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Comment by calewis | Hacker News Reader

I have spent the last year building sleep tech and I have read 100's of papers on the subject, been to conferences and spent lots of time with academics and experts on the subject of sleep. Screen time matters massively. It really matters for children and every single piece of evidence, bar this poorly written study (two questions), say so. It's a real issue for adults too, and blue light issue aside, the disturbance of your wind down routine is a massive health issue that needs to be adressed. It affects not only how you fall asleep (the marker for which people judge sleep quality) but also staying asleep and the quality of it (a far more important measure).

(Also if anyone is building sleep apps/tech I'm looking for work)

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If you've stumbled in your reading upon any hints on what to do with a two year old that barely sleeps more than 6 hours a day (including naptime) i'd kill for it.

We're having a neurologist appointment coming up because of it, but I can't shake the feeling we're just the worst parents. :/

We've taken away all screens from him a month ago, but he won't stop waking up at night, trying to breastfeed as much as possible and not falling asleep before 1 AM.

My sister-in-law only needed 4 hours of sleep a day growing up. Very frustrating for my in-laws. She is in her late 40's now. All this to say, its probably not something you are doing to your son. He might just be that way! :)

This is not strictly accurate. There is some daily mail science about “super humans” who need less than 7-8 hours. And while some people survive like this, your body needs sleep for 7-8 no exceptions. Deep sleep (as important as light sleep) only occurs during long uninterrupted phases. During those phases your body does some amazing things. Amongst other things the production of things like cancer fighting cells and repairing all the physical and mental streses of the day. While not fully understood exactly what, we know the why and lots of good studies prove the correlation between regular quality sleep and better mental and physical well being.

Just another parent here... Does he fall asleep easily? What's the room environment like? White noise? Disposable diapers or cloth? Does he have a healthy appetite and diet? Are you still in the room when he falls asleep?

I suppose with a neurologist in the picture, none of the usual things are suspicious though.

Maybe get him on some real food. I apparently was an unholy terror that never slept and wanted to feed every hour; my poor mother was probably about ready to smother me with a pillow before my grandmother who had raised ten children convinced her to add in some apple sauce and cottage cheese and oatmeal and that sort of thing.

Is he waking up near the same time every night? If so, wake him up and re-comfort him before he wakes himself up. Breaks his body's habits, and resets after a week or two (YMMV on the length of time). That was the advice from our (general) doctor.

We also tried gas drops, as we noticed sometimes he just burped and went back to sleep after half an hour of extreme crankiness.

Have you (assuming you are the mother) had your breast milk examined? The baby should be getting plenty of melatonin and tryptophan from your milk, but it is possible for some mothers to have nutrient underproduction issues. Even if they are properly nourished themselves.

I'm no expert, but my daughter is about to be weaned off the bottle at 1 year. 2 years seems an awful long time for breastfeeding. The key was to get her to bed when she's tired around 6:30 to 7:00 pm with a set routine. Also, I've weaned her off of night feedings by giving progressively smaller quantities at night.

The world health organization recommends to breastfeed only up to 6 months and to keep breastfeeding (foods allowed too) until 2 years old, to give maximum benefits.

So no, 2 years is not necessarily too much.

How quick are you to go comfort him when he cries in bed? We did the thing where we let him sort him self out unless he was crying for more then 15-30 min. After a couple weeks they learn to self-soothe. It can be hard emotionally for the parents. Also getting him off the boob and on the food helped. A belly full of babyfood seems to last longer then a belly of milk.

I don't have advice for your kids sleep problem, but the fact that you noticed this problem and care about it means you're not the worst parents. Parenting is hard, and it sounds like you're trying your best.

Sounded pretty like my daughter at 2. She's much better now though still breast feeds at night a lot - but she's happy and healthy and we are OK - so hang in there - it will get better.

Do you drink a lot of coffee? Anecdotally I was noticing restlessness/sleeplessless with my child when I was caffienated and breast feeding. Going cold turkey there helped a lot. Also if your child is slightly older, feeding him/her with some solid food might be useful. I gave my child mashed avocados, which was a huge hit.

Well I’m sure you’re not terrible parents. I don’t have children but what I do know about all sleepers is that it’s about routine. Same things every night, in the same order. No screens or other stimulus 2 hours before bed. Exercise or any physical activity close to sleep too, but running around and playing football etc. before meal timed helps, and as for meal times light non carb based meals well before bed. Reading is a great way to unwind and helps the mind. Children have been less of a focus for me but before a neurologist I’d suggest a sleep specialist. They can come to your home and give you some tips. There are even ones focused for children. If you’re in the UK I can help with contacts. I hope that was in some way useful, as sleep experts have said to me regularly, it’s not rocket science it’s dicipline.

Some kids are routine like that, but others not. Mine was good sleeper, but totally irregular.

Also, advice like this underestimate how frustrating and sucking boring killing all joy strict routine can be for parents. You may decide that sleep is not worth it.

Plus there are hard to determine health issues with small ones. Sometime a kid can't sleep and then you figure it is certain food before night or something of the sort.

Try co-sleeping, and lots of exercise and new experiences in the day.

Interested in your top 3. For me it seems to be:

1. Sufficient exercise.

2. Calm, non-screen activity before (reading for 30 mins)

3. Good environment (dark, quiet/constant background noise, good temp)

4. Not moving at all when trying to fall asleep.

1. Yes. But not to close to bed time (1-2 hours before you need to sleep) 2. More like 1-2 hours, hard but do it and you’ll notice the difference. Also leave your phone in the kitchen. Even having it in your bedroom stimulates your mind. “I won’t look at it” isn’t enough to convince your brain you won’t. 3. Absolutely. No noise above 36db though and you can train yourself off white noise machines. Ear plugs are good if you live in the city. Generally any noise is bad. 4. Diet. If you do drink alcohol you won’t sleep well, which is a trade off you may make on a Friday. No caffeine after 13:00 (it takes 12 hours to metabolise) 5. Regular routine. Same things. Every day and in the same order. Make a wind down routine and stick to it. This is the biggest one by far.

And if you can’t fall asleep, get out of bed and do something else (nothing involving bright lights) but saying in bed while you can’t sleep breaks the accociative behaviour of bed being for sleep. Don’t watch TV in bed. Don’t eat in bed. Your bed is for sleep and sex. If you still struggle to fall back asleep you can try creative free form writing. Sounds like sudo science but it’s proven to work. Get up. Get a pen and paper and write down a narrative. What ever comes into your mind for 30mins, or, until you feel sleepy. Then go back to bed. Often we fail to fall asleep because we are thinking about work, our partners, friends, a cute dog we saw. Creative writing is a technique used by sleep experts for chronic sleep disorders and has shown its self to work in multiple studies. Sleep.io is great if you really struggle with sleep. It’s a CBT based programme to hell yok sleep and it genuinely works.

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