Entering the three and four year old life stage and the behaviours it may bring swings rapidly from exciting to confusing even when there are no sleep challenges or overtiredness. However, an overtired preschooler swings more frequently and often more dramatically, and can be more difficult to parent than a well-slept one.
Just knowing this, along with the frustration of a preschooler who is still dancing around the bedroom at ten o'clock at night. is enough to challenge the patience of even the calmest of parents. So, let's have a good look at what we should be focusing on to promote sleep and restore serenity and sanity at your house.
Avoid the Overtired Preschooler
Brain wave disturbance that occurs in an overtired person will make calming to sleep very difficult.
As would do for an infant, watch for tired signs to cue sleep you readiness in your preschooler and act.
Make Sure They Are Well Fed… gotta love a food coma!
Ensure your preschooler is offered good size meals with good variety your including grains (cereals & breads), vegetables (all the colors) & fruits (not too much!), meats & fish and dairy (milk & cheese). It's surprising how much a preschooler will eat. A preschooler needs as much iron as a fully grown man.
Remember your preschooler may still not understand that not eating creates that uncomfortable sensation we call hunger, make his tummy rumble and keep him awake. So, talk to him about this each time.
Cut Out the Junk Food… and don't over-do the fruit intake!
Avoid unnatural sugar, chocolate. lollypops. etc. Sugar is known to fuel sudden bursts. It can also produce an over-active energy bowel, just when you don't need it! Remember, fruit is full of a natural sugar called fructose, so limit fruit to 1 piece per day.
Foods rich in iron are important. We know that anaemia causes disturbance to sleep. So, include meats, green leafy vegies and lentils in your preschooler's diet.
Early lunch (11.30am) often works best if your three year old is still having regular or occasional day sleeps. Straight to bed after lunch!
Plenty of water to drink up until dinner-time.
Be the Boring and Predictable Parent… bedtime rituals are gold!
Begin the family night-time ritual with dinner no later than 6pm.
You might like to put on an oil burner with good quality lavender oil in it around this time. Lavender scent promotes a calm house. Choose somewhere safe to burn it. Pushed to the back of a kitchen bench usually works well.
Bath-time is next. Lots of splashing fun and a nudie run to follow.
By the time the preschooler gets out of the bath, dressed and back into the living area, the blinds should be drawn and the lights dimmed. All sounds lowered. TV's and all electronic screens turned off or down.
Screen time is over for the day at least 1 hour before bed.
Move slowly and quietly to signal to your child that the day has ended and bedtime is close.
Brush teeth, one story chosen by each child is read in their bed, or if multiple children, the story is read on the couch.
A few minutes for a cuddle, perhaps a quiet song and then off to bed.
The ritual you chose needs to be similar each night. Then your child can rely on it and will know his part to play....which is to get into bed and close his eyes to sleep.
Provide choices…but only 1 or 2!
Too many choices will confuse your preschooler and may end up frustrating you both.
Preschoolers often like to have a small sense of control, so offer 1-2 choices with 2 options only at this time. ie. socks on or off? The train book or the zoo book?
Be Creative...try role play
You might like to try putting Teddy's PJ's on. reading him a story and tucking him into bed together to ensure Ted is warm.
Resist Stalling Tactics
Avoid getting drawn into just another story' or 'I need a drink or I need another kiss'. It's time for sleep now so we can play in the morning.
Be Aware Which Sleep Associations Can Be Helpful or Unhelpful: Know the difference
Needing you to lay with them to go off to sleep is an unhelpful sleep association, as I’m sure you have many other things to do that time of the evening, and you may not always be available to provide this.
Use of teddy, cuddly blanket, white noise or soft music will help your child to transition from your presence to the bed. This independent sleep association can be very useful.
Return Boomerangs to Their Bed
Persistence is the key! Patience is needed here as you may have to steel yourself for a number of nights of this before the habit is broken.
Children will generally tire of being jack-in-the-boxes when they get little feedback from the behaviour.
Camp Out In Their Bedroom…if all else fails
Some particularly tricky preschoolers will require you in sight when first beginning to intervene in their wakeful behaviour.
Be a minimalist. Give the least you can possibly get away with.
If your child needs you to lay with him to settle. Try laying across the bottom of the bed or sit on the floor beside the bed.
If your child needs to know you are there to close his eyes, try sitting on the floor beside the bed and holding his hand.
If your child just needs to have you in sight. Try sitting in the doorway on the floor of his bedroom away from the bed.
The idea of this method, known as 'camping out', is that you begin to remove yourself gradually away from the bed, then the bedroom. It might be useful to practice the temporary leaving of the bedroom first for a few nights if your child is struggling. i.e. you might say ‘daddy's just going to the toilet and then I'll come back' or 'mummy's just going to put her PJ's on and then I'll be back’ ......remember to ALWAYS come back as promised. The very purpose of this method is to build trust.
These tips are relatively easy to adjust to fit your individual family yet they are enormously helpful in supporting your preschooler with learning to drift to sleep with ease. If your preschooler continues to struggle to calm for sleep, stay with them to offer a sense of comfort and safety until they can manage to do it themselves.
This works because children are dependent both physically and emotionally during those first years and often need help to find calm and feel okay about being alone. If you want your preschooler to sleep independently of you, remember they need to feel safe and secure to be able to be separated from you and harsh ‘training' and 'quick fixes' are potentially more threatening than calming for them.
What is desirable is that your preschooler is comforted by a cuddle and the knowledge that you will return if you leave them. The goal is to eventually leave your preschooler when they are awake and calm, and return if they need you. Progressively, the time you can be away extends as your child learns to trust that you will return if needed. However, if your preschooler cannot manage to calm, then they will need kind and predictable comforting until they can calm, before it is appropriate to leave them alone.
Some children cannot tolerate being left alone or can only tolerate brief separations.
If this is the case, you can leave your preschooler when calm THEN RETURN if they become distressed. Some children may need someone around until they go to sleep initially, whilst others will stay awake to be sure the parent doesn't try to sneak out of the room.
Each of these situations is manageable by offering support that is appropriate to the preschooler’s emotional development and capacities and little by little building on their ability to be calm in their bed. This is a progressive process, so be realistic in your expectations and build upon your child’s growing capacity as they learn, with your support, how to self soothe at sleep times.
The reasons why children don't sleep are as varied as the personalities of the children.
Many parents however, say their preschooler has never really been a good sleeper, by that they mean the child, even as an infant, struggled to sleep or woke frequently overnight, even when they were not hungry. Other preschoolers may have a clearly identifiable catalyst to their wakefulness or sleep resistance. The most common triggers being moving house, a new baby or being cared for by someone new as parents return to work. Whatever the cause, a sensitive and responsive approach to addressing preschooler sleep struggles means your child’s experience can be respected while they are guided to a new way of drifting to sleep. Contrary to popular belief, children just do not need to cry and be distressed for extended periods, to learn that sleep is okay.
Copyright Louise Shalders
