Severe sleep deprivation 8 year old boy

[Sleephelpme]

Our son is 8 years old and he has always slept bad. However the last 4 years have been pure hell. He wakes to start the day before 4am every day. Usually it can be from 2:30-3:30am. He cries because he is such a bad sleeper, saying he “sucks at sleep” and his biggest dream is to sleep till 6am (mine too!) On the odd occasion he does have a full night sleep (till maybe 5am) because of sheer and utter exhaustion.

He doesn’t have a diagnosis for anything. He eats well. He does lots of sports. He is a smart boy but the sleep deprivation affects his ability to concentrate at school and also affects his general behaviour, as well as his interactions with his older and younger sisters.

We have been to sleep specialists for years. He has been on melatonin and two antihistamine (Atarax and Legargan) but none work, even at max dosages. The problem with these medications is that they help kids FALL asleep but not stay asleep. My son falls asleep with ease due to exhaustion (we’ve tried early bed times and late bedtimes but no impact). He goes to sleep at 8pm these days. Melatonin also made him sleep very heavily so he used to wet the bed every night but still not sleep any longer as he would then wake due to being wet.

Can ANYONE PLEASE offer any insight to this? I’m at my wits end after 8 years of pure parenting hell and it’s drastically affecting our entire family negatively. We simply CANNOT function like this. I’m also not the mother I could be due to being simply a walking zombie. This is however the perfect costume for Halloween today 😂.

Jokes aside, if you can help please do. I will be forever in debt. Thank you!

Enlarged tonsils causing intermittent obstruction during sleep? You poor things - must be so miserable for the whole family.

I guess you have tried everything by now.

Weighted blanket? White noise all night? Wake for dose of Melatonin at 1am instead of at bedtime? Elimination diet for intolerances?

@2reefsin30knots

I guess you have tried everything by now.

Weighted blanket? White noise all night? Wake for dose of Melatonin at 1am instead of at bedtime? Elimination diet for intolerances?

Pretty much what i was going to suggest.

My ds was a terrible sleeper for years and then hit 13 and changed!

He couldn't empty his mind so once awake would be awake and struggle to resettle. He suffered anxiety though.

However his years of being awake at such stupid hours and then sorting it we are up at 4am 4 days a week for his swim training 🤣

Magnesium helped here. Finding a kids multi vitamin that had it was not easy but I do notice if we forget it.
You can get magnesium salts for in the bath (or foot bath) or a spray on version.
Good luck.

Thank you all! So very grateful. We’ve tried everything suggested above except for the magnesium so picking that up today.

Also seeing a Chinese doctor to discuss potentially getting acupuncture as this has been recommended also.

Sort of feel like at this point we are will to trying anything and everything!

My eldest was a terrible sleeper although it was more struggling to get to sleep, up and down to the toilet for hours, didn't actually need the toilet but was anxious that he might fall asleep and then wake up needing a wee and it became a viscous circle.

Looking back I wish we had his tonsils and adenoids looked into as he did snore which calmed down as he got older and his adenoids naturally shrank. I've since read about children's sleep being transformed by having these out.

Also wish we had looked into play therapy or anything suitable for that age group to address the underlying anxiety.

He used to say he was so envious of other children who could fall asleep so easily 😢

That sounds awful. Really feel for your wee boy, and all of you. Have had similar issues. It just takes it out of you.

Ours is a night owl, so will happily spend hours awake at night, not dropping off. At one point, blamed fear of nightmares as the reason. Once asleep, and the methods we've tried ... we then cannot get them up in the morning!

I'd try breaking down the problem your little chap has. Seems he can get to sleep OK? But then wakes in the early hours. I think that might be at the end of a natural sleep cycle (deep sleep, light sleep, REM etc). It seems as if the issue is he can't go back to sleep. Can you work on that? What does he do when he wakes? Make sure he gets himself comfortable. Has a pee? Maybe a glass of warm milk? Flask in bedroom? Maybe a small dose of sleeping aid (anti histamine or whatever then? Like a quarter dose?). What about Valerian? Camomile tea? Then settle back into bed and perhaps concentrate on resting if not sleeping. Listen to soporific stories on Audible (Swallows and Amazons series, Secret Seven - painfully slooooooow!!) There are guided meditations for children on YouTube- need screen turned off tho to avoid blue light.

I hope you find a solution soon. X

I was always a night owl and so is my child. I spent years trying to sleep train and change stuff from diets to activities to ensure a longer night without success.

I gave up when DS was about 7, when we agreed that he could stay up as long he stayed in his room, didn’t use screens after 8 and didn’t wake me up.

I often heard him up quietly going about his business in his room until midnight and I can assure you that every morning when my alarm went off at 6:30 I found him having breakfast already on his uniform ready to go to school. He had a good diet, did sports and was classed as gifted and talented so sleeping less was not affecting him in the way it affects other children so, we drop the sleep battle and did much better.

He started finally sleeping late as a teenager but… he still can’t go to sleep at a reasonable time. He is doing fine.

Have you had a referral to a sleep clinic?

Did DS take quick acting melatonin or prolonged release? Prolonged release helps people stay asleep.

Have you tried Promethazine (Phenergan)?

Alexa has made a huge difference to my sleepless ds. If he wakes he listens to a story, mainly Harry Potter and it calms him enough not to worry about being awake and he does often drop off again. I do sympathise as it is awful having them awake.

DS1 had obstructive sleep apnoea caused by enlarged tonsils and adenoids - he would have frequent pauses in breathing then a big gasp which would wake him up. He was also an awful snorer. He had an adeno-tonsillectomy which resolved the apnoea but sadly didn’t sort his awful sleep like they promised!

Now his younger brother has massive sleep issues (he has asd), and is on melatonin. He now goes to sleep at bedtime, but always wakes about midnight, and keeps waking constantly through the night. We tried the melatonin at his midnight wakings, but trying to get him to take a tablet in the middle of the night when he’s tired and agitated was an epic fail!

With both boys we work on trying to reduce that anxiety they have when they’re awake and know they should be asleep, and try to stop them worrying about not sleeping enough, since it’s counter productive. Our oldest still sleeps badly, but his anxiety about it is greatly reduced, so if he wakes he just reads his book or listens to a podcast, and now is getting much more success at going back to sleep now he’s a bit more relaxed about it. He’s 10, and it’s only really this last year he’s been able to start this.

Our 7yo is utterly incapable of relaxing enough so he just gets in our bed, one of us often gets out since he rolls around all night and has nightmares. If we didn’t let him in our bed he’d be roaming the house all night. It’s that bad I thought I should take the melatonin instead then at least one of us could sleep!

Sorry it’s not much practical advice, but solidarity at least! It’s pretty lonely feeling like the only family with this issue, particularly when every one else’s kids you know all seem to sleep well 😩

@mumonthehill

Alexa has made a huge difference to my sleepless ds. If he wakes he listens to a story, mainly Harry Potter and it calms him enough not to worry about being awake and he does often drop off again. I do sympathise as it is awful having them awake.

Me too. Podcasts set on an iPad timer are enough to make me focus away from me.

Some include tips for thinking. I like 'Nothing Much Happens' as they are meant to 'bore'. But the reader reads a second time even more slowly. Not sure how age appropriate though?

My DD has always been a poor sleeper. But it has got better. She's had a lot of anxiety and OCD both of which she's currently in a good place with - weighted blanket had also been helpful.
She commented recently that she used to find the sensation of falling asleep frightening and would fight it to stay awake.

Thanks again you lovely lovely mummies!! We did acupuncture today. He had to rest for 20 mins and although the needles were fine he just couldn’t relax. He will start taking some herbal “stuff”, will have hot milk before bed and we will go back to the Chinese doctor next week. Let’s see if this works.

Will hold off on the magnesium for now, we’ve tried weighed blankets etc and although the iPad/audiobooks etc sound amazing in theory, my son isn’t allowed the iPad except Friday afternoons and the weekends and to be really honest, I couldn’t trust him to just put audible ok. Perhaps if I do it but then I’m even more awake. Sigh, idk what the right thing to do is there.

Also, no diet issues, stomach issues or tonsils/snoring.

Last night he had an apple and water in his room and some lego building books. He was up at 4am as usual this morning. He does suffer from anxiety (not generally but in the sense that he sees the clock and stresses that he has 3 hours to sleep before he’s allowed up and out of the room (except loo). Also, same issue with excitement if he has a party or match in the afternoon of the weekends.

I will post our progress here with the herbs and acupuncture.

🙏🏻X

He cries because he is such a bad sleeper, saying he “sucks at sleep” and his biggest dream is to sleep till 6am (mine too!)

I can't help much, but from personal experience with this part: I find getting to sleep hard and always have done (even when DD was a newborn and I was exhausted I couldn't get straight to sleep). I used to say to my mum that I was rubbish at sleeping, etc. She told me that if I was lying down resting that was what counted so not too worry about it. (I know this isn't strictly speaking true, but I think it's got some truth to it, and it stopped me worrying about not sleeping - which I think was in itself keeping me awake).

I'd also second the audio book suggestion - as an adult, that's what works for me now. An alternative technique I use is to really concentrate on imagining something - generally a very peaceful place. There's probably some "mindfulness" teen for this but I don't know it. As with the audio book the aim of the game is not to think about the fact you can't sleep!

Of course, if there's a physical/medical problem none of this is likely to help much.

Has he had a full sleep study to rule out any physical reasons for the waking?

Has he actually been assessed for SN? Much to our shock, our awful sleeper was diagnosed with ADHD aged 9. There were no major flags (we just thought he was an active, emotional and anxious boy) but the diagnosis made sense when we read up on it.

His sleep didn't improve until he started taking ritalin for his ADHD which has calmed him down a lot and made him less anxious and more able to cope with daily life. He still needs melatonin to fall asleep but is generally sleeping through the night now (the relief!).

He too would get so frustrated at not being able to fall asleep and stay asleep. The years of sleep deprivation have severely impacted my health so I totally understand you.

Good luck.

If you do want to try audio books, he doesn't need to be trusted with an iPad - why not get him a second hand CD player or Discman and some story CDs out of the library? In the past, I've used a pillow speaker so I can listen till I fall asleep without having to take headphones off. Not saying this will work, just it doesn't have to involve something with a screen.

DD uses an echo dot on classic FM or radio 3 and is accepting of my advice that resting in bed listening quietly to this music is the next best thing to sleeping. For us it’s the falling asleep part but could actually be the same for your boy as he has no ‘help’ falling back to sleep in the early hours.

I would be thinking the anxiety and worry is a significant factor and pressure to sleep unhelpful. Catch 22.

If doing in with you would get you both sleep I’d consider that at this stage. If he can settle listening to the radio in the early hours at least you will sleep and he may drift in and out without realising.

What settles him during the day maybe do more if that in the day even if it is iPad games!

I've been there so tired I caught myself falling asleep driving to work. Accidently the doctor found my daughter had over active thyroid. The medicine changed everything with in a week or so. Have his blood checked and good luck

Have you tried CBT (therapy) for sleep or a more general anxiety medication? CBT for sleep I believe has been shown by research to be the best long term solution for chronic insomnia & short term anxiety medication would probably help, but I know that’s complicated in children. I’m assuming you’ve worked on basics of sleep hygiene?