Question: I was doing the nightly insomnia shuffle with my five year-old daughter. The frequency and intensity of her problem had been getting markedly worse. At 5 AM, after she had evicted my wife and me from our bed, I found this site. While I was frustrated by the lack of any professional oversight or actual help, hearing the other parents’ situations may have gotten my thinking cap working again.
Tonight, after about twenty times of returning her (kicking and screaming) back to her bedroom and shutting the door, I got an idea.”Would you like to go on a Hawaiian Vacation, Sophie?” I asked. She looked at me as if considering the idea and then said yes but wanted to know how I was going to come through with that. Wise kid.I opened my iPhone and launched an app that makes relaxing sounds. That’s what it’s called, Relaxing Sounds. You set a timer to however long you want. One of the first sounds was Hawaiian Vacation, but there were about twenty others from babbling brook to whale song. The whales were freaky and kind of counterproductive. Hawaiian Vacation was just right. She started listening intently at the sounds. I said goodnight, kissed her on the forehead, and shut the door. She didn’t come out again. That was it.