Sleep

Question

My daughter 4 years old has CF. She is afraid to go to sleep. What do such children feel?

Answer

Dear questioner,
Sleeping problems are quite common in childhood. Studies with children show
that about 18% of the children suffer from problems in either falling asleep
or sleeping through. This problem is not specific to the illness of CF,
however, sleeping problems are even more frequent in children with chronic
illnesses.
In the specific case of your child, individual strategies to overcome the
fear have to be developed.
When talking about what children feel who are afraid to go to bed, it is
important to know, that not every child can tell exactly, what the reason
for the fear is; in that case it is important to have a regular time when
going to bed and to have appropriate rituals (singing, reading a book, etc).

In case a child can express what the object of fear is (e.g. it sees a
monster when going to bed), parents have to consider together with the
child, what that monster could be (e.g. shadows of a tree) and to take the
fear away, sometimes with the help of fantasy. It makes sense to apprach the
object of fear step by step with the child and to learn to cope with it,
instead of avoiding the object of fear, thereby reinforcing the fear.
It is not possible to talk about all relevant sleeping problems here, but I
hope with this little excurse to have helped you further.
Yours sincerely,

02.06.2008