English
French
German
Recently, my 9-year-old son has been having a tough time falling asleep. He had gotten better after many frustrating nights of continuously coming into our room, pleading with me to lay with him for “another 5 minutes” or worse, to sleep with us (NO!) until it was well past my own bedtime, taking a toll on the whole family.
Many of my friend’s children take melatonin, and I am very familiar with it as you may be. It’s a natural brain chemical we all have that signals our brain that it’s time to wind down and fall asleep.
As the doctor at a sleepaway camp recently, I noticed a good percentage of campers had melatonin on their medication list. Many parents have hailed it as nothing short of a miracle for their children’s insomnia, and the fact that it is natural makes us all sleep better (no pun intended!).
So, after yet another frustrating evening trying to get my son the F&%K to sleep, I figured I would try melatonin. Even if it worked as a placebo, so what? I just needed some sleep!
Now, as the doctor and mommy in the family, my husband rarely has an opinion about health-related issues since he isn’t even in the medical field. So when I brought melatonin up his opinionated reaction took me back.
“Why would we teach him from the age of 9 that his issues can be solved with a pill? Even if it is natural, so what? Whatever happened to a warm glass of milk with some honey at night?”
And then I remembered: My Nona used to give me a warm glass of milk every night I slept over. It was comforting, it was sweet (she used a touch of sugar), and I slept like that proverbial baby every night. Why didn’t I think of trying this first?
So, I took my husband’s advice and for the past week or so we pour my son a warm glass of milk an hour or so before bedtime. We were sure to tell him what it was for, just in case the placebo effect could help us out here.
Guess what? He’s been sleeping great!
Now, don’t get me wrong. Sometimes the situation calls for melatonin and I’m NOT knocking this natural remedy. I am definitely not shaming all the parents who use and depend on melatonin for their children and themselves!
My point, though, is that I write all the time about non-drug ways to alleviate our physical and mental issues. Yet, when I was desperate for a solution with my child (OK, also desperate for a good night’s sleep for myself!), my mind went straight to what I hear all around me. Everyone’s trying melatonin, why shouldn’t we?
The answer is that my husband was right. Lord help me, I hope he isn’t reading this, but it’s true. In a country where the majority of people are on at least one pill a day for something, why would I want to start my 9-year-old looking for pills to treat his problem?
What didn’t I do? I didn’t look inside myself patiently for an answer, to really meditate on it. If I had, I know that my Nona and her warm glass of milk would have come up naturally.
Will warm milk work for everyone? No. But it’s worth a try. Is anything wrong with melatonin in kids? Probably not. Still, it shouldn’t have been the first thing I tried in my son.
Sleep is a complex issue for many children. Eliminating electronics for an hour before bedtime helps. Talking honestly with our children helps, of course, but we were already doing that. We even tried a few sessions with a child psychologist specializing in sleep issues.
A knee-jerk reaction to solve a problem with a pill is shared by so many people, and I fear it’s translating to our parenting. We need to get back to basics with our kids: Extra TLC, those little touches that may not work as quickly or offer guarantees in results, but that are worth trying.
