Acupressure helps babies sleep!

This article reports that acupressure helps babies sleep, and can help with other issues that babies have.

Promoting better baby sleep from the perspective of Chinese medicine is very different from the standard American approach. 

Modern pediatric sleep advice is an incredibly contentious subject as any trip to the bookstore will demonstrate. There are books on the many different behavioral modification methods, from the cry-it-out approaches to the attachment-parenting styles. And if you go to any online parenting discussion board, there will be heated discussions among parents who defend their choice of sleep method for babies. 

Regardless of parenting style and culture, Chinese medicine techniques can help improve sleep because they alter the energetics of sleep and focus on physiology rather than behavior.

While a reliable sleep routine will be enough for most babies to establish a healthy sleep pattern, others may need additional support. This is when Chinese medicine and its attention to individual energetics can come to the rescue.

Causes of Poor Sleep 

In Chinese medicine, there are many different patterns of sleep disturbance, each with their own unique treatment. With babies, it is usually an excess of yang energy (fire) and a deficiency of yin energy (water), but it could also be due to a weak spleen (earth) and an excess liver (wood) or other elemental imbalance. 

Balancing these energies with acupressure can be done easily and effectively with the use of a good acupressure reference guide or the recommendations of a pediatric acupuncturist.

Better Digestion 

In Chinese medicine, the source of sound sleep is good digestion. A visit to a pediatric acupuncturist to treat sleep disturbances will always begin with an analysis of digestion. There can’t be good sleep if there is gas, bloating, constipation, or diarrhea. Regular abdominal massage can be incredibly beneficial to regulating the digestive processes.

To help digestion, you can massage in circles with medium pressure around the belly button, going counter-clockwise (against the flow of the intestines) to treat diarrhea and clockwise (with the course of the intestines) to treat gas, bloating, and constipation. 

To do a well-baby treatment, begin with 50 circles against the flow of the intestines and then finish with 50 circles going with the flow of the intestines. This is guaranteed to ease tummy troubles that interfere with good sleep.

Teething and Sleep Trouble 

Teething pain can disrupt even the best sleepers. Massaging acupressure points that have an energetic relationship to the gums helps to relieve the pain, heat, and swelling that accompany teething. In Chinese medicine, the primary channels that intersect the gums are the stomach and large-intestine meridians. 

To help ease teething discomfort, massage the point on the thumb-side of the index finger from the corner of the nail base to the nail tip (large intestine point), and the web between the second and third toe (stomach point) for two minutes per point as often as needed. This is very effective for improving sleep.

Deeper Relaxation 

Massaging between your baby’s eyes can also greatly improve sleep. This very relaxing acupressure point can induce sleep in even the most reluctant sleeper. This point is located above the bridge of the nose between the eyes. You can massage upward with medium strokes until the baby drifts off to dreamland. It is good for adults too.

Daily Massages 

A daily acupressure massage can also be used to promote good baby sleep. The entire body is crossed with energy channels that correspond to the internal organs. There are six channels that traverse the arms and six channels that traverse the legs. Regular massage along these energetic pathways will keep a baby’s immune system strong, improve digestion, and assist with good growth and development. 

For an easy massage that will benefit the whole body, begin by massaging one finger and follow that line all the way up to the shoulder. Continue with each finger until you’ve done the both hands and both sides of the body. 

Then do the same on the lower body by starting at each toe and massaging up each leg. Do both sides. Then continue with circular massage on the abdomen like the one to promote good digestion: Do 100–200 clockwise circles. 

Finish with a series of nine upward strokes on the back. Start these strokes at the base of the spine and finish them at the neck. Babies will love the attention and their health will benefit as a result of this tender care.

Parents should be persistent with their use of baby acupressure. Babies respond amazingly quickly to acupressure treatments, but if their parents’ efforts are not enough to work through sleep challenges, then a consultation with a pediatric acupuncturist may be necessary. They can do a more thorough evaluation and plan a comprehensive treatment strategy to put the baby on a better sleep track.

Babies benefit immensely from Chinese medicine’s unique perspective on pediatric sleep and its gentle and effective acupressure solutions. Regardless of parenting style and sleep philosophy, all families can utilize these simple and easy-to-implement strategies to improve their baby’s sleep. It just takes a little time and attention, and the result can be a better night’s sleep for both the baby and the parents.

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Digestive issues in children with ADHD

This article discusses how children with ADHD also commonly have digestive issues that go untreated in the child.

Children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are significantly more likely to suffer from chronic constipation and fecal incontinence than kids without the neurobehavioral condition, a new study says.

The study of more than 700,000 children found that constipation nearly tripled and fecal incontinence increased six-fold among kids with ADHD.

"We also found that children with ADHD tend to have more visits to see a doctor, suggesting that these children have more severe constipation and fecal incontinence than other children," said lead researcher Dr. Cade Nylund, an assistant professor of pediatrics at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences.

Taking medication to treat ADHD did not seem to affect the number of office visits for these bowel problems, according to the study, which was published online Oct. 21 in the journal Pediatrics.

In the United States, more than 8 percent of children are diagnosed with ADHD. Kids with the condition display hyperactivity, as well as difficulty staying focused, paying attention and controlling their behavior.

These ADHD-related behavioral problems may lie behind the increased risk for bathroom woes, Nylund said.

"Kids with ADHD may not respond properly to physical cues to go to the bathroom," Nylund said. "They may have difficulty interrupting other or more desirable tasks they wish to engage in at that time."

Fecal incontinence is a more severe form of constipation, Nylund said. "What happens is, kids have constipation for several years and then they lose normal cues to go to the bathroom entirely. Then ... they just overflow and leak into their underwear."

Parents who notice that their child is suffering from constipation should see their pediatrician, Nylund said. In addition, parents can prevent constipation by increasing fiber in their child's diet, he said.

"Parents need to be aware that this risk exists and hopefully prevent constipation from occurring," Nylund said.

One expert said he sees this problem all the time among his patients -- both children and teenagers -- but it is often ignored and untreated.

"Their parents are noticing that they do have constipation, but they are not bringing it to the attention of a pediatrician or child psychiatrist, and it's going unnoticed and unaddressed," said Dr. Matthew Lorber, acting director of child and adolescent psychiatry at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City.

Lorber said children with ADHD also might digest food more slowly or irregularly than children without ADHD. "Physiologically, that can lead to problems that cause constipation or fecal incontinence," he said.

Parents can help by setting consistent times for their child to go to the bathroom, such as before going to school or to bed, or before a long car trip, Lorber said.

He also said parents shouldn't "yell at their children for 'accidents.'"

Dr. William Muinos, associate director of pediatric gastroenterology at Miami Children's Hospital in Florida, agreed that children with ADHD often are distracted and forget to go to the bathroom.

"What we do is place them on lubrication therapy -- medication that will lubricate the bowel to help stimulate defecation," he said. "The other thing we do is simple behavior modification." This involves teaching the child to go to the bathroom at specific times, usually twice a day -- once before going to school and once in the evening, he said.

For the study, Nylund's team collected data on nearly 750,000 children, aged 4 to 12 years, who had a parent on active military duty. Among these children, nearly 33,000 were identified as having ADHD.

The researchers found that 4.1 percent of the children with ADHD suffered from constipation, compared with 1.5 percent of children without the condition.

In addition, 0.9 percent of the children with ADHD suffered from fecal incontinence, compared with 0.15 percent of children without ADHD.

Even when adjusted for factors such as age, gender and birth order, the researchers found the risk for fecal incontinence was more than six times greater among kids with ADHD and the risk for constipation was almost three times higher.

Although the research showed an association between ADHD and increased instances of constipation and incontinence, it did not prove a cause-and-effect relationship.

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