How do I get my 9.5 year old to sleep?

[pigsinmud]

A bit different to most of the threads on here as they are usually about babies and toddlers!

Ds2 has quite often struggled to get to sleep - his mind is often racing. He is 9.5 years old and in yr 5. He has busy days as he leaves the house at 7:55am to catch the school bus and gets home at 4:10pm - a couple of days a week it is later as he has after school clubs. He just can't sleep and is usually still awake at midnight. He is grumpy in the mornings as I have to wake him up at 7:15am.

He usually goes to bed at 9pm and reads for 30 minutes. Then he tosses and turns for the next few hours. He listens to a story cd which he finds boring as he has listened to them so many times - we hoped the fact they were boring would send him to sleep. Of course sometimes he has switched the light back on and is reading at midnight!

Any tips?

My DD is 9 and this sounds very familiar although she's not made it to midnight yet.

You could perhaps try getting him into bed earlier, we try to get DD into bed between 8/8.30. She can read until 9 when I go up and turn her light off. We had the same as you with her turning it back on again to read, easily sorted by either turning it off at the plug, or taking the bulb out! You could keep checking he's doing what you've said, bit of a pain, but he needs to know you mean business.

Do you think the CDs are just keeping his mind active? I try to give DD something to focus her mind on when she's trying to go to sleep, and obviously she has to relax her body as well as her mind to do it.

It's such a difficult one as they're so much older, but when we do manage to crack it she is defo better at getting up in the morning.

Thanks for the reply. We could try without the cd and see what happens.

Dh & I had discusssed the idea of an earlier bedtime last night. It tends to be towards 9pm as we get the younger 2 in bed for 7:30 and then do a few things with the boys. If we go for 8:30 followed by reading and then lights off at 9pm, hopefully that'll help.

I feel like he's just got stuck in a habit of not falling asleep and once broken he'll be able to sleep. He does have a very active mind at bedtime - we've discovered him crying in bed worrying about dying and various other issues. He needs to meditate or something!

DS 1 is the same
I go to bed at 10.30, go in and check on him and he is lying there wide awake.

He isnt worried about anything, just cant sleep;.

Was going to suggest relaxation cd's - I used them a lot when I was pregnant, and still do as I have problems sleeping - over thinking things etc

I found a couple of pod casts which I downloaded onto my ipod which really helped

We had exactly the same with DD2 being preoccupied with death when she was going to sleep! Which is why I tried to get her to focus on making her positive thoughts brighter and bigger, and make the negative thoughts grey and small, and it works most of the time.

It's a weird time, going to sleep. You normally need no stimulation to do it, but your mind can have other ideas and go into overdrive.

I'm sure you're right though, and you just need to replace the routine he has at the min with another one.

Thanks. He is rather negative, so I like the idea of focusing on positives. Relaxation cds could work too.

Crap - I can hear dh getting stressed with him now as he's still awake! I don't suppose that'll help much.