Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Sleep Issues and Strategies

Stole the above from another topic.

Is "horrible napping" common? We have sleep issues several nights a week. Jr does may nap 30 min twice a day and sleep 8 hours a night. He averages 10 hours a day. Some nights he will not fall asleep and wants our constant attention. To stay sane, my DW and I are now trading off on nights so one of us can sleep 7-8 hours uninterrupted.

Does anyone have issues? What do you do to deal with it? Does it ever get better or is this a "feature" of these kids?

The way I dealt with it was to nurse them to sleep until they were three years old. I'm not necessarily recommending that strategy, but they now sleep all night in their own beds.

This is what we call a feature, not a bug.

My ds8 seemed to never sleep, but, really he just never slept unless I was there, and I mean right there. This was until about 2.5, but maybe I coddled too much. I think he might have a bit of 'gerd', but other than that I think he just wanted to be around us...
Back in the days of $1 gas, we used to drive him around to get him down for a nap. (sorry ozone layer...) We could hardly ever successfully transfer him from car seat to crib, though. It seemed like the minute you let go of him, he'd feel the temperature change or something and wake up. My sister later suggested a sheepskin for this..I think they sell them at ikea now. Another thing you need is a very tall stack of good kids books to get you through the night. Singing always seemed to just keep him up longer, maybe the books did too...

Also, when they are going through intense developmental stages it can get worse: sitting up in the middle of the night to sing the abcs. But in the end it's all fun.

My dd2 is doing better than ds did. Maybe I'm better at this, now. She is a better napper and will even go down by herself, but she still loves to be up when I am up, even if that means 5:15 am.

Many GT kids have minds too active to sleep. It is pretty common. Exercise helps some kids, as does an early enough bedtime that they don't get overtired.

I am one of the lucky ones. My kids both slept through the night quite early (6 weeks for DS7 and 8 weeks for DS4). Of course, they were giant kids, too, so there's something of a trade-off there, I think...Big babies, harder labor, but sleep sooner.

As for sleeping alone: I was a hard-you-know-what and let them each scream it out for a night when they were old enough to put themselves to sleep (over a year old, but I forget how much over a year--???). It was a night of pure misery, but it was just one night. They were both good at getting themselves to sleep after that. It's not a strategy that everyone can use, but it worked like a charm for me. I just reminded myself that they weren't hurt, just tossing a fit. Fits I can resist!

Also, both our kids are pretty independent, so if they wake up at night, they usually just deal with it on their own. (And I stay up so late that if they wake in the middle of the night, I'm usually still up anyway.)

So all in all, they're good sleepers. Not all GT kids are, so I am VERY grateful to the GT gods (or whomever) on this one!

Hi - DS4 was a 20-minute cat napper. We had about a 6-month period just around age 3, when he took 2-3 hour naps. Yay! but when he was <1, pretty much the only naps he would take would be in the baby bjorn or in the car. He would not transfer from carseat to anywhere either. Ugh. (He did transfer and continue sleeping once -when he was 3 and had run around Legoland in CA all day. I guess complete exhaustion is the ticket!

I have to admit, though, that DS has always been a good night sleeper. He has always slept 10-12 at night, no problems. (Well, I did nurse him to sleep for quite a long time...and now we have to "just stay in my room for a little bit" at bedtime.) But we gave up on napping somewhere before 3.5, I think.

This is still a sore subject for me. I think I may have developed PTSD as a result of them never sleeping. Then looking around and seeing all the sleeping angel babies and wondering what I was doing wrong.
But, yes, it does get better. DD8 still doesn't sleep well but will stare at her ceiling quietly for hours(self described) and not wake us up.
I must not be very bright because I need a lot of sleep.

Me, too, 'Neato. I do have insomnia issues when I don't exercise, but even then I need LOTS of sleep. Just in the morning instead of at night, like normal people.

I'm convinced that my kids' ability to sleep well is a survival instinct because when Mommy doesn't get enough sleep, she's *not* a nice person!

Ditto this. The rule in my house growing up is the same one we're using with our kids: they may stay up reading pretty much as late as they want, but they must be in bed the whole time. No toys. It worked for me when I was a kid and it seems to work for our boys.

I am exactly like this! I must exercise or I lay awake. But I need plenty of sleep. Especially being home with kids full time!

My kids don't seem to appreciate this as well as yours though! DD4 is STILL weaseling her way into our bed at night. Which is particularly unpleasant after a 90 and humid day! I was not a nice mommy at all today.

Well, obviously you're too nice, kimck. You need to take "How to be a nasty mommy" lessons from me.

I'm EEEEEEEEEEEVIL! They're happy to avoid me!

We gave the books to DD8 to "read" until she fell asleep as early as 18 months. I have a picture of her when she was 2 lying on her bed with a giant disney book open and over her face!
MON-DD8 has pretty much the same sleeping strategy as your daughter. During the school year it's in bed at 8:30.
After we close the door......what happens in DD's room, stays in DD's room.
I find it unproductive to police her sleeping. I figure she will go to sleep when she is sleepy.

Kimck - we have the same problem. Our DS4 goes to sleep in his own bed every night, but almost always by the middle of the night he's made the transfer to ours. Often this involves some loud wailing - it's a bit hard to tell, but I think he has nightmares; the good nights, though they are few, are when he comes in without waking us up. Lately we've had an added problem - horrible wailing fits in the middle of the night because something itches. He has some mild over-sensitivities in general - we often cut tags out of clothes or have to make sure the sock seam is in the right place - but this is well beyond. I confess that at 3:00 a.m. when DS is screaming his head off because some apparent mosquito bite itches (though I can't even see it!), and he is flailing about so badly that I can't even put the anti-itch cream on (can you tell such an event is fresh in my mind?) I sometimes revert to Kriston's strategy. Evil daddy. I try hard to avoid this response in general, but a person can only take so much. For some reason his uncanny ability to choose the worst part of my sleep cycle seems to play an important role in whether this response gets evoked. I'm probably giving him some awful Freudian fear of itches this way, but not having slept in 4 years is definitely getting to me. I am, by the way, a person who really needs both exercise and sleep. I used to get huge amounts of both, and now get rather less of each than is probably healthy for me.

BB

BBDad - your son's sensitivities remind me how we do have to go through quite a process before DS4 will in fact go to bed. He absolutely must have long sleeves/long pants jammies. His other usual requirement is socks, too, but i've somehow convinced him that none of them are clean so he won't sweat so horribly on these 90 degree days. Also, he complained about blankets being uncomfortable, and he would only sleep inside of a duvet cover (with quilt in it too), which left him incredibly sweaty. (When he was younger, he would sleep with a blanket footed sleeper, and threw off any and all loose blankets. So I think he has a need to be enclosed.) I finally found a silk sleeping bag liner (his "silky", which works great - he's enclosed in a little twin sized silk cacoon, and he's cool enough and happy. When I saw the itch thing, i thought "hmmm, maybe a silky would work." You could tell him he's completely (magically?) protected since he's all enclosed. Just a thought.

kimck - i've been "mean mommy" lately too - i can't stand this sticky weather!

St. Pauli: I think that our DS's itchiness doesn't have to do with clothes; or at least it didn't in this recent incident. I think he really did have some (very minor!) mosquito bite or something. It's just that he seems, especially in the middle of the night, to respond to it all out of proportion to its effect. It's hot and sticky here too, though, so maybe he's just out of sorts from that. Me too!

BB

My son has always had trouble falling asleep and he seems to need less sleep than I do. It helps a little when he reads, but he still hears things outside and wonders what could be making the noise, he can't get comfortable enough to fall asleep, and he doesn't like being alone in the dark and says he needs a night light, but then he puts the blanket over his head. He wants to talk to us and would keep this up for hours if we let him. If I get up in the middle of the night, he wakes up and is right there and wants to know if I am okay. Sleeping in the same tent with him at scout camp is not fun. It is either too hot or too cold. He can't tune out the sound of the coyotes howling or the sound of the wind in the trees and the thought that a spider or wasp might be in our tent. He sometimes dozes off at about 4 a.m. but then he is up with the others at the crack of dawn.

"Nighttime Parenting" by William Sears really changed my attitude about the whole CIO scenario. I had dabbled with Ferberizing my first baby, and I couldn't stand it. Attachment parenting just feels right for my family, though I know it isn't right for everyone.

Its amazing reading all the different ways we try to help get them to bed. We never really did it correct. DS5 almost 6 slept with us till about 4 years old. He is a hot sleeper, bed hogger, with nightmares. Finally we get him into his own bed (Bribed him with a Thomas the train bed) we still had the I am scared, or nightmare that brings him back to our bed. He never was a napper, but could sleep most the night. He still is always looking for reasons to sleep with us, somtimes we give in.
Now we have a full routine for the bed time, One of us must read to him,(It's better now, but from 1 on it was 6+ books a night) or he will read to us, when its time for bed, I have to turn on the invisable force field that protects him, then do a count down from 10 for a blast off into space as I turn off the lights. Then I have to lay down with him until he falls asleep. (I know bad dad) Have you ever tried sleeping in a Thomas the train bed when you are 6'1.

The good news last night he told me he could go to bed by himself without me lyning next to him. He said he was going to be 6 soon and needed to practice falling asleep alone.
What a surprise for me. 1st time, I hope it continues. I think Evillll dad would have been a lot eaiser.

It does for our family too. And I do agree, it isn't necessarily the right fit for everyone. I think kids can perceive whether or not you are comfortable with what your parenting choices. Maybe even more so for GT kids. It's just better to be consistent and know where your lines are. At the end of the day, whatever works for you!

My DH is actually more of a softy than I am. DD4
knows she needs to climb in on his side of the bed. And Edwin, your story gives us hope!

Edwin, your story gives us hope too. Our line, insofar as we have one, is that DS has to go to sleep in his own bed. This is not much of an accomplishment, however, since it involves DW sitting there with him until he's fallen asleep. Also, like you, we have a rather baroque bedtime ritual, though I confess it doesn't involve force shields. Maybe that's worth trying. I remember a time long ago when I had the opinion that he should probably sleep in his own bed through the night, but it's long since stopped seeming worth the effort. No method that seemed at all humane had any effect. (Ferberizing seemed to me barbaric, though I can imagine that it works well if you have the fortitude to stick with it.)

For the most part, we've learned to be at peace with our situation. Bed-hog issues don't bother me too much since it's pretty easy to move him over, and I'm even pretty unflappable about getting kicked in the ribs; the massive head butt to the first thoracic vertebra that I received a few nights ago did get me worrying a bit about pulmonary function, but it seems to have worked itself out more or less. Evil dad comes out mostly under the extreme stress associated with loud shrieking in the middle of the night that has no apparent cause. Even then he is limited to quiet but firm words of dissuasion. But that seems to be effective. I do worry about the Freudian issues related to itching, though.

BB

Wow... we must have touched a nerve here. Lots of posts here!!

My DS8 didn't sleep through the night until after he was 4. He was a baby who would catnap for 20 minutes and then be off for the races again. We tried the ferberizing thing once. (an only once!) He screamed for over an hour until he was so upset that he puked everywhere. He literally got so angry over the injustice of being left to cry it out that he would not calm down for at least an hour or two afterwards. (I think he was about 2 at the time).

My only strategy for getting him to sleep for either naps or bedtime was to read to him. By the time he was 18 months, I would pick out the longest, most boring books from the library (books with over 100 words per page!) and then read as quietly as possible while lying down in bed with him. It would usually take an hour of reading in the afternoon, and an hour of reading at night, for him to fall asleep. He was just way too mesmerized by even boring stories to fall asleep. I would quite often read myself to sleep, only to have him shake me and yell for me to keep reading.

The best advice that I ever received about raising kids was from a mom down the street. She said that her little guy got more and more wound up the more exhausted he was. That described by son to a tee. His mind starts racing the more tired he is. He also has more nightmares if he goes to bed very late. My DS hits this small window of sleepiness after dinner, around 7:30 at night, every night. We have to catch it then, or he gets a second wind and will be up all night long. So even at the age of eight, we have an the hour of reading, followed by an early bed time of 8 pm. He may lay in bed for 30 minutes and think about things, but he falls asleep fairly quickly.

As a side note ... If we are up late for some reason (scout, family or friends), and he is exhausted when he goes to bed, I know that it will be a terrible night. He just can't seem to get into a deep, restful sleep when he is tired. He will also unfailingly wake up at some ungodly early time, instead of sleeping in. (so he will short change it on both ends). Interestingly enough, I have the same problems. I catch a second wind if I stay up too late. And if I go to sleep exhausted, I rarely have a deep and restful sleep.

When DD was three we became rather desperate for her to sleep in her own room since I was expecting DS. What we ended up doing seemed a little barbaric, but it worked. DD had to stay in her own room at night. If she came out, we told her we had to shut her door so she would stay in there. This resulted in much wailing and gnashing of teeth. If she stayed in her room, she was allowed to have her door open.

DS was fine sleeping in his own room at three. We got lucky there

I definitely see the merits of attachment parenting, but if I'd had to spend all night with my toddlers given my personality, I'd have been an emotional wreck. They had all my time all day long, all my brainpower, my breasts...for goodness' sake, I needed my sleep to myself!

I always thought the barbaric part of Ferber was how long people made it take. Stretching the process out over days or weeks just seemed too painful to me. Torture! I never got that part of how people did it. "Do it or don't do it," I thought. But the one-night version worked like a charm for us.

I just reminded myself with each child that he was not hurt, and that if I were a toy and he were throwing a tantrum to get me, I would not give myself to him. That helped. Then I had a nice stiff drink to steady my nerves, and I turned on a fan to dampen the sound of the weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, while still allowing me to hear if something was really wrong with the child. (It wasn't.)

It was like taking a band-aid off. It hurt at the time, but when it was over, we were ALL happier. We all sleep better as a result. It was certainly easier to break a 16-mo.-old (or whenever we did it) of the "I need Mommy" habit than it is to break a 4yo of it.

But with that said, let me reiterate that I have great respect for those practicing attachment parenting. Actually, in virtually every way except sleep, I was practicing attachment parenting, too. But sleep was where I drew the line...

To each his or her own.

Absolutely. And I definitely have respect for those who have the fortitude to stick it out. I'm just not one of them. But then, it's difficult for me to get the band-aid off too.

BB

I am pretty strict on the sleep schedule but I also find activity relates to her sleeping. Since she is extremely active, in swim camp from 9-12 mon-fri now, her sleep schedule is pretty good. When she is not on such an active schedule, then I have problems.

Ren

Jr did this. At 3mos we both were so exhausted and he somehow turned off this monitor such that we did not hear him for a while. He was so upset when we picked him up that he balled for an hour and was banging on me with his little hands - even after he ate.

His last real CIO spell at 4mos was in my FIL's car with my MIL in traffic. He still gets upset when he hears her voice and cries just when he can SEE FIL's car. If we sit with him in it, he goes ballistic, struggling to get loose. His grudge is upsetting to my MIL for obvious reasons.

I agree with this in theory, but we have had to go with a rule of no exciting novels in bed because he can and he will stay up to 4 or 5 if it is exciting enough. So we give him things like Smithsonian magazines and Stephen Jay Gould books which he finds interesting but that do no create suspense.

I was not allowed in my parent's bed. But I always had horrid nightmares and would come and get my mother who would come and join me in my bed until (drum roll, please) I went off to college at 18. Are you scared now?!?

But DS never comes to get me, never joins us in bed, and never disrupts our sleep unless he is genuinely sick. And, I did absolutely nothing to deserve this! No trick, no skills, no books, just pure injustice! Because if anyone deserves a disrupted sleep, it would be me!

Oh acs, your mother sounds incredibly sweet though!

DS7 is very low maintenance at bed time. He will read all night often if he has a good book and I don't remember to have him shut his light off at a reasonable time. I actually wish he would still let us read with him! I cannot get DD4 to even look at books by herself at bedtime, although she does all the time during the day.

I can relate on this issue....DS5 has never been a good sleeper. For literally - NO exaggeration- the first 3 years of his life, he woke up an average of 4-6 times a night. Both my husband and I were seriously sleep deprived. Just in the last year or so, he has more nights a week where he will only be up once a night and 1 or so nights a week where he sleeps through the night. He sleeps in his own bedroom and due to his Sensory Processing Disorder, hears every little sound - he is terrified of the air conditioner kicking on and off and some nights refuses to do his teeth and potty because he is scared to death that the noise will kick on while he is in the bathroom (and our air is NOT loud - it's actually a brand new outside unit as well - he just has super sensitive hearing). He has a sound machine that we turn up full blast at night to try to help drown out the noise and when he was a baby he would fall asleep to our vacuum (so we taped it on a recorder and had it on constant repeat).
He had GERD very badly when he was an infant and pretty much would only fall asleep on DH or my chest and a handful of times in his car seat...i would strap on his little baby harness and walk the neighborhood at 2 and 3 am trying to get him to sleep...and of course the infamous hour long car rides through the area that never seemed to work.
When he turned 4, we had to make a special chart for him where I photographed him completing his night rituals (bath, teeth, story....) and when he finished one step, he would turn the card over, for each night he completed all the bedtime routines he would get a sticker on his chart and once a line was filled up on his chart, he got to buy a new book at the store...that cut our finally getting into bed deal down to 30 minutes instead of an hour. We read 4 books every night and then DH and I take turns each night laying next to him until he falls asleep....but I don't know if he will ever be a sleeper.

DD is still not a sleeper but now she is old enough (nine) to be in charge of all the book reading, music playing, etc. You'll get there

Belle-

My kids have had similar patterns to yours. The three who took multiple years to sleep through the night all have issues with dairy- from mild intolerance to what we believe is real allergy. We are still waiting for our three year old to sleep through the night. She has gotten MUCH better since we took her off all dairy- including yogurt and butter, which people who are merely intolerant are supposed to be able to digest easily. I've always been a real butter user, so it's been hard to change my cooking to all vegetable oil based spreads. We have also switched to soymilk for cooking, whereas we used to make pancakes and such with cow's milk. I can see when she has a bit of cow's milk that ti does affect her at night- it can be just a single chocolate chip cookie, and then she'll wake 5-6 times crying at night and be difficult to comfort.

I believe that allergies can also cause or exacerbate reflux in infants. If you haven't checked out possible intolerances or allergies, maybe it could help.

Bump

My DD4 has a very active mind that she can't shut down at bedtime. I'm the same way, and we both have to be exhausted in order to fall asleep quickly. Sometimes she's still awake at 10 after having gone to bed at 8:30. My DS8 goes to sleep relatively quickly and rarely wakes up. DS6 is somewhere in between. I often lie awake for an hour or two after going to bed, even if I'm tired!

I asked a couple of GT friends about their sleep patterns and some were like me and some weren't. I agree with the people who say that this habit is a feature of being GT and not a bug. I don't know how common it is in the general population.

Val

Both DS4 and DD19mo have always required less sleep than all the other kids their ages. When DS was an infant he barely slept during the day. All other babies slept during the day, but he just didn't. He always slept fairly well at night, but required less sleep than typical children. He also seemed bored as an infant. As if he couldn't sleep but wasn't sure what to do since he just didn't have the motor skills to do stuff yet. He now sleeps about 10 hours a night, no nap. My 19mo old sleeps about 11 hours a night, with about an hour nap on a good day. Some days she will sleep a few hours...but usually it is less than an hour. They sleep through the night well so I don't feel like I can complain. When DS was about a year until about 3 1/2 he would wake up in bed very early and would just sing forever until we came to get him. Sometimes he would wake up so early it would be almost an hour. He truly was singing for fun though, wasn't upset in the slightest. Very odd, but cute.

That is too cute shellymos! DD24 (who I think is bright but may not be gifted) slept 12 hours everynight and would nap 1 or 2 times a day starting at about 4months, funny thing is as an adult she still sleeps a lot! My two younger daughters 4 and 5 (both gifted)still wake us up almost everynight and go to bed late even if we start at 8:00pm the last one is not asleep until 10:30. Needless to say we don't get enough sleep over here.

DD24 mos. defaults to exactly 11 hours of sleep in a 24 hour period, however we want to divide it up. I usually opt for at least a one hour nap because I need a break! She wakes several times per night. Exercise or other forms of stimulation do not make her more tired.

As a newborn she did not sleep much and was bored and irritated she couldn't move around herself. I swear I was the only mother celebrating getting a *break* when DD started crawling and then walking. lol

shellymos...my DD is very much like your description. She never slept in the day as an infant and would finally collapse around 8 pm at night (If we were lucky) OK I shouldn't say never. We had a 15 minute nap here and there but not the normal baby sleeping cycle. We use to walk her around the neighborhood sometimes at midnight b/c she would sleep for a few hours and wake up. In the stroller she would konk out but trying to put her in the crib would awaken her. We eventually used the swing for her bed.

Now I can get her to take a nap in the afternoon most of the time. And she goes to bed at night with no problems. She just seems to like being in her bed and I have empty her room out so she has no distractions. She only has her stuffed animals in bed with her. But just because she goes to bed with no problems doesn't mean she sleeps right away. I hear her playing sometimes 2 hours before it gets quiet. Usually having conversations with her animals. Then she wakes up early in the morning but quietly plays until someone comes and gets her. So I am not really sure how much she sleeps. I would say 9 - 10 hours is her norm.

Yeah, I remember not being sure about my DS as well because I would hear him up forever just singing/talking...and then up early doing the same. Now he seems to be out shortly after 9pm and usually I wake him around 7:00 if he isn't awake yet, but sometimes he is already up. He does seem to sleep better if he works really hard at something mentally during the day. Like on days he goes to his montessori school he has been sleepy earlier at night. He still doesn't fall asleep earlier but gets tired and sometimes sleeps in longer. That is a good thing. I love my sleep. I would love more of it. And I should go because it is going to be a late night as I brought some work home with me to do tonight. (sigh).