For many children, wearing snuggly pajamas and soft slippers does not mean they are ready to crawl into a soft cozy bed. Unfortunately for some parents, night time can be the most dreaded time of the day. Dreaded because there are some children who just don't want to go to sleep for various reasons.
There are plenty of reasons why children don't want to hit the sack. Some pre-school aged children feel that they will miss out on something fun and exciting. For other children in elementary school, anxiety about taking a test the next day at school may be keeping them awake.
I obviously knew nothing about children. When my older twins were three years old and my younger twins were two years old, I went through a very challenging time trying to get everyone to fall asleep. It became a vicious cycle because the less sleep they got, the crankier they seemed to be.
I tried lavender baths right before bed, I tried earlier dinners, I tried Sesame Street Bedtime Stories DVD's and the list goes on and on. It's exhausting enough trying to get one overtired child to bed. Four overtired children who couldn't fall asleep was way too many for one household.
As a lifestyle reporter with years of interviewing medical experts, I clearly knew that not getting enough sleep weakens your immune system. According to Dr. Sears, world renowned pediatrician, children aged two to five years old need ten to twelve hours of sleep per day. I can only imagine what Dr. Sears would have said about six to seven hours of sleep a night.
I knew that I had to think outside of the box for a sleep remedy that would work for young children. So as a stressed out adult, I looked back at some of the most relaxing moments of my years before children and they always involved the spa. So I decided to recreate a spa night at home that was child friendly and see if it put everyone into a more relaxed zone.
What many parents seem to forget is that young children do suffer from stress and anxiety. Of course it is not the same level of stress we suffer from with our jobs, our finances and endless list of responsibilities. In your toddler's mind however, the stress can be overwhelming enough to affect their daily behavior. Some children become overstimulated from new pre-school classes they are taking or frustrated from trying to learn a new skill.
So I created a spa environment for them that included aromatherapy, soaking the feet, a light foot massage and nature soundtrack of ocean waves. The first night I experimented with this, I could just see the nervous energy melting away.
That night my children went to sleep without a struggle and fell asleep faster. I did not have to deal with the mutliple excuses of why they just HAD to get out of bed.
Dennis Nielsen