Bedtime Mistakes – You Didn’t Know You Were Making

By Author: Harshad Valia International School
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In recent times parenting and sleep schedules have become a vital study. If you ask any parent around the globe, they would say that parenting a toddler is equivalent to having a full-time job. Between the age of 2 to 4, children are the most energetic, running from one corner to the other without any reason. But sleep is one of the most critical schedules you as a parent need to set right. For their age, an ample amount of sleep encourages healthy growth and development of the child. Thus, it is advisable to maintain a sense of discipline when it comes to their sleeping schedules.

Let’s look at the 10 most common mistakes that parents make when it comes to their children’s sleeping schedules. This will help them avoid the below-mentioned mistakes the next time they put their children to sleep.

1. Skipping the bedtime routine
As a parent, one of the first things you need to establish is a proper sleep routine for your toddler. This familiar routine will signal to their mind and body that it’s time for a night’s sleep. It might be hard at first, as toddlers can be cranky no matter what part of the ...
... day but don’t lose your calm. With a fixed sleep routine, your child will close their eyes automatically the moment the clock strikes 9 pm. (Or whatever bedtime you have chosen for them)

2. Creating sleep crutches
One of the most common bedtime mistakes is the formation of sleep crutches. These refer to particular habits that your child associates with falling asleep. It can be a lullaby or you narrating a story every night or even playing a song on loop for them to fall asleep. When these habits become associated with their daily night routine, an absence of them will prevent your children from falling asleep. Instead, you can randomise these activities with activities in the daytime so that your child’s mind cannot detect any regular pattern in them.

3. Dinner just before sleeping
This is one of the bedtime mistakes to avoid if you want your child to grow up to be health conscious. Not only is a healthy meal essential for the body, but the digestion process is also equally important. Doctors usually advise keeping two hours between having dinner and falling asleep to aid healthy digestion. In case you have already set into the habit of feeding them just before bedtime, you can exchange that feed with reading or studying time letting your kid study after having dinner.

4. Giving sugary drinks before going to bed
If you browse the internet for some common bedtime mistakes, keeping your child away from sugary drinks will feature in all of them. No matter the age, consuming sugary drinks is not advisable before sleep. It can have a counterproductive effect on your children. Hence, consuming drinks like soda or fruit juices would make them more awake and active giving your parents a sleepless night. Instead, it is better to keep the sugary drinks restricted to consumption in the morning or afternoon. Therefore, the food your little one consumes is an important aspect of sleep.

5. Not enough engagement during awake hours
At 3 or 4 years, your toddlers are a bustling bundle of energy. If you have learnt the art of channelising your energies in the right direction, you will be surprised to see that your babies will put themselves to sleep without outside help. This means you have to spend a portion of their waking hours engaging and playing with them. The increase in physical and mental activities will ensure a deep sleep as soon as their body hits the bed. The next time you are worried about why the toddler won’t go to sleep until late, take them for a walk in the local park.

6. Ignoring ques
If you’re wondering how to shift baby bedtime earlier, it’s not as challenging as it looks. Kids have a natural body clock that displays signs when they require rest or sleep. These signs include frequent yawning, rubbing eyes, clenching fists, and being dazed and irritable if you find your toddler displaying one of these signs, it’s time to allow them a nap as soon as possible. The biggest mistake you can do is to wait till they start crying to put them to sleep!

7. Not turning off distractions
Wondering why your baby is resisting going to bed? It could be because of the running television in neighbouring rooms. Children are easily fascinated with any moving animation, and this includes any TV serial you might be into currently. Their minds associate running TV with playtime, and thus you have a child misbehaving at bedtime on your hands. Furthermore, the lights and the noise from the TV might also create a restless atmosphere that hinders your baby’s peaceful, sleepy time.

8. Allowing long naps in the day
One of the common bedtime mistakes is letting your child take longer naps during the day. Managing a toddler can be challenging, and a parent might be inclined to let them sleep a little longer so they can finish their own tasks. But longer naps do more harm than good to your toddler’s sleep cycle. This can make your baby have trouble falling asleep and staying asleep for longer times. It’s assumed that toddlers should be allowed to take naps no longer than 3 hours during the daytime.

9. Allowing toddlers to sleep late
You must be wondering how letting your child awake longer is bad for their sleep schedules. Worry not, this is one of the most common bedtime mistakes metropolitan city parents do. When a child is awake for too long, their body tries to counter that effect. If it’s during the night, it might result in general laziness during the day, leading to longer naps which ultimately mess up the sleep schedule the next day. So, it’s important to make sure your kid goes to bed within a certain time so they can be active during the day and sleepy during the night.

10. Change in the sleeping place
Lastly, the place where your toddler sleeps can also prevent them from having a good night’s sleep. For example, you might put them to sleep in their own bed but end up having them in your bed by midnight. In such cases, it can send mixed signals to your child’s mind. Instead, make it a habit to encourage your toddler to stay in their own bed all night long.

Last words of advice:
The above list provides a general idea of what situations or behaviours spoil a toddler’s sleep pattern. But since no kids are the same, each can have their own habit that helps or prevents proper sleep. You may also want to skim through the general parenting mistakes you must avoid (https://shcvaliaintschool.in/parental-mistakes/).