What Gets Measured Gets Done

I mentioned before that I have a small library of sleep books on my shelf, covering the whole range from Suck it Up to Cry it Out.  While the techniques and philosophies vary, they all have one thing in common.  Every single one identifies a sleep log as the first step.  The logs they describe range from simple recordings of total hours slept to complicated and detailed summaries of every major activity in your child's day.  The one thing they have in common is that they all agree narrative logs (like this one) are the least helpful in identifying patterns.  Even so, blogging my girls' sleep this week I have noticed that Rose Red's nightmares disappeared on siesta days, and reappeared when we skipped it.  Any record at all provides useful information.  Of course, it's an exercise that needs to be repeated, since the situation is always changing.

In the last two years, I have kept many sleep logs, and I have found that sleep deprived parents need to keep it simple or else they won't keep it up long enough to get real patterns identified.  Of course, the first thing you need to know is "How much sleep is my kid actually getting?"  The second thing tends to be identifying the times when your child falls asleep or wakes up.  If you discover your child always wakes up at 2am, it can help you narrow down the causes.  Once you are familiar with the basic pattern of your child's sleep, you can start to identify possible culprits for sleep disruptions.  A second or third generation sleep log may be as simple as
Good Night/Bad Night
Exercise today? Yes/No      
Sugar after 4pm? Yes/No