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Sleep

How to Stop Getting into Bedtime Battles with Toddlers

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Bedtime can be one of the most difficult times for parents, especially when your child is a toddler. Kids seem to be convinced that they’re going to miss out on everything interesting the instant that they fall asleep, which means that they tend to fight to avoid going to sleep. However, this doesn’t have to be your life. There are a lot of ways that you can help your child build good sleep habits and make your own life a little bit easier at bedtime.

Develop A Routine

Just like everything else in their lives, kids do best with a routine for bedtime. While they are young, you get to choose what activities go into your child’s bedtime routine. You should set them up for success by having them help you tidy up their toys, taking care of their hygiene and by reading to them for bed. Building habits early in life can help them to keep those habits the older they get, making them more likely to sleep better later on in their life as well. Knowing what to expect from bedtime also helps your toddler resign themselves to their fate.

Limit Screen Time in the Evening

One thing that should not be in your child’s routine is screen time. Electronics are a great way for your child to learn new things, but they also cause your child’s brain to stay awake and focus on what’s on the screen. This can cause a lot of problems when it comes to actually getting to sleep because the effects of the screen can stay for 3 to 4 hours afterward. In order to avoid a grouchy toddler struggling to sleep, limit screen time to before dinner for the best results.

Keep Dinner Early

Speaking of dinner, you should make sure that dinner is three or four hours before bedtime whenever possible. When the human body is digesting food and sleeping at the same time, it leads to indigestion and needing to go to the bathroom more often.

You should also avoid making their dinners excessively spicy or acidic, as these can increase the likelihood of your child having indigestion. If your toddler is getting hungry later in the evening, try giving them a snack that’s it’s a combination of dairy and carbohydrates, such as a bowl of non-sugary cereal. This combination helps their body to digest the tryptophan that can help make them sleepier, thus helping them get to sleep easier.

Make the Room Comfortable & Distraction Free

This may seem like a no-brainer, but making your toddler’s room comfortable is key to making them actually want to go to sleep. The mattress doesn’t have to be fancy. You can even get it from Amazon. It just has to be comfortable and as distraction free as possible.

Kids are very easily distracted, so this might be harder than you think. A good policy is to keep as much of their favorite stuff out of sight as possible. This will help to keep your child from getting out of bed on their own to play with their toys while you think they’re sleeping.

Being a Parent is Hard – Especially Without Sleep

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Being a parent is not an easy task.

When dealing with school, soccer games and homework, things can get a little hectic. In moments like these, your health and sleeping habits can be overlooked, leading to a state of sleep deprivation. This can cause many problems, from obesity to stress, to poor judgment and many other negative effects.

By adjusting your routine and habits, however, this is something you can tackle and control.

The Virginia Spine Institute has created a guide to help rid of the effects of sleep deprivation and to help you get through daily life happy and energized:

Summer and Kids’ Sleep Schedules: How to Find a Happy Medium

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Verbally trying to convince your child that they need to get their sleep is an undeniable challenge. As soon as summer vacation hits, it seems that all the kids want to do is stay up too late and sleep in too long. As a parent with your kids’ best interests at heart, it can be frustrating to watch. Depending on the age of your kids, you may find it best to pick and choose your battles. However, with elementary age kids, it can be easier than you think to find a happy medium that will maintain the excitement of summer without ruining your kids’ sleeping habits.

Agree on a Reasonable Time

With school out, your kids are excited to capitalize on the sudden freedom of their schedule. Forcing them to maintain exactly the schedule they had during the school year is not a give and take solution.

Instead, agree on a time that is just slightly different than the typical bedtime and waking up. This ensures they are still getting proper sleep while allowing them the excitement of a different bedtime.

An alternative option might be to agree on a single sleep-in day. One day a week, it is agreed that – within reason – the kids get to stay up later and sleep in. This provides a similar agreement in which the excitement of the long summer days is taken advantage of while a healthy sleep schedule is being maintained.

Subtly Coax Sleepiness

Going to bed can often be a less than fruitful argument. Fortunately, though, Mother Nature is here to help your point of view along. Certain foods will encourage sleepiness, meaning they can make an ideal nighttime snack.

Cherries and cherry juice are the best way to get your child to feel tired and seek sleep on their own. Cherries are naturally high in melatonin, the hormone our brains produce for sleep.

Be sure to avoid excess sugars, fats, and empty carbs. Things like bananas with high magnesium may also encourage sleep as magnesium relaxes muscles. You might also consider getting your children into the habit of performing a certain bedtime routine which will work to signal their brains that sleep is coming.

For example, an hour before bedtime, they put pajamas on. Screens are off at this point, and you may supply a coloring book or other quiet, seated activity. A half an hour before bed, each child gets a cup of cherry juice. Fifteen minutes before bed, they brush their teeth. This slow lead up to bed will eventually teach their minds, Pavlov-style, to feel sleepy at the end of the routine.

Staying Up Late Credits

If your child wants to stay up late, you may want to consider a chore chart, each chore worth a certain number of additional minutes past bedtime. That way, they will only be able to stay up a short amount of time and will simultaneously be helping around the house.

Doing what’s right for our kids can be a difficult task, particularly when they are fighting against the positive habit of change. The key is compromise. Respect your child’s wishes and decisions – within reason – and they are far more likely to be receptive to your ideas as well. Keep in mind that summer is their vacation, and you wouldn’t want to have a sleep schedule if you went on vacation either. While their health is important, treating your kids like future adults is also critical in their development. Settle at a midway point and you will spend much less of your summer arguing with your kids.