Why does the child sleep badly at night? What to do?

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

When faced with a sleep disorder in a child at least once in their life, parents begin to think about the cause of what happened and try to correct the situation. According to statistics, every sixth baby has a sleep disorder. Why is this happening, why does the child sleep poorly at night? From the article it will be possible to learn about the causes of sleep disturbance and how to establish a perfect sleep for a child.

Research

Multiple studies on children's sleep disorders show that staying awake at night is one of the most common problems in children under 4 years of age. Scientists say that approximately 25% of children from 1 to 3 years old are awake at night 5 or more times a week.

Psychologists, neurologists and pediatricians note that this is the most common complaint of parents. If the child does not have any neurological disorders and is completely he althy, he is diagnosed with insomnia, massage and sedative medications are prescribed. However, doctors note that these measures are notguarantee a solution to the problem.

Before looking for methods to deal with a problem, it is necessary to find out the causes of its occurrence.

Children's dream

Sleep is very important in a child's development. A newborn baby sleeps a lot (up to 20 hours a day) and wakes up only for a short time in order to refresh himself. At the same time, his sleep is an active process, he shudders in his sleep, waving his arms and legs. With these movements, he often wakes himself up - and this is the main reason why the child does not sleep well day and night, often wakes up and cries. This type of sleep is called active, and it is necessary for the development of the brain of a newborn, for the formation of hereditary and acquired instincts that are responsible for the formation of personality.

By a month, brain structures are formed that are responsible for biorhythms, the child begins to distinguish between night and day, he mainly does this by the level of illumination, silence and other factors. What to do: the child is a month old and does not sleep well at night, confusing the dark with the light? Parents need to emphasize the differences between night and day. For example, dark, calm, quiet - at night.

At 3 months old, if a child wakes up at night, he can stay awake on his own and not wake up his mother. Therefore, it is necessary to ensure that he knows how to calm himself and feel safe. Only in this case, he, "walking" at night, will fall asleep on his own.

By the age of 2, the child's brain is practically developed, so the duration of active sleep decreases, and it becomes morecalm.

Physiological type of sleep disorder

Physiological types of sleep disturbance include sleep crying (sobbing) and startle.

Sobbing (whining or crying) of a child in a dream is considered by doctors to be the norm. This reaction of the body performs a number of functions:

1. In the first months after birth, the baby receives a large amount of information about the world, which is processed by the baby's brain in a dream. All the impressions of the day are reflected in a dream in the form of sobs and whimpers.
2. Crying performs a “testing” function: it is very important for a child at any age to feel safe, to know that his mother is nearby. Whimpering, he checks to see if it's true. If there is no confirmation, then he wakes up completely and cries already in the waking state.

Recommendations on what to do if the child does not sleep well at night and cries:

1. You don't need to actively and immediately react to your baby's nocturnal self-expressions. If he is overprotected, he will never learn to calm himself. The child needs to get used to being alone at night.
2. Night awakenings are a natural element of a child's sleep, this happens several times a night and for various reasons (startle, poor sleep), and the child is able to calm down and fall asleep again.
3. It is necessary to observe the baby and remember what time and how many times he wakes up at night. And at this time, try to be around and calming actions to prevent him from waking up.
4. Need to come up withphrase for sleep and accustom the baby to it from the first days of his life. For example, “Sleep, baby. I'm near. Everything is fine!”
5. If the child does not sleep well at night, cries and wakes up, it is necessary not to wake him up completely. That is, do not turn on the light, do not give to drink. You should give a pacifier, turn on soothing music if he is used to falling asleep to it.
6. Children over 1 year old are helped to fall asleep by special sleepy associations (favorite toy, pacifier, etc.).

Start is a natural process associated with the transition from the stage of light sleep to a deeper one, this happens after falling asleep after about 40 minutes to 1 hour. The child shudders and wakes himself up. In young children, this is especially pronounced, since the nervous system does not yet have inhibitory mechanisms. The older the child gets, the less startling in sleep occurs.

What to do if the child does not sleep well at night, shudders in his sleep and wakes himself up:

1. If the baby is under 6 months old, you can try to swaddle it. This will keep the legs and arms from flinching. At the same time, there are various ways of swaddling: “Australian”, “only handles”, “free”. But it should be borne in mind that the legs should not be tightly brought together, otherwise this can lead to serious complications in the development of the hip joints.
2. After falling asleep, the child should stay with him for about an hour and hold his hands with his hands. As soon as a start is felt, it is necessary to calm the baby.

Behavioral type of sleep disorder

If the behavior of the child and parents is not properly organized, then behavioral sleep disorders appear.

Wrong associations when falling asleep are the conditions under which the child feels great and falls asleep.

Violations are such situations when the child, immediately after he has cried, is picked up and rocked. In the future, this manifests itself in the inability of the baby to fall asleep on its own. That is, the presence of an adult is mandatory for him.

The child does not sleep well at night due to improperly organized behavior. What to do?

It is necessary to provide the baby with comfortable conditions for sleep from the first days of life. If he gets used to falling asleep in his arms, during motion sickness, then in the future he will insist on these conditions for sleeping, because he is used to them.

Violation of sleep settings. This disorder is typical for children after 1 year. These babies already know how to get up and out of the crib.

One-year-old baby does not sleep well at night because the wrong rules of behavior have been set, namely:

1. He doesn't want to go to bed on time and comes up with various excuses (he wants to eat, drink, use the potty, etc.).
2. Gets out of bed and runs to bed with parents.
3. Wakes up in his crib, throws a tantrum because he wants to sleep with his parents.

A year old child - sleeps badly at night: what to do? Recommendations:

It is necessary to change the child's attitude to the daily routine and strictly observe the sleep ritual. child agedone year has no sense of time, which is why the bedtime ritual is so important, which will give him guidelines that are understandable to the baby and subconsciously prepare him for parting with his parents for the night.

If a child does not sleep well at night, it is necessary to think over the schedule of actions that the ritual will consist of, and follow all this order about an hour before bedtime every day.

The child will develop a reflex, he will understand if he is bathed, read a fairy tale, fed, dimmed the light - it means that he will soon have to sleep. Soon, all these consistent actions will make him sleepy.

It is important to consistently perform all actions. If suddenly there is not enough time for some stage, you need to shorten its duration, but do not break the order.

If the baby yawns, then you need to forget about the ritual and quickly put him to bed, because if he is overworked, it will be difficult to get him to go to bed.

In addition, you should plan at the same time and daytime sleep, only in this way the child's internal clock will tune in and start working.

Eating disorders are expressed in the fact that the baby woke up and cannot fall asleep without food or drink. This is due to the fact that the child, when he woke up, was not given the opportunity to fall asleep on his own, but was immediately offered a bottle. Such guardianship leads to a reflex and a picture is observed when a child at 2 years old does not sleep well at night, wakes up and demands food. Doctors say that a child after 6 months does not need night feeding. In addition, suchsnacking leads to such negative consequences as tooth decay, inflammation of the inner ear due to the fact that milk enters it when feeding in a horizontal position, hormonal disorders.

The child does not sleep well at night and cries. The main mistakes of parents

Parents often face the question: "How to put the child to sleep?" Scientists have established the 6 most common mistakes parents make when laying their baby. But even small changes in the child's regimen can lead to sleep problems. So, the mistakes parents make when laying:

1. Too late bedtime. The more tired the child is, the more difficult it is for him to fall asleep. Therefore, you should observe a strict regime of sleep and wakefulness and put the baby to bed at the same time. Doctors believe that the optimal time for going to bed is 21-22 hours.
2. Sleep in motion. Modern parents often resort to rocking babies in a sling or electric swing. But this leads to bad consequences - the child does not sleep in a deep restorative sleep. This is a very superficial light sleep, after which he feels sleepy and tired.
3. Various distracting details. Do not put the baby in bed with toys. They distract him from sleep and, if he still managed to sleep, he will often wake up.
4. Inconsistency in actions. You must strictly adhere to the rules. If you decide that the child should sleep in his own crib, then do not allow him to fit intoparental bed.
5. Violation of the ritual of falling asleep. Strictly observe all the actions of the ritual, and in a certain sequence. For example, bathing, eating, reading a story, kissing goodnight.
6. Too early transfer of the child to a large bed. Consideration should be given to the psychological readiness of the child to change their baby's cozy bed. Scientists believe that approximately this happens in three years. He needs to mature for a big bed.

Correct falling asleep

If a child does not sleep well at night, it is necessary to teach him to fall asleep correctly. The most important thing is to teach the child to go to sleep on his own, with minimal involvement of parents.

You can use modern video baby monitors and baby monitors, while watching the baby from afar and not getting into his field of vision. The child learns independence and self-soothing.

You can teach your baby to fall asleep with a soft toy. But it should be without buttons, ribbons, ropes. It is better to remove the toy from the crib immediately after falling asleep.

Rule of sound sleep

If the child does not sleep well at night (1 year and older), he should provide the following conditions:

1. Create for him all the conditions for the greatest activity in the afternoon.
2. Take him for a walk a few hours before bedtime.
3. Swimming is mandatory 40 minutes before bedtime.
4. 30 minutes before bed - a hearty dinner.
5. In the nursery, the air temperature should be 19-20 ˚C, and the humidity should be 70%.

If the problem occurs not onlywith sleep, but also with falling asleep - it is necessary to sing the same song to him, put him to bed with the same toy (and he should see it only during motion sickness). This will develop a he althy habit in him, and once he hears the tune of the song and sees his "sleep bud", he will easily fall asleep.

Pillow for sleep. Is it necessary?

Doctors say that children under 2 do not need a pillow. If you put the baby on its side, you can see that his head lies on the bed and the neck remains straight, this happens because his head is large and his shoulders are short. And such proportions persist until about two years of age. Therefore, if a child does not sleep well at night and during the day, do not think that this is due to the lack of a pillow.

Helpful sleeping positions

Sleep position is of great importance for children under 1 year old. Pediatricians around the world do not recommend putting babies to sleep on their tummy. This is dangerous for their lives, as it can lead to sudden death syndrome.

The cause of this terrible condition is respiratory arrest. Why this happens has not yet been clarified. But it has been proven that children under one year old who sleep on their stomachs are much more likely to die. Pediatricians advise laying the baby on his back, and turn his head to the side. After a year, the sleeping position does not matter - how comfortable the baby is, let him sleep.

Instead of a conclusion

All parents should remember that no matter what age the baby is - a couplemonths or several years. To sleep well, at any age, children need the same thing: to be active during the day, to be he althy, to be happy and loved. It is important for a child to be surrounded by happy people, positive and joyful impressions - in a word - “happy childhood”, which parents are able to give him from the very first day of his life.