Dei'ah veDibur - Information & Insight
  

A Window into the Chareidi World

26 Av 5761 - August 15, 2001 | Mordecai Plaut, director Published Weekly
NEWS

OPINION
& COMMENT

HOME
& FAMILY

IN-DEPTH
FEATURES

VAAD HORABBONIM HAOLAMI LEINYONEI GIYUR

TOPICS IN THE NEWS

HOMEPAGE

 

Produced and housed by
Shema Yisrael Torah Network
Shema Yisrael Torah Network

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home and Family
Sleepless Children
by A. Ross

To let the child cry it out or not. That is the question. No definitive answer...

Part II

In 1986, the Institute for the Care of Mother and Child, in Prague, published a report on children's sleeping patterns. They came to the conclusion that infants vary tremendously in how long and how deeply they sleep, how restless they are and how much they move in their sleep. They decided that it depended on the child's personality. This study proved what most parents already knew!

About fifty years ago in Chicago, a young physiology graduate used an EEG (electroencephalogram) to record the impulses of the brain while his subjects slept. He made an observation that people had regular periods of Rapid Eye Movements (REM) throughout the night. He also found that people who were awakened during these periods of REM sleep were far more likely to report dreams.

Since that time, sleep has been analyzed in increasingly sophisticated sleep laboratories. There are two main forms to sleep: orthodox and REM. Orthodox sleep is divided into four categories, ranging from very light sleep to the fourth stage which is a very deep sleep. The same person who will waken at the slightest sound while in the first stage of sleep might sleep through drawers being opened and closed and quite an amount of noise during the fourth stage of sleep. In spite of all findings in research, Hashem has given mothers an instinct to wake up from the deepest sleep if their own child is distressed. Naturally, there are exceptions to the rule, but on the whole, this instinct works.

Most people follow a regular sequence through the various phases of sleep, about once in every 90 to 100 minutes throughout the night. Babies have a much shorter sleep cycle of about fifty minutes, which would explain why they are more prone to wake at night.

It has been found in these sleep laboratories that chronic insomniacs often get as much sleep as everyone else, although they will claim that they haven't slept a wink all night.

It seems that adults spend about 80% of their sleeping time in deep sleep, and only 20% in light sleep; babies have a different ratio, with half their sleeping time being light sleep. Some babies who wake up at night just turn over and go back to sleep; others don't.

It is most frustrating when doctors, neighbors, friends and even grandparents say that the sleepless child is the fault of the parents. However, it is true that a parent's reaction to episodes of sleeplessness can prolong what would perhaps have been a temporary problem. If a child wakes up with an earache and you pick him up, take him downstairs, cuddle him and perhaps give him a drink, he will calm down and go back to sleep after a while. He might wake up again the next night, even if he has no earache, and you might pick him up again. You are beginning to reinforce his behavior. It is much more pleasant to be picked up and cuddled than to stay alone in a dark room. By the time you realize that this has been going on for quite a while, it is part of the child's way of life. In this case, where parents themselves have unwittingly conditioned the sleep problem, crying it out is probably the best cure.

The most common advice given to parents is to let them cry it out. This works very well for some parents. For a baby who has never yet slept through the night, this might work very well if parents' nerves can take the strain. The first night, the baby cries for half an hour. The second night, it may be twenty minutes and by the end of the week, the baby seems to realize that crying is futile and he cries himself to sleep.

For the older child who has been mistakenly `conditioned' to wake up regularly and demand attention, this method is also very effective. However, this advice is unacceptable to many parents. They let the child cry for half an hour or even more, and then cannot take the strain any longer, so they pick up the child. They are right to do so, if they feel they are being cruel. Letting a baby scream is not the only solution; there must be other ways. Hashem has designed a baby's cry to evoke powerful emotions in a mother and you can only follow advice which appeals to you.

A child of four wakes up at around one and wants to play for two hours. She might even pry open Mother's eyelids with her little fingers for a story or song in the middle of the night! Parents try everything they can and listen to all the advice they hear from friends and relatives and naturally, also from professionals. Nothing seems to work and they try the next thing. One woman told me that she had never had a single night of undisturbed sleep for over 25 years. She is now a grandmother and has seven peaceful quiet nights a week.

There is so much controversy about being firm or not being firm at bedtime. A child may refuse to go to bed at all, or may insist on one particular person taking him. He may go to bed happily but scream the minute a parent leaves the room. Some children insist on certain bedtime rituals: the door must be open at a certain angle, or the door must be closed. The light has to be on or off. The window must be open or closed and the same with the curtains. These are obsessional requests and time consuming, but otherwise really harmless, if you can summon enough patience to deal with them. In the end, it makes for a happier secure child who will eventually grow out of these foibles.

There is a revolutionary claim that children who sleep with their parents are happier, more confident and develop more quickly than their peers. Generations of children have always crept into Mommy's or Daddy's bed and fallen asleep immediately (taking over the whole bed). Years ago, we were told how dangerous it was to take a baby into bed and that we were spoiling the older ones if we let them stay. Now it seems that if you can stand the lack of space, you are doing a good thing!

Parental instinct is a wonderful thing. If you feel that you are able to muddle through till your child gives you uninterrupted sleep, you are probably doing all the right things.

 

All material on this site is copyrighted and its use is restricted.
Click here for conditions of use.