SLEEP

[kcchater]

HI all,

My son is 2 years old and a terrible sleeper is this something some of you are experiencing? I don't know how to make him sleep, i don't know if it's an HFI thing or not. Any ideas or comments would be great help.

I'm a very sleep deprived mom who works full time out of the home so i need sleep to survive.
Thanks

[elilly]

Is he having problems falling asleep or staying asleep? If it's falling asleep, then maybe it's a melatonin issue? There are a few others who have experienced this as well. We give Graham 2 mg of sublingual melatonin every night and it knocks him right out

[colormist]

I sleep walk and have very lucid dreams. I'd be surprised if that was a common HFI trait.

[sarosh]

Me too. I used to sleep walk for a long time. I read somewhere that it happens when you have hypoglycemia at night.

[Tammy]

Regina has never been a good sleeper. I've gone in her room in the middle of night, when I thought she was asleep, and she just opens her eyes and looks at me. If I don't say anything to her, she doesn't say anything, just closes her eyes again. But I know she's not sleeping deep.

[charlie]

Megs is a terrible sleeper. She doesn't settle no matter what I try and often doesn't get to sleep until 10.30 at night ( she is 7). she then invariably wakes between 2 to 3 am and is restless from then on. Then about 5am she finally sleeps and can't get going for school in the morning.

We are looking into it at the moment as to whether it could be that the fructose problem blocks the absorbtion of tryptophan the deficeincy of which can cause melatonin deficiency and therefore insomnia. Turkey is supposed to be rich in tryptophan which is maybe why everyone feels sleepy after Christmas and Thanksgiving dinner!!!
It is something that has been reported for fructose malabsorbtion as the fructose doesn't get absorbed through the gut wall so combines with the tryptophan amino acids and blocks its absorbtion. Now HFI problems are at the liver not the absorbtion problem but maybe there is a similar excess sitting in the bowel - a sort of backlog maybe.
We saw our dietitian today who is going to look into it.

[colormist]

Eh, now that I think of it, my brother did scare the crap out of me one night when I was up late reading Stephen King's IT when the power went out. He kept making noise and I kept yelling at him to stop it and that he wasn't scaring me (he was). Finally, I walked over to his room, opened the door, and found him laying in bed (asleep) clutching the screen to his bedroom window. I woke him up. He had no idea why he had removed and was holding the screen.

If this seems REALLY common among HFIers, I'll add sleepwalking/restless sleep to the wiki article as a possible trait.

[lukesmom]

I say don't add it. My son is HFI and has always been a superb sleeper. Still sleeping 12+ hours at night and is lmost 6! Napped, too, til he was 4. No sleep walking, restlessness, etc.

[CK]

I have a terrible time getting to sleep. Sometimes the Melatonin doesn't even work. Many nights I'm still trying to fall asleep at 1:00 am, and I have to get up at 6:00. It drives me crazy. I wish I could come up with a solution to this.

I have terrible nightmares- especially if I accidently get a bit of fructose. When I was little, it was awful. I tend to wake up in the night without having a clue to where I am. Night time is interesting.

[millan]

I have never sleepwalked and have no serious issues with sleep in general apart from being being very sensitive to sound when trying to fall asleep as well as being a mother to a child who seems to need less sleep than me.

[charlie]

Hi CK, chances are we can't get it here in England but what melatonin can you get. Trying to persuade our consultant to give it a go with Megs as I'm sure the bad sleeping isn't helping her at school. And definately not helping me - maybe i need to knock myself out then I'll sleep through her wakeful patches!!!!!!

Charlie

[julienc]

My brother and I don't have any sleep issues like the ones mentioned above. I'll have occasional insomnia problems, but that is always stress related.