Mommykitty,

I've had sleep problems for several years and even had a sleep study done. Finally, I was put on Trazodone and I love it. No more waking up at night. I used to wake up numerous times during the night but I don't do that on Trazodone. I don't have any side effects from the medication, although I don't know if there are any differences with children. I've been on Trazodone for at least 3 years now. I also get the generic version at Walmart for only $4 and it's not addictive.

Once, due to a mix-up at the doctor's office, I didn't get my refill in time and didn't have any medication left. I had been taking the Trazodone faithfully for a long time. Just one night without it and I was waking up throughout the night.

I hope you are able to find some relief for your daughter.

Elaine

Quote

My daughter (diagnosed ADHD at 8 yrs) who is now 17 yrs. old, has consistently been somewhat of an insominac also. We would hear her in the middle of the night rearrangeing furniture or find the mess she left in the food pantry for a midnight food rage. We had to leave our door open and fortunately one of us (my husband or me) would hear her and redirect her to bed. I would not have considered locking her door, either. Had we not woken or the damage been min., I would have considred an alarm for her door. We did try melatoin. This did not seem to work. (Nor herbal teas, etc.) I am reluctant about sleep. meds. but have spoke to many Dr.s that this is the forst step if all else fails.

Is part of her sleeplessness part of her anxiety? I have further pursued discussing with her about anxious thoughts and training my daughter to use soothing thoughts or reframing anxious thoughts (with therapy). I have not been in favor of TV or computer too late at night (yet I know I use TV to help get to sleep).

It is very complicated, so let yourself know that this is a big challenge. And then it may change with age. Good Luck and hang in there.

Quote

I was well known for rearranging the furniture in my bedroom at 2 a.m. on a Saturday night... so I understand what that's like though I aways blamed it on needing change because I was an army brat (currently 50, and had 32 moves - 19 of which were before I was 10...) When I wasn't moving furniture, I normally had the radio on to block the sound of everyone else sleeping/snoring when I couldn't sleep. It acted more like white noise and stopped me from being quite so agitated at night.

re: Melatonin, I've been taking melatonin for a few months now and noticed a couple of things. 1. synthetic doesn't work for me, but the natural version does. 2. 3mg of melatonin doesn't work for me, but 5 mg. does. Try it again, all melatonin is not equal. If one type doesn't work, another may. Even then, I've had one doctor tell me, that it is hit and miss with it. The only thing he can stress to me is a consistant bedtime and wake time, every day, including weekends. Minimum amount of sleep is 7 hours, though I normally get only 6.5 at most.

Good luck. Here's hoping you can figure out a way to help your daughter.

Quote

What about trying benadryl? The active ingredient in it is the same that is used in the adult OTC Unisom. One regular dose knocks my 8 yr. old daughter out in about 30-40 minutes. And I mean out cold. Check with your doctor and see if he/she would recommend trying it and the correct dosing. Sometimes the simplest things will work, when we least expect them to work.

Also, we live in a ranch (so all the bedrooms are in the same area of the house) and use baby gates to gate the hallway to the main area. Maybe you could put baby gates up in her doorway or blocking her access to living/dining/kitchen/stairs? She can still see out, so maybe it wouldn't trigger anxiety as much as a closed door.

And one more suggestion. Maybe try co-sleeping or room sharing. You would be able to monitor her midnight magic a little better, because her waking would alert you quicker, being in the same bed or room. My dd has a lot of vivid dreams and being able to reach out and snuggle back in always calms her more quickly than if she had to search us out from her own room - and she doesn't fully waken.

Best of luck!

Quote

HAHAHA you are definitely not alone. Both my son and I have this issue. I am 28 now and both of us have had it our entire lives, when he was a baby at 6 weeks, he was sleepign through the night, but that consisted of 4-6 hours of sleep with no naps, definitely not "normal". I love my late night energy as that is my "me time" since I am a stay at home mom.

Here are a few things we do:

I put an intruder alarm (simple $5 device that sticks on with sticky tape from Target) on the outside of his door and turn it on just before I go to bed. If he opens his door and the two pieces separate it will shriek and I will wake up. It is a pain to get woken up, but it gave me piece of mind that he would not be up getting into things. He also liked to get into the food, expecially treats, would eat them all then try to hide the evidence.

Next we send him to bed around 11pm with his nintendo DS and let him play until he feels tired enough to fall asleep. The catch is he has to stay in bed and stay quiet or it will be taken away. We used the leapster when he was younger with the same principle. We are VERY selective about the games he is allowed to play and for the most part he is okay with it, only educational, non-violent games. A word of warning, play the games first, just because they are E for Everyone does NOT mean they are non-violent.

Another thing we do is if he wakes up before me (he will now because his door will still be shut) he needs to stay in his room and play quietly with legos or whatever until I wake up, or until he has to go to the bathroom or something, at which point the alarm on the door will wake me up anyway. Also we have a shelf in his room with a basket that has some healthy snacks for him to get if he feels the need at night or early morning like granola or cereal bars and water. This helps to curb the sneakiness, keeps him out of the kitchen and makes him feel empowered. We started that when he was 4 and did so to teach him that he does not need to be sneaky with food, and this helped him overcome his need to "horde" food or treats.

Or you can do what my cousin does for her AHDH child (which I personally do not agree with but to each their own) is she got a locking bedroom door knob and put it on backwards with the lock on the outside and locks her daughter in her room at night. Before you get hysterical the prompting behind this was because her 3 yr old turned on the gas stove one night and almost burned down the house, however I think my alarm method is a little less traumatic. She is afraid the alarm wont wake her up. I am a pretty light sleeper so that has never been an issue for me.

I thought I would sahe to let you know that ALOT of people go through this and everyone propably has a different way to dealing with it. Take care!

Quote

I just noticed the part where your daughter doesnt like the door closed. We have a small light that we leave on all night and music (we play christian worship music which tends to be soothing) but it was definitely and issue at first. We built up to it slowly, at first only closing the door after he fell asleep so he would wake up to it, terrified but eventually after a few weeks he got over it, though I shed quite a few tears in the process wondering if I was traumatizing him. Next we moved to closing the door halfway, the most of the way, then eventually closed all the way. I have found the closed door actually helps him get a better night's sleep with less potential to wake up to noises.

Before we could close the door however we would use a suspension (the kidn that lock into place by being tight) baby gate and when he could climb over at about 2, we raised it about 1.5 feet off the floor, enough so he couldnt get a footing to climb over, and wouldnt fit under. Then when he got tall enough to climb that, we doubled up the gates, one on top of the other in the doorway, I felt abd because it seemed like he was caged him but it kept him safe and he could still see out. We started working on the closed door when he was about 4.

I spent many nights sleeping on the couch or just giving up and bringing him to bed with us, though my hubby was not fond of that in an effort to get some sleep since I was always so worried about him getting up and getting hurt. Since I generally only get 4 hours of sleep a night, losing any of that was hard on me and left me cranky, but remember it's not forever :)

Also another thing you can do without closing the door is set the alarm I use to an entry chime so if something passes through the opeping it will chime like a store bell. It only does it twice though vs. a constant alarm until you close the door again or turn it off, but it could help if you think it may wake up up. You just put one piece on either side of the door frame and if she walked through the beam it will go off. The downside is that it has to be low enough to react so she may learn to turn it off or avoid it altogether. We have the alarm at the very top of the door on the outside. It may be worth a shot though until you can shut the door.

Here is a link to one similar to mine:

http://www.target.com/Bell-Howell-Sonic-Alarm-System/dp/B000FJRNHO/qid=1237922880/ref=br_1_1/189-1750663-0431367?ie=UTF8&node=14190181&frombrowse=1&pricerange=&index=target&field-browse=14190181&rank=pmrank&rh=&page=3

Quote

Quote:

Mama2Girls said: What about trying benadryl?

We did this too until our Dr told us that prolonged us can make it ineffective so if you need it for an allergic reactio as you sometimes get with ADHD meds, it wont work and can also "create" allergies that were not there before. I generally only do this when he is sick and really needs the rest or an occassional night when I am just really tired LOL. Our Dr said it is not recommended more than 1 time per month or 12 times per year. Occassionally we give him a Tylenol PM, just one tab, of the non medicated kind meaning no additives for cold, you can get it in the sleep aid section and it is non-addicting and pretty safe. It also should not be used often as it can make it so your child's body will not learn to sleep on it's own.

Also if your child is on certain meds like Wellbutrin, it says not to give them ANYTHING with sleep agents i.e. benadryl, tylenol PM, etc as it can interact with the meds.

He was prescribed ativan at one point but it made him so groggy the next morning that I said no it's not worth it.

Quote