ADHD bedtime routine ideas

[Gerbi1]

Hello, I was just wondering if anyone had any advice for my 11 year old ADHD son. He’s always been terrible at bedtime, he gets so hyped up and bounces around winding everybody up and keeping up his little brothers who are shattered.
I do the usual bath, story, bed but he’s always rolled all over the floor or started wrestling or climbing up the bunk beds and jumping off or shouting out stupid things. It’s almost like he has to get everything out of his system before he gets into bed. Can anyone offer me any suggestions that might help??

Hi, you didn’t mention whether he has melatonin or not?

No he doesn’t

Is he on any meds?

No

I have the same problem, but what about weighted blanket? Meditation/Headspace maybe?

Melatonin works 80% of the time for us. Otherwise, it's lights low, spa music and a massage. But labour intensive but it works!

Do you get this prescribed? My daughters going through the diagnosis pathway now- nowhere near the end but so tired and sleep is just the worst

My DS is younger but podcasts work well for us. We put one on half an hour before sleep time and he lies in bed and listens and draws or flips through a magazine. It's not foolproof but it helps to settle him!

It used to take 90 mins to 2 hours to get our then DS 6 year old to get to sleep. Melatonin has been the wonder supplement. He has a “sleepy vitamin” (which he loves as it is a chewy sweet) 30 mins before bedtime. Then he goes up and in 10 mins is asleep. It has saved my sanity.

on holiday - when he is in and out of a swimming pool we give him a break from it.

I think melatonin is quite tricky to get in the UK so we buy in bulk when we go to the US.

I don’t think our family would still be together if we hadn’t started using melatonin

I can totally relate to this, my DS is Autistic and has ADHD and bedtime has always been a nightmare. Unfortunately we went for a private diagnosis and therefore have been refused Melatonin by the NHS. We were signposted to sleep support and tried all ideas they gave us (most we did already) but some helped. Routine- We have the same routine every night (DS will try to change it but we don't allow it as it never ends well).
Screen time- We make sure he stops screen time an hr before bed.
Food/hunger- he has a supper 30 mins before bed, banana or small bowl of porridge/crackers ect.
Sensory time- various activities including rolling around on a yoga ball/tickling time/rolling him up in blankets to make him into 'food- sausage roll/pizza roll' (enjoys feeling of containment in the blanket) This part is the most important we have found.
We also found some Sleep gummies on Yumi that seem to help him feel tired.
Low light levels in rooms
Time to read before bed.

Bedtime has improved for us, but can still be tricky and he gets anxious about not being able to fall asleep. I find it hard as this is the time of the day when I am feeling tired and want some down time rather than being patient and calm if he acts up.

Hope things improve for you.