What is a sleep disorder in children?
A sleep disorder in children can manifest itself in various forms. The disturbance or deviation of sleep can refer to the ability to fall asleep or sleep through the night. Furthermore, an early morning awakening with a very short sleeping period or an above-average length of sleep can also indicate a sleep disorder.
Also nightmares, snoring and breathing stops as well as sleepwalking are counted with the children to the sleep disturbances. Basically a disturbance is only spoken of when the sleep behavior of a child shows a strong deviation from the comparable age and development group. Generally speaking, sleep disorders are frequently found in childhood, most of them are based on developmental and age-related changes and recede on their own.
Causes
Sleep disorders are found in a large number of children as a temporary phenomenon at certain stages of development or age. Most of the time, these are self-limiting and subside after some time. Sleep disorders can also be caused by certain habits, such as watching exciting TV shows or playing computer games before going to bed, eating sugary or caffeinated drinks and food, or a lack of exercise.
Irregular getting up and going to bed can also have a negative effect on sleep patterns. The children are then for example too agitated, too awake or simply not used to full capacity/tired enough to find their way to sleep. Beside the evenly designated circumstances, which can have a bad influence on the sleep behavior of children, also psychological loads/illnesses or physical diseases are to be considered as possible cause.
If children are heavily burdened, stressed or even traumatized by external circumstances, this can lead to sleep disorders. In the same way, children who suffer from hyperactivity, anxiety disorder, depression, schizophrenia or other psychological disorders can have deficient sleep behavior. Likewise, physical illnesses, which are accompanied by pain or difficult breathing, can lead to disturbed sleeping habits of a child.
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