7 Tips for Building Healthy Sleep Habits

Sleep training your child is no easy task. While parents understand the importance of going — and staying — asleep, children can be exceptionally good at fighting that urge to go to bed. While every child has different needs, there are some ways parents can help make the process a little bit easier. Here are some tips, many of which I have tested while sleep training my two boys.

1. Ensure your child is getting enough sleep.

Sleep plays a vital role in the development of children's brains. The amount of sleep a child gets impacts their mood, levels of happiness and cognitive function. Ideally, toddlers older than one should be sleeping at least 10-12 hours at night with a goal of 14 hours (including naptime) in a 24-hour window. This time will gradually decrease as your child grows older.

2. Create a routine.

Healthy sleep habits really come down to developing a good routine. As adults, we have a list of things we do every night before bed, but we often forget this should also be true for our children. Your child should have an established routine that follows the same pattern nearly every night. This can begin with setting a specific time for dinner, followed by a bath, brushing teeth, and then in bed and to sleep.

These routines will also help you deter the delay tactics most children will inevitably attempt to stay awake just a little bit longer.

As part of this nightly routine, it also helps to turn off televisions and devices at least an hour before bed, so children are not trying to go to sleep while overstimulated.

3. Try not to put your child in bed when they're already asleep.

If you rock your child to sleep or read them a book to help them fall asleep, try to ensure they're in bed and you're out of the room when they're drowsy, not fully asleep. If you put them in bed while they're already asleep, they may wake up and become disoriented. At the same time, you're creating the expectation that you'll stay with them every night until they fall asleep.

4. Resist the urge to go into your child's bedroom when they're calling out for you. 

It can be difficult to not react to your child when they're calling out for you from the bed. I know this from personal experience. I had to deal with lots of anxiety when this happened with one of my kids. Instead of going into the room, my husband and I would take turns sitting right outside their room and soothing him with positive reinforcement, with reassurances like, "You're good. You're doing fine." Although this will be difficult initially, this leads to healthy sleeping patterns for your child in the long-term.

5. Understand the difference between nightmares and night terrors. 

Nightmares typically happen during the second half of the night — when you are in REM sleep — whereas night terrors happen within the first hour. After a nightmare, children will typically wake up scared and have difficulty falling back to sleep. Here, it is important to comfort your child, talk to them and reassure them. After a nightmare, leave your child's night light on as a comforting sleep aid.

In the case of a night terror, your child is in the deepest stage of their sleep. They may suddenly sit upright in bed, shout, sweat or thrash around. Despite this, try not to wake them up. Kids who wake up are likely to be disoriented or confused, and may take longer to calm them down and get back to sleep. The good news is, night terrors are usually worse for the person witnessing them than the child.

6. Let sleepwalkers stay asleep.

 When your child is sleepwalking, they usually will not recognize you. There is no need to wake the sleepwalking child; instead, try to guide them back to bed. If your child does sleepwalk, make sure they can't leave the house and keep the toddler gates up so the child doesn't get injured.

7. Don't give a child under the age of two melatonin.

If your child has difficulty going to sleep, first try cutting off the tv and any screens earlier at night and limiting your toddler's stimulation at least an hour before bed. It may also help to use a sound machine or another relaxing activity — like reading a story — to help your toddler fall asleep. If you're still having trouble getting them to sleep and want to try melatonin when they are old enough, it's a good idea to check with a pediatrician.