For children of any age, sleep is very important. This is not just a rest after activity, at this time the information that the baby receives during the day is absorbed and his mental development. Therefore, sleep must be sound and healthy, so that he enters the new day cheerful, ready for new impressions. Not all children are able to sleep through the night. It is considered normal if the child gets up for physiological reasons or if he is hungry. But often a child wakes up at night with hysterics, and parents do not know how to calm him down so as not to frighten him or harm him.
Content:
What is considered hysterical?
Many mothers have at least once gotten up because of the crying of their 2-3 year old child, who had previously slept peacefully, waking up only when he wanted to go to the toilet or have a snack. It is quite easy to distinguish hysterics from ordinary night wakings. This is a strong nervous excitement, often uncontrollable, manifested in screaming and tears. Trembling and uncontrolled movements of the arms and legs are possible. An anxious child may not recognize his parents, pushing them away and even hitting them.
Night tantrums are often confused with whims, which manifest themselves just like a child’s daytime whims. The baby begins to cry because he needs his mother's attention. As soon as the mother is nearby or he gets what he wanted, the child calms down and falls asleep on his own.
If the parents fail to calm down, on the contrary, when touched, the baby screams louder, breaks out, breathing becomes intermittent, the forehead becomes covered with sweat, we are talking about hysteria. They can be isolated, repeated over a long period of time, or not repeated at all. But more worrying is the occurrence of similar situations almost every night. Here it is worth thinking about taking action as soon as possible.
Doctors do not advise immediately classifying this condition as a pathology. As a rule, there are no mental or neurological abnormalities here. In most cases, time passes and children outgrow this period. This does not mean that you should wait for the moment without doing anything. It is necessary to understand the reasons.
Causes of night tantrums
The physiology of sleep is quite complex. Sleep consists of fast and slow phases, replacing each other throughout the night. And if in an adult the slow phase predominates, when the body is relaxed and the brain rests, then in children, especially younger age, the REM sleep phase predominates.
During this period, the brain is engaged in processing information received during the day. You can observe how the baby's eyes move under closed eyelids, he twitches his arms and legs, pronounces sounds, words, even whole sentences.
In babies, REM sleep occurs throughout the night. The older the child gets, the longer the slow, deep sleep becomes. During the REM sleep phase, dreams occur, which most often cause tantrums in many children. These can be bad dreams, nightmares, or simply an abundance of impressions. This is comparable to the waking moment when a child cries from overwork and many emotions. The same thing happens when he sleeps, only he experiences all this in a dream, not yet being able to distinguish a dream from reality.
What exactly causes hysterics in a child at night is something parents should figure out.
Unhealthy atmosphere in the family
Young children are very sensitive to negative energy. If there is a tense atmosphere in the house (quarrels, scandals or a constantly tired, irritated mother), all this will certainly affect the child’s psyche. During the day, when adults loudly sort things out, insulting each other, a child is able to hide in a secluded corner and quietly watch what is happening, and at night he will experience this horror again. Feeling the weak protection of mom and dad, the baby has nightmares and wakes up in tears.
Important! You need to learn to sort things out outside the room where there are children. It would be ideal if adults learned to conduct dialogues without raising their voices. You can’t drag a baby into a conflict! Mothers who take it out on their children should remember that the smallest irritation is a big tragedy for their son or daughter.
Fears and nightmares
Nightmares are usually associated with increased emotional stress. If during the day the baby was seriously scolded by his mother, he quarreled with a friend on the playground, watched TV for a long time before going to bed, where they showed the terrible Baba Yaga or the “ugly and evil uncle” from an adult film, then at night these fears will return to the child, and hysterics can be avoided It's unlikely to succeed.
You should limit your TV viewing, especially before bed. When a hysteria occurs, the little one needs to be calmed down by stroking his head and whispering to him kind words. If necessary, turn on soft light (night lamp or sconce with a very weak glow - ideal for a nursery). A good practice is to put your child to bed with his favorite soft toy, which will definitely “protect” him from bad dreams.
Wrong daily routine
Some modern parents popularize education “without boundaries”: you can make noise and run around wherever your beloved child wants, and eat and relax when you want. But there is nothing good in the fact that a child wakes up at lunchtime and goes to bed for the night well after midnight. Depleted nervous system, problems with sleep appear.
The daily routine needs to be normalized. The procedure for going to bed should be pleasant and last at least an hour: play interesting, but quiet games, take a warm bath, perhaps with sedative herbs recommended by the pediatrician, read books or listen to music.
Hyperactive children
There are more and more such guys, because modern life dictates its own rules. Parents trying to make a child a genius, unfortunately, often overdo it. From Monday to Sunday, the child attends many clubs, sections, and events. But they do not always maintain such a rhythm.
It happens that a hyperactive child himself requires such a busy life, but you need to think about whether he has time to play with peers or do his favorite things on his own. Bright everyday life carries a heavy burden that the baby does not feel. But at night all this manifests itself in the form of whims arising from overwork.
Note: It is imperative to develop the child, but this should not be done in spite of health. Parents should leave time “for childhood” so that their son or daughter grows up not only smart and comprehensively developed, but also healthy.
Of course, health problems can also be the cause of a child’s nightly tantrums. In small children, these are often teething problems, colic, and neurological problems. Then it is better to resolve this issue with a doctor. It is worth seeking advice if the situation has not improved by the age of 7-8 years (at this time, as a rule, children's tantrums at night stop).
Video: “Being parents is easy.” Advice from psychologist and family consultant Inna Morozova
What not to do
Parents whose children often wake up at night need to remember that the baby is already scared, most likely from a bad dream, so there is no need to frighten him even more. You cannot shout at the child, trying to wake him up completely, or harshly pour water on him or splash him in the face with water, especially cold water. You can’t slap on the cheeks, much less hit, no matter how tired the parent is.
Some mothers share their experience when a sharp blow in the face helps them with uncontrollable crying at night. But what works for some is not always effective for others. If such a practice has not been used, it is better not to use it. When they blow in your face crying child, this causes a temporary holding of breath (which is what the method is based on), but the child’s inability to breathe can frighten him even more, and then the hysteria will develop into panic. The consequences can be the most unexpected: from mild fright to serious neurological problems, such as stuttering.
How to deal with nighttime tantrums
First of all, you should find out and eliminate the reasons why your child wakes up at night:
- Organize a daily routine by setting a time for naps for children under 5-6 years old.
- Going to bed at night should be calm, excluding too active and noisy games.
- For some time, while the hysterics are repeated, it is better for the mother to sleep in the baby’s room so that, when he wakes up from a nightmare, he is not even more frightened by not seeing his parents nearby. Psychologists offer an alternative soft toy, with which the child will fall asleep.
- It is better to show hyperactive children to a pediatrician and pediatric neurologist. Perhaps they will recommend medications designed specifically for children to relieve excessive agitation.
The best thing a mother can do is to take the child in her arms and try to calm him down with stroking, light rhythmic tapping on the back, whispering that she is nearby, nothing bad will happen.
If the child is actively fighting back, there is no way to calm him down; you should not wait for the hysteria to end on its own, because this may not happen. In some cases, especially impressionable children develop fever, seizures, and even epileptic attacks. A soft cloth soaked in cool (but not cold) water will help revive the child. It should be used to wipe the child’s forehead, cheeks, chest, stomach, legs and arms. Due to the temperature contrast, the child will most likely come to his senses, stop screaming and fighting, and then he can be picked up.
If the baby can speak, then in the morning you need to ask him about the reason for the hysteria. For example, mom and dad will be able to explain a bad dream by telling the baby that everything he saw is not reality. And no one will dare to offend a son or daughter.
Very little time will pass, and the nightly hysterics that tormented our beloved child will pass. According to statistics, by the age of four or five, they disappear completely. If the problem is permanent, and in the daytime the child also behaves very aggressively, then you should be wary. Such behavior signals a neurological disease, for example, increased intracranial pressure, which parents cannot recognize on their own.
Video: Doctor Komarovsky about bad sleep. How to improve your baby's sleep and get enough sleep
Lyudmila Sergeevna Sokolova
Reading time: 5 minutes
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Article last updated: 05/26/2019
A newborn baby cries often, especially in the first three months of his life. The fact is that a baby can only tell his parents by crying that he needs something, is experiencing pain in the tummy or some kind of discomfort. And in order for the baby to form a correct perception of the world around him, the mother should definitely respond to these requests, and as quickly as possible. Today we will figure out why a child may cry at night, whether there is causeless crying and what it can mean.
Causes of newborn crying
The child wants to eat
One of the most common reasons for crying in babies is hunger. The baby wants to eat, so he wakes up, screams, is capricious and rolls around in his crib every hour at night. In such cases, the baby quickly calms down at the mother’s breast.
And this is quite natural. Nutrition is the basic need of children in the first months of life. And in order to satisfy her, the baby signals this to the mother with the help of tears. If you don’t feed him on time or thoroughly, he will wake up every hour with a feeling of hunger and call for his mother, no matter how you try to put him to sleep. The baby will calm down only when he receives his portion of the mixture or breast milk.
During the night, a child can eat two to four times. And if during the day feeding is often carried out according to a schedule, then at night this should be done on demand.
Due to the feeling of discomfort caused by filling the diaper, the child tends to be capricious often. The intestines of infants are characterized by frequent bowel movements. Therefore, it is likely that the baby pooped and signals this to the parents. If this is the reason for crying at night, then after changing the diaper the child will instantly calm down and fall asleep sweetly.
Baby has a tummy ache
Most babies experience colic in the first three to four months of life. This process is characterized by sharp, intense pain.
Crying at this moment may be accompanied by bending the legs and bringing them to the tummy. The baby tenses up, may turn red, and sometimes farts - this eases the pain of colic. Many parents help their babies with microenemas or gas tubes.
Spasms in the intestines in the first months of life are observed due to deficiencies of enzymes and an increase in the amount of food. This is due to the formation of the gastrointestinal tract and is considered normal.
Pain appears either during feeding or a few hours after it. At first, the child falls asleep well, and after half an hour he may wake up, crying loudly.
Discomfort
Various factors can create discomfort for the baby, for example, tight swaddling. At this moment, the baby is constantly spinning and trying to get out of the diaper. The reasons may also be a tightly fastened diaper, or a wrinkle in the diaper.
Tight swaddling disrupts the baby's natural position, so the newborn tries with all his might to tell mom and dad that he is uncomfortable.
Is your baby cold or hot?
It is necessary to maintain the optimal temperature in the child’s room, because this factor greatly affects the mood and well-being of the baby. A newborn baby should be in a room whose temperature varies between 22–24°C. At the same time, you should not wrap your baby up; clothes should be breathable and made of natural material. Cotton is best.
If the baby is cold or feels hot, he will call his mother for help with tears.
The child experiences anxiety
The baby perfectly feels the mood of his mother. Therefore, if she is frightened or anxious about something, her condition can often affect the baby.
Children react very sensitively to the situation in the family; strong night crying can occur for no apparent reason. Parents cannot understand the reasons for this behavior, but it lies precisely in the psychological situation in the family.
You can cope with this problem only by calming down or eliminating the main source of irritation. The baby should feel harmony and friendliness in the environment around him. Otherwise, he will continue to wake up at night in anxiety and call his mother every hour.
Newborn wants to be held
Often, a child’s nightly tears indicate that he just wants his mother to take him in her arms, caress him, and calm him down. This is very important for a baby; sometimes he lacks physical contact and the feeling of love.
You should not listen to people who say that a child can be spoiled and ruined by this. This is wrong. A child should feel the security and love of his parents every minute, every hour. And if he understands that everything is in order, he is taken care of, mom and dad are nearby and he can always count on them, then his nervous system develops correctly. Subsequently, the baby will be much calmer and cry much less.
Types of crying
Experienced mothers can immediately understand by the nature of crying what their baby needs.
How to understand what a newborn baby wants to say? There are several types of crying:
- Invocatory– the child begins to scream for a few seconds, after which there is a short pause and everything repeats again. At the same time, the crying time will increase and gradually turn into continuous tears.
- Hungry- occurs at the hour when the baby needs to supplement with breast milk or formula. Its characteristics are similar to that of a conscript. However, if the mother took the baby in her arms, but did not offer to eat, then he grows up, subsequently turning into hysterics.
- Painful– in babies it occurs at the moment when pain occurs: for example, colic begins. The nature of such crying resembles hopelessness. At a certain point, the baby gets tired of screaming and may even fall asleep, but if the pain does not go away, then the sleep will not be long. The awakening will begin again with tears.
Parents can hear each of these types of crying at night. And now, knowing the features of the cry, you can understand what the baby wants to say and what kind of help he needs.
How to calm a baby when crying
- The most basic rule of parental behavior when children's tears appear: you need to take the baby in your arms. And it doesn’t matter what time of day, what time it is, the main thing is that the baby does not feel lonely and understands that the parents are nearby.
- If the baby continues to cry, then you should try offering him his mother’s breast or gently rock him in your arms, humming a calm melody.
- If the baby is still spinning around, not sleeping, and continues to scream, then you need to understand the reason for this. Perhaps it's colic or discomfort from a dirty diaper. You can lay the baby on his tummy, change his diaper or diaper, see if his clothes are comfortable enough, and if everything is in order in his sleeping place. After eliminating the visible cause of the disturbance, you should try to put him to sleep again.
- When calming the baby, parents should also be calm. Under no circumstances should you get angry, irritated or shout. This can only aggravate the baby’s condition by scaring him with your reaction.
- If all remedies have been tried, and the baby continues to cry and does not calm down for more than two to three hours, then an immediate consultation with a doctor is necessary. At night you should contact an ambulance.
Sometimes it is quite difficult to understand why a baby is crying. And it seems to parents that there is no particular reason for tears. But this is not so, the child will simply not be capricious. The task of mom and dad is to understand what is bothering their child and fix the problem.
Read further:
Night sleep is important not only for the baby, but also for his parents. Why does a baby cry at night?
Why does a child cry at night, common reasons
The main reasons for baby crying at night:
Hunger
Three months of age is the most difficult time for parents; it is also called a crisis. During this period, sleep is restructured and becomes shorter. The teeth begin to move in the gums and not the most pleasant sensations arise. The baby cannot get enough milk from the breast normally. He breaks off and cries loudly for no reason at all. You have to feed him after he calms down. As a result, he may not be able to eat normally and may cry from hunger in the middle of the night. The unpleasantness of the situation is that the baby refuses breast milk and screams in a voice that is not her own. There is no need to despair, just apply it to your breast more often.Stomach hurts
Colic is a rather painful phenomenon. During attacks, the baby shrinks all over, tenses, pulls up his legs, and screams. If colic occurs at night, sleep is disturbed until it gets better. Fortunately, colic does not last long and goes away with time. Some things that can make a child’s life easier are a tummy massage, belching after eating, a gas tube, a warm heating pad, special medications for emergencies and only on the advice of a pediatrician.Got some sleep during the day
The older the baby gets, the less sleep he needs. More and more often he does not sleep during the day, but sometimes he can confuse day and night or fall asleep soundly from fatigue. As a result of a good daytime sleep, especially a long one until the evening, the night's sleep will be worse or the baby may cry all night and fall asleep again in the morning. In such cases, it is important to develop a certain regimen and strictly adhere to it. Go to sleep, wake up, and eat at the same time.Teeth are growing
Teething is one of the most common causes of disruption to a baby's nighttime sleep. The baby feels not only discomfort, but also quite noticeable pain. Teeth erupt for a long time - from 4-6 months of age and up to almost 2 years. For some children, this is real torment. Naturally, at night, when extraneous sounds disappear, nothing distracts from the pain and severe itching, the child becomes nervous and cries. Special teething toys, massage of the gums, and lubricating them can help cope with the problem. by various means, eliminating unpleasant symptoms.Too hot or cold
Temperature is important for the well-being of the baby. Both excessively high and low levels prevent the baby from sleeping normally, especially at night. To have a good night's sleep, it is important to maintain optimal temperature conditions. Finds it comfortable for small child The ambient temperature is within 18-22 degrees.Wet diaper
A wet or dirty diaper is a reason to wake up in the middle of the night. The baby's skin is very sensitive, plus the urge to defecate disturbs sleep. Some children wake up and cry before they relieve themselves, others - after. To calm the baby, just change the diaper.Breathing problems
The respiratory system of a newborn is not yet ideal; various malfunctions may be observed. Breathing is also impaired due to various diseases that interfere with normal gas exchange. For example, from a runny nose, the nose is stuffy, and a newborn cannot yet breathe through the mouth due to anatomical features. Since the instinct of self-preservation is embedded in us from the very moment we came into this world, the body itself reflexively reacts to improper breathing and the baby can wake up at night. Therefore, when colds You need to clean your nose, at least before going to bed.The child cries at night, what should I do?
A baby's nighttime crying unsettles parents. After all, they only have time to sleep at night after a hard day of work. And the cry of a baby exhausts even the most persistent ones. What to do? First, calm down and try all the options:- Take him in your arms, rock him, cradle him, talk to him quietly.
- Change the feeding position and holding position until the baby likes it.
- Change diaper.
- Feed.
- Give a tummy massage.
- Shush the baby, making a sh-sh-sh-sh sound.
- Swaddle at night.
- Rock the baby in any available way.
- Place the crib next to your bed.
- Create “uninterrupted” contact between the child and the mother - breastfeed, carry in slings or kangaroos.
Time after time, among the advice on how to get a child to sleep well, I come across opuses that the child needs to be “tired up” during the day physical activity, limiting daytime sleep, all kinds of stimulation, going to bed as late as possible and then... he will definitely [NOT] sleep with you all night!
I’ll immediately make a reservation that such advice, applied partially, can actually work in rare cases for children over 3-4 years old, but certainly not with younger children.
Why? Let's figure it out.
I have already written a lot about the effects of the hormone cortisol on a child’s sleep. Cortisol is a stress hormone that is produced in children when excessive fatigue accumulates, and its direct purpose is to keep the human body tense, activated and maximally susceptible to the environment. After all, the original purpose of cortisol is to keep you moving long enough to escape and hide from a predator in the wild.
One of the mechanisms by which this hormone works is its slow elimination from the body, which especially affects the ability to fall asleep and stay asleep for long periods of time.
Therefore, when mothers come to me with a question about why their child often wakes up at night, the first point that I draw the parents’ attention to is the routine and amount of sleep that the child receives over a 24-hour period. In the vast majority of cases, after detailed analysis It turns out that the baby sleeps little during the day, falls asleep late in the evening, and often wakes up at night. It turns out to be a vicious circle - accumulated cortisol prevents you from getting a good night's sleep, and the lack of sufficient rest prevents cortisol from leaving the body. You can notice another clear sign that the baby has accumulated fatigue when the child cries at night in his sleep. At such moments, the baby may not wake up (the eyes are closed), but whining and sometimes strong crying bother mothers no less. The child goes through a stage when the body, which has not yet rested, tries to wake up (pushed again by cortisol), but fatigue physically brings discomfort and causes crying.
Does your child cry in his sleep at night?
What can you do to help your child break out of this vicious circle? The first step is going to bed early. There is no need to be afraid that the child will wake up before dawn if he falls asleep earlier, just the opposite. Night sleep is the only segment that is easier to lengthen if you need to compensate for lost sleep or “sleep off” accumulated fatigue. Think about it, it’s really difficult to sleep during the day - the light and noise of the day seething around us does not allow us to fall into a sweet slumber for a long time, and at night nothing interferes. It’s rare that a one and a half year old child can comfortably stay awake for more than 5 hours, and if your baby is younger, then 3.5-4 hours may be beyond his real capabilities. How early can you go to bed? According to experience, 17-00 is the earliest point that works, does not lead to crazy early (before 6 am) getting up, and compensates for the lack of rest. Children in their first years of life can sleep up to 12.5-13.5 hours a night if necessary, so don't let your doubts get in the way of your child's rest. And in a situation where a child screams loudly in his sleep, often wakes up at night and generally has difficulty sleeping, there is not much to lose. So why not try it?
A few words about how long you need to wait to see changes for the better.
Often, parents of young children are faced with the problem of restless sleep in their children. As a result, mothers do not get enough sleep at night, they are perplexed and at a loss: is this behavior a neurological abnormality or a variant of the norm? Let's find out what could be the reason for the fact that the child often wakes up at night and cries.
Why does a child cry at night?
Let us immediately make a reservation that this information applies to children from birth to 3-3.5 years. If your child is 4 years old or older and still cries at night for no reason, it may be a different problem.
So, often the reason for a poor night's sleep is the so-called insomnia– problems falling asleep and maintaining uninterrupted sleep during the night. At the same time, the child sometimes does not even wake up, but whimpers half asleep, as if checking if the parents are nearby. If you immediately calm the baby down by simply patting him on the head, he will immediately fall asleep, calmed by the attention provided. If parents do not approach the whining, sleepy baby, he may burst into tears for real, even to the point of hysteria, and it will be quite difficult to calm him down.
But often mothers who are accustomed at the first call of the child, take him in your arms during the day, they act the same way at night. This is not entirely correct, since babies quickly get used to this pattern of behavior and in the future, waking up at night, will ask to be held in order to fall asleep in familiar conditions. If possible, you should communicate as little as possible with the baby at night, so as not to disturb his peace and not create such “ bad habits" Instead, give him your love and affection during the daytime.
Another reason for such behavior in a child is sleep disturbances caused by night feedings. Children older than 6 months no longer have a physiological need to eat at night, but it is the dependence on sucking at the breast or bottle with formula that causes the baby to wake up every 3-4 hours and cry. can gradual transition to a new ritual of falling asleep, when the evening feeding takes place before bed by 30-40 minutes.
Children often wake up at night if they are disturbed. colic or cutting teeth. 
Usually these problems are easy to recognize: they plague babies from birth to about 3 months and give characteristic symptoms. They are easy to deal with with the help of drugs for treatment and prevention. infant colic. If babies are teething, a special gel that relieves inflammation and soothes the gums will help you.
Much less often, the reason why a child sleeps poorly, gets up and cries at night is neurological pathologies. In particular, this is a change in muscle tone or increased excitability. At the same time, poor sleep is a consequence of these diseases, having cured which, you will gradually improve and normal sleep. To confirm this connection and diagnoses, a visit to a pediatric neurologist is recommended.
