However Covid-19 has had an impact on people’s sleeping patterns. A survey by The Sleep Charity last April found that nearly four in 10 people were going to bed later but also nearly a third were waking earlier too. Time for sleep Medic G, Wille M, Hemels ME. Short- and long-term health consequences of sleep disruption. Nat Sci Sleep. 2017;9:151-161. doi:10.2147/NSS.S134864

Your sleep needs vary during your lifetime and by how many cycles of sleep you need to feel rested. It takes, on average, about 90 minutes to go through each cycle. Completing five cycles a night means you’d get 7.5 hours of sleep, while six full cycles translates to about 9 hours of sleep. Without a bed a child is unable to participate in social activities such as sleepovers and may feel embarrassed asking school friends to visit their home, and struggle to form important friendships with their peers. All will lead to further feelings of isolation and solitude that a life in poverty brings.And so on. About halfway it changes from "it's time for bed" to "it's time to sleep", and it ends with a little girl being put to bed with the lines: Stories to Grow By believes that these are the best stories that should be shared at bedtime. Each story has been hand selected from among hundreds of stories for kids from all over the world. We ensure that each bedtime story helps children ease into sleep and leaves them with a positive outlook on themselves and the world around them. Paruthi, S., Brooks, L. J., D’Ambrosio, C., Hall, W. A., Kotagal, S., Lloyd, R. M., Malow, B. A., Maski, K., Nichols, C., Quan, S. F., Rosen, C. L., Troester, M. M., & Wise, M. S. (2016). Consensus statement of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine on the recommended amount of sleep for healthy children: Methodology and discussion. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 12(11), 1549–1561. There are a few possible reasons you might wake up tired, even after sleeping for 8 hours. A good place to start exploring these reasons? Consider your sleep habits and sleep hygiene practices.

For many people, wake-up time remains fairly constant from day to day. The time you go to sleep, however, might vary, depending on any number of things:Melatonin Dosage: How Much Melatonin Should You Take 94% of us drink caffeinated beverages. But what does it do to our sleep? Kang EK, Kim SS. Behavioral insomnia in infants and young children. Clin Exp Pediatr. 2021;64(3):111-116. doi:10.3345/cep.2020.00052 The book is beautifully illustrated with a wide array of baby and adult animals including mice, geese, cats, dogs, deer, snakes, fish and bees. I like the inclusion of animals that little kids may be afraid of upon encountering in the real world. I think it's important for kids to respect and appreciate all life forms so I like that the book includes non-traditional and non-cute and fuzzy animals.

Our favorite night-night book. White text makes it semi-visible in a room with a night light, although this isn't really necessary because it's not a story. It's a series of big animals lovingly telling little ones it's time for sleep. We have books for play but this soothes a 2 year old off to dreamland. I don't like the line towards the end "The very last kiss is almost here", and always change it on the fly, but so he still knows it's almost night-night kiss time. I sleep on the hard floorboards and my children top and tail on the mattress as we don’t have beds. The situation is impacting my mental health. It makes me really upset. My children are really sad too. My daughter isn’t eating and my autistic son is frustrated and aggressive a lot of the time”This is one of my all-time favorite books for wee little ones. I used to read this book to my kids even as babes in my arms. The story is so lyrical and and the words roll off your tongue like a soft lullaby.