Bad news: Jelly Bean has croup. (A virus characterized by a nasty cough that kind of sounds like a seal barking. Which my boys found hilarious. Which made Jelly Bean upset. Which made her cough harder.)
Good news: She got a dose of steroids at the pediatrician’s this morning and she’s like a new kid. Modern medicine really is a miracle. (Except that she’s ravenous. I’ve never seen her eat like this! It’s kind of funny – she just ate 4 pretzel buns, one after the other, only stopping to tell me, “these is the bestest food I’ve ever had!!”)
Tired news: But that meant that I spent most of last night awake – holding her upright, rocking her, taking her in a steamy bathroom and then out into the cold night air. (The hot/cold thing is supposed to help open their airways – I learned it from Anne of Green Gables. And the pediatrician also recommended it.) And then watching her fitfully sleep just in case she, you know, stopped breathing. Thankfully she’s fine now but I didn’t sleep at all and now I’m a walking zombie.
Exhaustion makes me incoherent and incoherence leads to awesome interviews, as I found out today when I tried to do some for an article I’m working on. (I called one poor guy the wrong name four separate times. It wouldn’t have been so bad except it was a different name every time. He probably thought I was drunk.) Fortunately, unless interrupted by a kid emergency, sleeplessness isn’t usually a problem for me. Don’t ask me how I dodged the insomnia bullet – with my anxiety disorder and general high-strung-ness you’d think I’d be a shoe-in for the sheep-less sleeplessness but if I have one God-given talent, it’s the ability to fall asleep anytime, anywhere. But for the 60 million Americans who suffer from insomnia, my brutal night and consequent ditzy day are the norm. (Did you know you can actually die from insomnia?!) And I think Son #2 might be one of them. He has a terrible time getting to sleep most nights.
So I was super excited when Shape assigned me a story about the new research into using exercise as an aid for insomnia. Anyone who has insomnia can tell you that laying in bed watching the numbers on the clock change and telling yourself to just sleeeep already! doesn’t work. And that whole counting sheep nonsense? Only works for Little Bo Peep, lucky girl.
“Sleep is the fuel of life.” Gale Green, author of Insomniac, says. “It’s nourishing; it’s restorative. And when you are deprived of it, you are really deprived of a basic kind of sustenance.”
Insomnia can be as difficult to treat as it is frustrating, so what does help? Exercise is one of the first things doctors often recommend but how well it helps you skydive into snoozeland isn’t quite that simple. It’s not simply a matter of “wearing yourself out” so you’ll pass out. A new study from Northwestern University reports that while exercise can be an effective tool to help you get a good night’s sleep, there are a lot of factors that determine how effective it will be.
Director of the behavioral sleep program at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine and lead researcher Dr. Kelly Glazer Baron says she first decided to look at the sleep-exercise connection after having multiple patients complain that getting their sweat on just wasn’t helping them doze off. While it’s been known for a long time that exercisers sleep better, researchers haven’t been sure exactly why. “It may have to do with resetting the stress response,” Baron explains. “We think that one reason people with insomnia can’t sleep is that their stress response is overactive. I tell my patients- your brain is doing 60 mph and everyone else is going 45!” So Baron designed a study to examine what type of exercise helps with insomnia. Here are her tips:
1. Consistency is key. Like so many things in life, just sticking with it is half the battle. The study followed 11 women with insomnia who were assigned to exercise 3-4 times per week for at least 30 min at 75 percent of their maximum heart rate. What they found was that while exercising on a single day didn’t improve that night’s sleep, after 16 weeks of consistent exercise all the participants were falling asleep faster and sleeping nearly an hour longer.
2. Time of day matters. Baron says that exercising too close to bed can negatively affect sleep so the study participants were instructed to do their exercise between 1 and 5 p.m. although earlier would work fine as well.
3. No need to kill it in the gym. Brazilian researchers found in a 2010 study that while brisk walking helped participants fall asleep in half their usual time and sleep longer, higher intensity activities like running and weight lifting did not have this same effect. And participants in the Northwestern study only worked out 3-4 days a week at most.
4. Be patient. The improvements didn’t happen overnight for the participants. “On the days that subjects exercised, they didn’t sleep any better,” Baron says. “However, they exercised more after nights with better sleep. The results tell us that exercise is not a quick fix for insomnia and takes a while to improve sleep.”
5. Do it. ”People have to realize that even if they don’t want to exercise, that’s the time they need to dig in their heels and get themselves out there,” Baron said. “Write a note on your mirror that says ‘Just Do It!’ It will help in the long run.”
Any of you have insomnia? Does exercise help you at all? Any other tips I could try with my son?? Anyone else a total Anne of Green Gables fangirl?
Update: So Jelly Bean just wandered out of her room as I was publishing this post (10 pm) to tell me she “has the snots” and can’t get them out. Poor thing is super congested. Looks like it might be another long night… sigh.
I’m a long term chronic insomniac. There are times when I’ll get < 8 hours sleep in a 3 day period. It’s cyclic for me and I don’t know what triggers it. I found that exercise doesn’t really help. For me I find if I eat carbs (tiny jar of baked beans, or potato – not cake or candies) just before bed that helps. This is contrary to the ‘experts’ advice but it works for me. When I regularly meditate it does help, but not much.
I also find that sometimes no sleep is better for me than an hour or two of broken sleep. I feel more alert and less queasy.
I hope your son grows out of it, as it really isn't fun. The first time I learned that other people fall asleep easily I was 6 and completely shocked ! It's still a talent I envy.
One of the symptoms I get before a cycle is I feel like I’m being bitten in bed. I vacuum and steam my bed regularly so I don’t have bed bugs or anything like that. Sometimes if I change my sheets and they’re crisp it helps. Also if they’re tucked in really tight so I can barely move it can also help. Sounds weird but maybe something like this might help with your son.
Sorry – me again – I find I sleep almost like a normal person when I visit my friends who live on a property out in the middle of nowhere. I’ve realised it’s because at night they turn very few lights on, and there’s no ambient light as there is in the city. I’ve tried to recreate this at home to some extent by buying the lower wattage light bulbs and making sure most lights are off so it’s darker. This has made a difference – not a cure but a significant difference.
Being up with my sick family member dozens of times a night and then getting up at 4am for work, is taxing. That is for sure. I find that the simplest things to do, feel impossible. I also have a tendency to nibble all day. When I get a good nap in, I suddenly have energy and clarity and I don’t nibble.
How would it be to sleep well? I would love it. I bet I would lose weight and get so much more done.
Has your son tried melatonin? It usually kicks in in about 30 minutes. It doesn’t last more than 3 hours though, but it sure is worth a try. I hear they have gummy melatonin for kids.
Ha! I remember that part in Anne of Green Gables. I still love those books.
I’m like you, I feel super lucky that sleeping comes easily to me. Sometimes too easily. I have a hard time if I get less than 8 hours of sleep, which is most weekdays, and then all I want to do is sleep all weekend to make up for it. Which according to the chronobiology class I took in college totally doesn’t work. My dad suffers from bad insomnia though, poor man. He takes a brisk walk on his lunch break most days and says that really does help.
I can sleep anywhere anytime. It’s a blessing mostly. While it can be annoying when I want to stay awake for things (I cannot tell you how many movies I’ve seen half of), it means that when life gets crazy I can deal since I’m OK on sleep. HAving said this…I can say that going on little sleep (~4hrs a night) for extended periods (ahem grad school) can make you crazy – true story. My husband is the insomniac of the family. He is the king of powernaps.
I don’t get insomnia on a regular basis, just on rare occasions, and mostly, that’s when I am overtired, or maybe I indulged too much? Oh, and had it bad pregnant!
Hope my kids don’t get that… my hubby sleep walks and sleep eats, and sleep (yuk) bites his nails and cracks his knuckles… My 3 year old was sleep walking once at daycare… sleep distrubances… not like-y.
I think I am the kind of person who needs more sleep. I sleep 8+ hours at night, and wake up tired anyway… When I was in college, I would fall asleep on my books, so I never studies too well… only once did I pull off an all-nighter. and I dind’t like coffee, so didn’t help.
My firends had to tkae me out and keep me out if they wanted me to “party” with them, coz if I was home, there was no taking me out again… 9 pm bedtime in college, yep, boring huh… and it hasn;t cahnged almost 20 years later!
I have never been a good sleeper and I typically only get 5-6 hrs of sleep a night. When I was a kid, I used to wander around the house in the middle of the night for a while, then go back to bed. Regular exercise helps, melatonin doesn’t (I wake up after an hour and can’t get back to sleep). When I can’t sleep, I just kind of go with it the next day–I don’t generally feel sleepy, but I crave sugar and sometimes I smell cigarette smoke (in a completely non-smoking environment). I rarely feel well-rested, but keeping a consistent pre-bedtime schedule helps a bit. It is what it is.
BTW, Mark’s Daily Apple has some really good articles about sleep: http://www.marksdailyapple.com/the-definitive-guide-to-sleep/#axzz2gfoUDHR4
Younger me hated sleep, thought it was a waste of time. Now, I love sleep so much. I usually have no issues with it, I can fall asleep pretty quickly and easily and sleep through the night. As long as I can 1. fall asleep to the TV (in a pinch, music works, but talking is better) and 2. Nothing wakes me up in that critical first ~30 mins of falling asleep where I’m sleeping lightly.
My husband knows it’s going to be a bad night if I get woken up right after getting back to sleep, as it usually takes me another episode or two of whatever we’re watching to fall asleep.
I have found this to be much, much better as I’ve taken up running. Nothing quite tires me out like a good run a few times a week.
Have you tried a weighted blanket for your little guy? It can really help. There are also compression t-shirts and pants/shorts. We’ve found that the ones on therapy sites work better than the ones made for working out. (therapyshoppe.com is one site).
I’ve never been able to keep a good consistent sleep pattern. I *hated* my sister when we were kids. We shared a room, and she’d be asleep in moments, and I’d be there wide awake for hours. My mind would not shut down. I grew dependent on the radio, but after a short while it became a distraction that also prevented me from getting sleep. I sleep walked through my elementary and junior high years.
Then with my kids, even a decade after they’ve grown out of babyhood, my sleep patterns were demolished totally. I was also diagnosed with ADD-inattentive a couple of years ago, which fits with the insomnia & interrupted sleep patterns I’ve had my whole life.
Possible solutions for your son: a child sized mummy sleeping bag, if his own movement wakes him up, or if he needs to cocoon. A change in diet before he goes to bed. Audiobooks have helped my son. He loved listening to The Percy Jackson series on DVD as he fell asleep. A night-time journal to write or draw down all his worries and preoccupations so they don’t follow him into bed. My daughter found that to be helpful. When I was a kid, my own (morbid) solution was to pretend I was dead, or *already* asleep. Another solution was one I discovered in PE in junior high! The PE teacher had us all lie down and outline our bodies with our minds, in our heads. It’s a common meditation technique I learned later. There are guided meditation podcasts that can help with that.
I hope your son’s insomnia gets better.
Poor Jellybean. Hope the snots go away soon. My little guy woke up in the middle of the night with croup once, and it was terrifying! We got to experience our 1st parent trip to the emergency room for a vaporizer and steroid after which my little man hocked up the biggest glob of phlegm I’ve EVER seen. I would have been freaked out if I had coughed up that much crud.
Hope your little gal is feeling better soon! I think having sick kids is sometimes more exhausting than being sick myself!
Insomnia isn’t something I really struggle with, but in my case exercise doesn’t necessarily help. I mean I’ve lost more sleep the night before races, long runs or super hard workouts than I care to. Okay, overall I know exercise helps me sleep better. When I stop, I can’t sleep for anything.
I feel like I’m no longer making any sense. Time to stop typing.
Hope Jellybean in feeling better soon. Croup is no fun. Both my kids have had it numerous times and I still get it every once in awhile.
I have always had insomnia and exercise hasn’t helped, although according to the article the exercises I do wouldn’t help, so maybe I should just walk? Bo-ring! I have mucho anxiety problems too and sleep or not sleep tends to follow the patterns of my anxiety.
When I struggled with disordered eating, I used to say I was also a sleep anorexic because I would deprive myself of food AND sleep on purpose. I don’t know why…I wish I could go into my brain and tinker with the part that made me feel that way. It was horrible.
As far as your son, have you ever tried books on CD for him to fall asleep to? My oldest used to have mad trouble falling asleep, then we got him some bible stories on CD to listen to. It made all the difference. There might even be book on CDs to rent at your library…
Most of us just like me are unable to get their daily requirement of good sleep. This only makes us more cranky and not want to exercise
Exercise is good, just not too close to bedtime.
I think that people who can’t quiet their minds in bed at night should do meditation during the day and learn to quiet their minds. Then they can apply this learned skill in bed.
No trouble sleeping over here, but for most of my adolescent years, I wanted to marry Gilbert Blythe.
It is the very rare night that I can get a full night’s sleep. I would like to thank the random man rolling a suitcase down the street at 3:30 this morning for his contribution. I am an extremely light sleeper.
Exercise makes no measurable difference for me except that I feel it would be harder to function without being physically fit. The only thing that does help is to have a fan on to drown out normal low level noises.
My middle son is the only one in the family who is similarly affected. The rest of the family can sleep through the night as soon as their heads hit the pillow. More impressively, they can fall right back to sleep if awakened.
Insomnia is so annoying, especially when you know how important sleep is! I experimented with some natural sleeping supplements and posted about it here. http://thehealthycollective.com/2013/08/27/the-importance-of-quality-zs/
I can definitely tell a difference in my quality of sleep when I’m exercising and when I’m not. Probably because it helps with anxiety as well.
Hilary x thehealthycollective.com
I have terrible sleep deprive until a year ago . I use to sleep only 3-4 hrs for years . I will be very happy if I could get 6 hours sleep once a month. I don’t do exercise at that time as I’m to weak for lack of sleeping. I could fall asleep on the cab on my way home or even in the office because with only 3-4 hour sleeping you cant last at least 12 waking hour. I took some sleeping pills , go to psychiatrist and even take sleep therapy. None of them work. And one of doctors advise me to take some high calcium veggies, nuts, purple mangosteen essences or xamthone , avoid all kind of caffeine and swimming. But make sure not to do high intensity activity at least 4 hour before your bed time. It works for me now I can sleep well and function again.
Delayed sleep phase syndrome (from infanthood), over here.
Regarding the influence of exercise: my experience conforms with the findings you report – vigorous stuff (in my case, 20-40 minutes of e.g. ‘metabolic’ or interval-type workouts) later in the day (after 6pm) jazzed me up too much, so I did them earlier in the day. Resistance training (of the non-interval kind) with no cardio wasn’t as problematic.
I happened upon late evening swimming (9-10pm) because that’s the time my pool’s open for lap swims. Now *that* is some sweet sleep elixir. Full body and mind relaxation, I think because of the repetitive movements (I’d swim at a slow, steady pace) and the focus on breathing. It’s tiring, as well (especially that late). Leaving the gym, I’d find myself spontaneously driving about 10k slower than I did coming in. I would think a gentle evening walk might be a reasonable alternative (probably not as effective as swimming, though).
Good sleep hygiene helps, always. Light control is the most effective among that bag of tricks – lights & electronics off, & quiet environment a couple of hours before bed (“winding down”), together with bright sunlight in the morning. (This is because of the connections between the retina and the endoplasmic reticulum and the thalamus, if I’m not mistaken.)
Agree with carbs before bed.
Sometimes, I take Valerian root pills or tea, absolutely nothing else — check out the scary findings around hypnotics! I don’t like the idea of relying on melatonin, either — any time you give your body a pharmalogical mimic, it overcompensates the other way (tolerance), or reduces its own production of stuff. I’ll go as far as Valerian root very occasionally, only in emergencies.
All this takes a fair bit of conscious self-management, and any slippage – a trip, a night out – puts me right back where I started from.
My mother tells me I was like your boy, when I was a baby. My parents tried to set consistent times; up until I was 3, they’d take me on long drives in the car to soothe me, up – nothing worked. I had terrible nightmares; fear of sleep was part of it. I was sensitive to both internal sensations – feeling too hot or cold, or worked up from excitement about some future event, or worry about something that happened that day – and my environment – I hated the wallpaper in my room (which my mother changed, to one I thought was worse). Also disliked bedrooms that were too big (scary!), too small (trapped!), or too far away from my parents’.
If those kinds of issues might affect your son, I would investigate ways he can learn to self-regulate — to calm himself down if he’s agitated, distract himself from engaging thoughts, or learn to take the blanket off if he’s too hot. I would also decorate his room in a way that supports calm. E.g., mid-range tones on walls, vs too light [overstimulating] or dark [scary]. For colours – most people find green fairly soothing. Not too many toys and things poking out from shelves or baskets – “a place for everything, and everything in its place”, in the form of wardrobes or closed shelves, can go a long way towards creating a sense of calm. (I have thought *a lot* about this stuff.)
The best I ever slept in my life was the week I worked on an apple farm, in my twenties. 8 hours of hard physical labour in the sun makes a woman sleep like a queen 🙂
I sometimes have trouble switching off and getting to sleep. Exercise seems to help with this. Even if my mind is still going by body says enough is enough I need to sleep 🙂
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