Autism and sleep problems
Posted by Health articles on September 28th, 2009
Recurring sleep problems in a child with autism can affect mood, stamina, behavior, socialization, and their ability to do well at school or with their work. Having trouble falling asleep each night, talking, waking up once or more per night, waking after too little sleep and staying up all day: it’s a wonder they can perform at all with such a low amount of energy and rest to rely upon. Naturally, this also affects everyone working with the child and those caring for them. Therefore it is in everyone’s best interest to look into different ways to help these children overcome these barriers to being at their best each day.
Some important factors to consider are:
- diet
- schedule
- bedtime and pre-bedtime routines
- exercise (different kinds can have different effects on alertness or a relaxed state in the body)
- recognizing problems that require medical attention
- keeping a diary to record the day and night time observations and progress
- maintaining progress made
There are many available resources to help with this. If you belong to an autism family/parent support group, listen and ask if any other parents have autistic children with sleep problems, and ask them how they are working on it. There are a number of people who may already be involved in the therapies for your child whom you are already consulting or seeing for appointments that you can ask, and they may even have other clients or patients whom they know are successfully making progress with improving sleep. These could include your family doctor, your pediatrician, your naturopath, your child’s psychologist, your speech pathologist, your occupational therapist…the list goes on. There are also accredited sleep centers and support groups that you can look for on the Internet to see what is local or closest to your area.
Movement Disorders
A proper night’s sleep each night that includes enough deep sleep is essential to your child’s happiness and directly affects how well they do each day. It is no different for the rest of us, either; being at our best gives us better access to the best in ourselves, which means we feel better and have more to give, too.
Tags: Autism, sleep problems