’s pleading but doing so simply means you have to start again the next evening. Most families will find that within 4-6 weeks they’ll see a substantial improvement in bedtime if they stick to the routine. If it’s really tough for you to follow through. Let your nanny put the children to bed for a couple of weeks.
In many households, technology can come to our aid. Parents and nanny can have alarms set to remind them to move from one stage of ‘operation sleep’ to the next and software such as f.lux can help. Available for laptops and phones, flux works on a set timer and helps by reducing the blue light exposure, changing the colour balance of the screen to the warmer end of the spectrum. Therefor allowing our mind and eyes to naturally get tired through removal of bright, fluorescent unnatural light.