The challenge is real: your child simply doesn’t fall asleep or stay asleep. You’ve tried melatonin, warm baths, deep pressure massages, milk and cookies, and tearing your hair out.
Here’s a great way to ease your child into sweet dreams, and it’s soothing as they come.
Hemi-Sync is a company that produces neuroscience-based audio recordings to help ease the listener through physical and emotional challenges, and they offer an entire line of recordings devoted to sleep enhancement.
Malki Kahn OTR, is an occupational therapist practicing in Brooklyn, New York (and who happens to be my sister-in-law), passed along the idea which she got from Ann Buckley Reen, OTR, RYP. Some of my best “discoveries” come via word of mouth.
These particular audio recordings came highly recommended and include ocean sounds, music, and binaural beats. The first two are helpful for sleep, but the other two are more stimulating, for daytime activities:
There are many other choices and plenty of samples to listen to online. Here are the audio recordings that are relaxing and/or sleep inducing.
The Program
Once you’ve chosen your audio recording, set up shop in your child’s room. You can either download a digital recording or purchase the CD. A mom I know used the audio downloads and kept her phone on in her children’s room through the night (not necessarily an option for everyone).
I recommend keeping the the recording on for two weeks in a row, on repeat, for the entire night. Keep the volume low so the music remains in the background.
Although you want to help your kids fall and stay asleep more easily you don’t want them getting so used to the music that they rely on it in order to stay asleep. It’s a good idea to change the routine after two weeks.
At this point, the recording should stay on for just the first part of the nighttime ritual, bed time and the first few hours of sleep. You can turn it off when you go to bed.
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