During Ramadan, most people in the Kingdom sleep during the morning and day, and remain awake at night. As a result they find it difficult to reorient themselves and it is not uncommon to find students struggling to wake up on time or doze off in class on the first days of school.
Parents admit that the hardest task is to bring things back to normal because of Ramadan. “Life changes completely during Ramadan,” said Huda Al-Asiri, a Saudi widow and mother of two children aged 10 and 12.
“For the entire period of the vacation, many families spent the whole night awake and slept during the day,” she added.
“I’ve started to force my children to go to sleep early at night, but they’re finding it difficult to adjust. They stay awake in bed all night trying to sleep,” she said.
Umm Luqman, a Syrian housewife and mother of five, is experiencing the same problem.
“I’ve tried to change my children’s sleeping patterns in the last week. I’ve been forcing them to go to bed at 8 p.m. Then I found that they were struggling to wake up in the mornings. It was then that I realized that they were spending the entire night awake in bed,” she said, adding that she has even stopped her children from watching TV or playing video games to ensure they go to sleep on time.
Abu Emad said it is difficult for adults and very difficult for children to readjust their sleeping times.
“I try hard to adjust my children’s sleeping habits by taking them outside in the afternoon on family visits or to a shopping mall. I try to make them stay awake until night. I do not want my child to suffer at school because of tiredness,” he said.
“It is easy to manage a child’s sleeping habits, but most families do not know the correct way of dealing with their children,” said Jihan Arnaout, a children psychologist who works for a private school in Jeddah.
“Families should try to fix the times they go to bed and wake up. It is normal for a person to fall asleep at a certain time, but this can only happen if it is relatively fixed,” she added.
Arnaout advised people to stop their children from drinking items that have caffeine content such as coffee, tea, fizzy drinks and chocolate, and eating spicy and sugary food six hours before bedtime.
“If the mother starts implementing these habits, a child’s sleeping habit will readjust automatically. This would make children go to sleep on time without any difficulty,” said Arnaout.
