PSA! It's not just blue light that's keeping us awake!

While scrolling through LinkedIn one day, I stumbled upon a post by Dr. Michael Gradisar, where he shared an intriguing article about a bidirectional model of sleep and technology use. Naturally, I had to download it immediately!

As a sleep specialist and Board-Certified Behavior Analyst (BCBA) in British Columbia, I’ve often heard the assumption that it’s the blue light from screens keeping us awake at night. But from personal experience, I knew there was more to the story. I’ve relied on technology to help me fall asleep since childhood—starting with books on tape (shoutout to "The BFG" and the unforgettable whizzpopping scene!) and progressing to DVDs on my tiny 13-inch TV. Even now, my nightly routine involves watching The Great British Baking Show with my husband and reading on my Kindle, both of which relax me and help me drift off to sleep in minutes.

Sleep is something our body is naturally meant to do. It is our environment and our daily choices as humans that usually influence our sleep. There are medical considerations that definitely can interfere but that is a completely different post!

Have you ever wondered why your pet can sleep anywhere anytime? They never have difficulty falling asleep once all is settled and stay asleep all night. Their sleep is usually only disrupted by natural reasons (Milo sometimes has to poop at 2am if we feed him too late - again our fault haha).

As humans we self sabotage sleep - usually accidentally because we are just so tired and still need to get through the day. 

All of our patterns of behaviour serve us in some way and I’m here to provide you with some examples of actions you can take to take care of yourself during the day with hopefully a by product of getting out of the cycle or sleep sabotage. 

You are likely here because you want to know if you can truly teach your child how to fall asleep on their own.

I share my top two strategies and some proactive measures to ensure you can have the tools to teach your child to fall asleep on their own.