WHat do you do with a kid that won't sleep?

[solidgoldbrass]

He's 7 and just doesn't seem to need that much sleep, pretty much every night there's an hour or two of 'Mumeeeeeee, I can't sleeeeeeep'. Bedtime is generally 8.30-9 on a school night.

What time does he get up? DD doesn't sleep before 9 but she goes upstairs to our room at 8, we read and then she watches a DVD until she falls asleep at about 9, she is 6.5. It works for us, I don't want her hanging around downstairs until 9pm, this works for all of us.

8-ish for school, actually 8-ish generally, unless he's really tired. He stays in his bed, I'll give him that, but it's the endless 'Mummeeeeeee!' that drives me nuts.

I have found that the bed at 8, fruit and drink and a dvd stopped the Mummeeee bit, she is up at 7 everyday.

Ah fuck.

My ds is a terrible sleeper.

He's still only 19 months.

You mean I have years of this still to come?

Yep, DS woke us up at 4.30 this morning.

You have to wear him out during the day, does he do a lot of physical play? If he's kept very active he will probably sleep better. Look at his diet too, limiting sugar can have a huge effect.

Bobbledunk, this child never sits still! We go to the park, we run about, he runs up and down the stairs....

Books, quiet music, colouring, toy cars, these are my DDs choices when they couldn't sleep.

I'm afraid at 11 and 1 It's lap tops, iplayer, DSs and ipods, but both seem to get up ok and do sleep earlier some nights when tired, so I've given up worrying greatly.

I too must go to bed.

11 and 14 ( although DD! didn't believe in bed when she was 1 either).

Dd1 is the same, I now let her read until 9 in bed, unless she's obviously knackered.

If he's struggling to wind down, as mentioned on another thread yesterday, Christiane Kerr's CD of Enchanted Meditation for Kids.

It's a children's relaxation tape with some lovely visualisation stories. Don't know if it works for all children but we've found it works wonders for our six year old.

I'd always thought she just didn't need that much sleep. And I wouldn't say she's sleeping that much longer, but she's dropping off a lot quicker - we rarely get past the first ten minutes of it before she's asleep.

I put it on around the time that I think's the earliest possible she might fall asleep - for us around 8.30pm.