When it comes to creating the most sleep friendly environment for your little one – a dim red or amber night light is always best. Why?
1. It protects night vision.
It sounds obvious but its true. Think night vision goggles! You are able to see without your eyes needing to readjust to a new brightness. Using a red light will maintain an optimal sleep friendly environment for your little one to help them fall back asleep quicker if they do wake up in the night.
2. Red light does not suppress melatonin production (i.e. your sleepy hormones).
To start let me explain the impact of light on our bodies and circadian rhythm. Our circadian rhythm is our biological body clock and it is set by darkness and light. Our bodies naturally feel sleepy when its dark and when its light we release hormones to wake up. That worked well back in caveman days but in this modern world both adults and children are bombarded by different light sources that can confuse our bodies and sometimes we need to cheat to recreate what our bodies need (i.e darkness) to feel sleepy.
Daylight is a form of blue light (which stimulates us to wake up) but so is the light that comes from screens/devices along with white lights and even some LED lights for example. Our children can have access to all these types of lights throughout the day even before bedtime. The result is it becomes harder for them to fall asleep. Having a bright light in their sleep space can do the same thing. Red lights on the other hand do not impact our bodies in the same way and we are still able to create melatonin (sleepy hormones) when exposed to these colours.
3. Gives comfort.
When little ones start express fears of the dark, using a red night light can provide a lot of comfort to help them see around and see what’s there and helps to reduce any fears. The red light will give comfort but without impacting sleepy hormones.
So aim for a dim but deep red, crimson or amber for best quality sleep.
What colour light do you use? I would love to hear below.
Keep well everyone. Sending you much love at this crazy time.
Leigh. X
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