Questions and Answers

A: Sleepiness is a very common problem for children with these conditions. Depression itself can create extreme fatigue and hypersomnia (excessive sleeping). Also the medications that are used to treat these conditions are powerful. Remember, these illnesses are illnesses of the brain so the medications used to treat them target the brain/central nervous system which controls the sleep/wake cycle. So a common side effects found with many of these medications is sleepiness.

Here are some ideas to try:

• Have your daughter get to bed very early. Try different bed times. She may need well over 8 hours of sleep to be able to arise rested in the morning.
• Talk with your daughter's physician and see if any medications can be eliminated or changed to medications that cause less drowsiness. Discuss possibilities of changing dosages or times of administration. Sometime tweaking medications can help tremendously.
• If she is currently prescribed a stimulant (i.e., Adderall, Ritalin, Concerta) to treat her ADD discuss with her physician the possibility of administering the medication an hour before she gets up in the morning. If her physician feels this would be acceptable, it can be quite helpful in raising her alertness level enough that she can get up on time for school. You can make this an easy process. If she usually gets up at 7am, go in at 6am, tap her on the shoulder, holding her medicine and a glass of water. Tell her, "it's time to take your medicine". She can grab the medicine and glass of water with her eyes closed even, take the meds, and fall back asleep for another hour. Then when you go to wake her up her system is a little more alert and you may have more success in actually getting her out of bed.
• Next, gently raise her alertness level over an hour or so, by activating each of her sensory systems, one by one. Perhaps first work with raising the light level in the room. You can buy a dawn simulator through any of the web sites offering light boxes, such as sunbox.com or sadlight.com. These units create dawn in your bedroom at whatever time you set. Or you can improvise by using a dimmer switch and slowly increasing the level of light, or you can just turn the lights on. Next work with sound. Put on a tv or radio in the room, talk to someone in the hall outside her door, run the vacuum…anything to raise the sensory level.
• Ask your daughter what might help her wake up. Some children like to be sprayed with water, some use multiple alarms around the room. Involve your daughter in finding a solution to her dilemma. Keep working at it. You will find a system that will help her. Good luck.

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