Helping Your Child Sleep

If your child has a sleeping problem, chances are neither one of you are getting an adequate amount of sleep at night. You and your child are probably tired, grumpy, and irritable. However, do not despair. There are ways to help your child’s sleeping problem and to get your child to sleep and therefore get yourself to sleep.

Do Not Overdue It

You may think that enrolling your child in countless dance, sports, and other extracurricular activities is a good thing. However, it may be contributing to your child’s sleeping problem. Your child may be stressing over every activity that he or she has to do. It may cause your child to even wake up in the middle of the night anxious and fearful about an impending sports game or a dance recital. In addition, if your child is constantly out of the house and away doing some activity, he or she has no down time to relax. Your logic may be that these activities tire your child out, but a child sleeping problem can be caused by having no time to relax or do what he or she wants to do. So instead of having an event planned for every day of the week, try giving your child a few days a week to simply relax at home, play with his or her toys, or watch television.

Fear Of The Dark

Another common child sleeping problem is a fear of the dark. Children are young and do not fully understand the world around them. In addition, many children have incredibly and vivid imaginations. A small child can take what they saw on a television, dream about it, and wake up truly believing that it happened. In order to help your child’s sleeping problem due to fear of the dark, eliminate scary movies or television from the house. In addition, help your child check every nook and cranny of their room before bed at night. This will help him or her feel more secure about his or her surroundings. It may seem silly, but it could help with your child’s sleeping problem.

Insomnia And Medical Sleep Conditions

True insomnia is rare in children. Most child sleeping problems are caused by environmental issues like not enough time to relax or being afraid of the dark. If you truly believe that your child has a medical issue making him or her not sleep at night, do not hesitate to talk to a doctor about it. He or she can do some tests to rule out severe conditions like sleep apnea and other conditions like insomnia. Your doctor is your best resource for sleep conditions of the medical nature.

Overview of Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Sleep apnea is more common than we think and more than 30 million Americans suffer from obstructive sleep apnea. People who suffer from this disease have recurrent incidents of throat closing down disabling them to suck air in lungs. There is a muscle that holds the throat when we are awake and it relaxes when we sleep. But when the muscles relax too much and you try to breathe in, the throat gets closed completely not allowing any air to pass through it. This is called obstructive sleep apnea.

Breathing must cease for more than 10 seconds for it to be called apnea. Obstructive sleep apnea can last for upto two minutes causing drop in the oxygen level in the blood. When there is an episode of this disease, the apnea can only be terminated by waking up the victim. This will increase muscle activity of the tongue and throat and they enlarge the airway. This all goes absolutely unnoticed by the sufferer.

Symptoms of Obstructive Sleep Apnea

Most common sleep apnea symptoms include fatigue, tiredness, excessive daytime sleepiness and loud snoring. The other symptoms also include difficulty in concentration, heartburn, memory lapses, rapid weight gain, dry mouth when you awake, intellectual deterioration, excessive perspiration, headaches in the morning, frequent urination, confusion and grogginess when you wake up.

Obstructive sleep apnea can be serious and if goes undiagnosed, it can cause heart attack, cardiac arrest or a stroke during sleep. In addition, the person suffering from it can become extremely sleep deprived which can cause some serious accidents. If left untreated, obstructive sleep apnea can become worse ultimately causing disability or death.

Things to do

It is a sad fact that most of the healthcare professionals are not well informed about this disorder. It is hence a good idea to become as knowledgeable as you can about obstructive sleep apnea. If you suspect that you might be suffering from this disorder, it is a good idea to convert your suspicion into certainty. You can ask for help either from your spouse or some other family member and they can videotape while you are going through one of the sleep apnea. You then need to show this tape to your physician who will refer you for diagnostic sleep study. This study can be done either at your homeor in the sleep disorder center and you undergo all night sleep study. The presence or absence of obstructive sleep apnea can be verified using this test and it will also indicate the severity of the problem. The functions that are monitored during the study are air flow, blood oxygen level, body position, snoring and respiratory effort. There is no pain when this study is conducted and is covered under insurance.

Treatment of Obstructive Sleep Apnea

CPAP(continuous positive airway pressure) is the most commonly prescribed treatment for obstructive sleep apnea. This machine uses a small nasal mask to deliver the air pressure. It can also be treated using surgery but its effectiveness depends on numerous factors. You need to make sure that the surgeon is qualified and has a good track record.