The obtainment of conventional sleep has been known to elude the brilliant mind. While Einstein is reported as needing a solid 10 hours of shut-eye, Tesla and DaVinci tallied up their naps to equal only a few hours of sleep per day. Charles Dickens stayed up each night, and used the sunrise as a cue for his bedtime, while Thomas Edison believed sleep to be a complete waste of productive time.
These tendencies toward an odd sleep pattern may be due to the level of cognitive processing that the gifted person is operating with, but that concept doesn’t alleviate the fact that our Western society is designed to operate on a standard, 9-5, schedule. While pursuing the type of lifestyle that will eventually allow your gifted child to thrive under the volition of his or her own internal clock, it is most likely that your gifted child will have to learn to play by these societal rules for sleep and wake.
A sound approach in determining the best way to assist your gifted child toward a productive sleep schedule is to uncover the factors which prevent your child’s mind from agreeing to shut-down on demand. For some, the difficulty may lie in the mind having been overstimulated at a point too near bedtime. For others, it may be the quiet solitude of the nighttime which allows their minds to roam most free, resulting in the grand ideas that our distracted daytime minds are impeded from forming. For yet others, it may simply be the case that they do not need the amount of sleep that is being imposed.
Depending on your child’s level of insight, he or she may be able to describe exactly what it is that occurs each night. For younger gifted children, some parental detective work may be in order. Here are some questions to consider:
Does Your Child Suffer From Effects of Sleep Deprivation?
Studies have indicated that failing to obtain enough consistent sleep to meet the needs of an individual comes with highly observable consequences. Both short-term and longer-term sleep deprivation – as a result of obtaining no sleep, at all – have the expected results of negatively impacting motor skills, mood, and mental processing abilities.
Partial-sleep deprivation, however, addresses what is most commonly observed by parents of gifted children. In this study, such a deprivation was defined by the individual obtaining five hours, or less, of sleep during a 24-hour period. While motor skills were negatively impacted by all three forms of sleep deprivation, it is partial-sleep which produced the most decline in cognitive and emotional abilities. Participants in this group were found to lie two standard deviations below the norm in these areas.
In addition to declines in functioning, if you notice that your child shows physical symptoms of sleep deprivation – such as more frequent illnesses; excessive clumsiness; unexplained weight changes; or persistent yawning – it is time to intervene. Otherwise, it may just be that your gifted child is one who does not need the typical amount of rest.
Why Do Exceptionally Gifted Children Have Trouble Sleeping at Night?
Once the possibility that your gifted child is, in fact, getting enough sleep to meet her or his needs is ruled out, more detailed analysis of the problem can be implemented. After ensuring basic amenities to provide your child with adequate environment to induce sleep – such as a quiet bedroom, comfortable bed, and a full stomach – an examination of your child’s personality can be useful in determining your next steps.
If you haven’t yet uncovered such, finding out whether your child is more prone to introversion, or extroversion, is a valuable component in the child-rearing toolbox. Contrary to the popular interpretation of the concept, there is more to these personality types than simply being outgoing or quiet. In psychological terms, an extrovert is one who gains energy from social interactions, while an introvert gains energy from being alone.
What this can mean for your child is that the ability to fall asleep may be regulated by the personality bend. For an extroverted child, being alone in the bed for a period of time may be what decreases the emotional and mental energy levels enough to achieve sleep. For the introverted child, being alone in a quiet room can have exactly the opposite effect. An introverted child’s mind will take flight under these conditions, resulting in insomnia.
For the investigating parent, robust measures of these personality tendencies can be determined through having a child take an official test. Additionally, a free – yet useful in the interim – source of determining your child’s tendencies toward introversion or extroversion is available at 16Personalities.com.
Putting Data Into Action
You are armed with the information about whether your gifted child is getting enough sleep to maintain proper physical, emotional, and cognitive functioning. You are armed with the information about how your particular child is stimulated or relaxed. Now is the time for implementing strategy.
In the best-case scenario, your child is just fine with the amount of sleep that is being obtained. In this situation, it is we – the parents – who need to adjust our expectations. We are best to not force such children to suppress their natural inclinations toward wakefulness. If our child is, indeed, getting adequate sleep, then functioning along with a daily routine should not be an insurmountable difficulty.
For those who do notice negative symptoms of lack of sound sleep in their children, utilizing strategies in-line with the child’s personality bend may help. While unconventional, allowing an introverted child to engage in social activities prior to falling asleep may produce the desired outcome of eventual rest. These types of children lose energy during interactions, and are prone to become more sleepy during engagement in nighttime texting or phone calls. In contrast, an extroverted child will need time to wind down after interactions, indicating that an evening schedule devoid of socializing may be the most effective approach. In both cases, the opportunity to take naps may be a solution.
