5 Sleep Tips: When Your Child is Sick
When you become a parent, you hold your baby with such love and tenderness. You think to yourself that you will take such good care of them, how you will do anything humanly possible to make them happy and comfortable. After all there is no truer love than the love of a parent. That is why it’s so painful to see them sick. Growing up my mom would tell me how her heart would hurt, when one of her children was sick, how in that moment she wished she would be the sick one. Now as a mother, I find myself thinking the same thing. But the truth is, even though we want to make their illness go away, we can’t. All we can do is comfort them, make them feel safe and make sure they are getting enough liquids and sleep.
Sounds simple enough right? Not really. You see sleep is in fact our superpower yet just like adults, when children are sick the first thing that is affected is their sleep. This means that even the best little sleepers (my son included), go from taking solid naps and sleeping through the night, to short/no naps and multiple night wakings, when they are sick. Leaving many parents confused as to how to respond to these short/no naps and night waking’s.
Well, don’t fret! I am here to give you my 5 tips on how to handle sleep when your child is sick.
What Sleep Schedule? First things first, I want you to forget about your sleep schedule, no more okay to wake time, nap times and bedtime. The important thing is to comfort your child when they are waking up. Instead of going by your normal sleep schedule follow their sleepy cues and do your normal nap time/bedtime routine, with some extra snuggles. Keep in mind that naps will probably be short 20-30 minutes (my son naps for about 15-45 minutes at a time when he is sick), so be flexible and offer as many naps as they need.
Super Early Bedtime: If naps are all over the place and nowhere near where they usually are, move up their bedtime. How early? I usually like to recommend 5pm. However yesterday, when my son was sick, he started showing sleepy cues at 4pm, so he was in his crib by 4:30pm and guess what? He had zero-night wakings, woke up at 6:15am and was fever free…yeay!
Oh, Those Night Wakings: To prepare for those night wakings, I like to recommend that parents go to sleep earlier than normal too. Remember to keep the baby monitor near you and if you hear your child stirring give them 5-10 minutes (depending on what you are comfortable with) before going to them. Why? Because although they are sick, they have healthy sleep habits and what they so desperately need is sleep. However, if they fully wake and are unable to go back to sleep, then go to them, asses them, give them medicine (with your Doctors approval), give them a drink of water and comfort them. I know it’s hard but whatever you do, try not to bring them into your bed, rock/hold/feed them to sleep or use any of the sleep crutches you worked so hard to remove.
Rule of 3: If you do end up bringing them into your bed, rocking, holding or feeding them to sleep, give yourself some grace and just remember to not do this for more than 3 days in a roll. After 3 days in a roll, your child will start to think this is the new normal and you will realize you just created some new sleep crutches.
Camp Out: It can be very tempting to bring your child into your bed when they are sick, after all you want to keep a close eye on them. Yet it’s so much better for them, to keep their sleep environment consistent, so instead of bringing them to you, you go to them. Yup that’s right, set up an inflatable mattress or sleeping bag and camp out in their room. You will be able to keep a close eye on them and being so close to them will give you peace of mind.
Once your child is feeling/doing better go right back into your normal sleep schedule. The first few days might be rough but stick with it and trust that they have the healthy sleep foundation you worked so hard to establish. However, if things are not looking better after a few days and you’re still struggling, I am here to help you! So, book a complimentary call with me and let’s get you that sleep you and your child need and deserve!
