Help With Getting Your Child to Sleep at Night

I know what it is to have a child that does not sleep as he should at night, as many of you out there do. The difference for me is that I wasn't bothered that much by the fact that my child only slept in short spurts.

I do wonder...are there any other parents out there who are on the spectrum themselves that don't seem to mind if their children are up at night?

At first, my only complaint was getting to have some mommy time to myself. I look forward to having time to myself at some point of the day, usually at the end of the day. There have been times my son has been up late night and want to play or help me clean. Don't get me wrong, the cleaning part is great, but I'd rather he help me during the day and let me have my time late night. Other than that, I had not complaints, at least, not until he developed epilepsy. Those of you who battle epilepsy know the importance of sleep when trying to minimize seizures.

I'm working hard to help my son's seizures to decrease. It's been a struggle getting my son to sleep through the night. His neurologist  prescribed Gabapentin. I didn't like it at first because he's groggier during the day and it seemed to increase his seizures. Though the seizures were mild, the frequency became a major issues. I tried adjusting the medication several times. Nothing was getting better. It had gotten to the point where I had to homeschool him and schedule speaking engagements later in the day because he was too groggy and highly prone to seizing late mornings and early afternoons. I literally had to completely restructure our days. This had to change.

About 2 weeks ago I had an aha moment. My son needed more than medication changes to help him sleep through the night. I needed to change his night time routine. So we began building a bedtime routing that allowed him to still have some activity, but activity that allows his mind calm and be receptive to sleep. It's working well. When it's time to get ready for bed I put on a video that is interesting enough to draw his attention while being boring enough to lull him to sleep. It's taken a couple weeks for him to get used to the new routine. I think it's working very well. Even though he's been a bit resistant, sleep patterns have improved tremendously and seizures have decreased.

Whatever nighttime routing you come up with for your child, be sure to have a back up plan. I say this because I've noticed a few of my son's nighttime videos have gone AWOL. Not to worry...until March of the Penguin, Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium and all of the Wallace and Gromit movies return to their home on the shelf, I will gladly let him watch a few of my select favorites...Bob Ross Painting, Turtle: The Incredible Journey or Bears (the movie). Ha! Ha!

Here's a blog post I ran across today, written by Anna Laura Brown. She gives sound advise to parents struggling with getting their wee ones to sleep at night.

How to Solve the Sleep Problem Without Going Nuts - by Anna Laura Brown

Anna's an awesome blogger that I follow on twitter. If you're interested in following her you may do so @annalaurabrown.