There are six common causes of disruptive sleep in children and these include sleep deprivation, night waking, sleep-onset associations, separation issues, resistance to sleep/settling problems and parasomnias. Let’s take a brief look at each one of these.

Any sleep disorder can lead to sleep deprivation which can affect a child’s physical and mental health as well as his/her performance in school and in other social activities. Sleep deprivation among children is becoming more and more commonplace in our society, to its detriment as it has many debilitating effects on an otherwise healthy child’s life.

Night waking refers to times when a child sleeps lightly and/or wakes up without an obvious reason such as discomfort or a loud noise. This is normal if it happens occasionally, as, just like adults, children cannot remain in deep sleep every hour of the night. However when night waking starts becoming the norm or the child consistently has problems falling asleep then treatment is needed.

Sleep-onset associations refer to what children associate with drifting off to sleep (such as being rocked to sleep by a parent or sucking on a soother) and what they also need if they should awaken suddenly in the night. The most positive sleep-onset associations are the ones that don’t include parents or anyone else for that matter. To encourage a good night’s sleep for your child, put them to bed when they are sleepy but not completely asleep yet. By putting your child in his/her bed when they are drowsy but still technically awake, they are learning to become independent by going to sleep by themselves. This helps to foster self-confidence in children and a sense of accomplishment. Children with moody or temperamental dispositions generally need the comfort of sleep-onset associations even more so than other children do. The most common problem for disruptive sleep in children is sleep-onset associations.

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