Sleepless 3 Year Old

In the morning, get her up at the same time every day if you don't already. Including weekends.

If she is still napping, cut the nap. Then, oddly, try putting her to bed earlier. I know that sounds weird but sometimes it works and they sleep all night.

You don't mention what time she goes to bed at night and whether or not she still naps. These are very important details.

Most 4 year olds need 10 to 12 hours of sleep. Now that's total sleep (nighttime sleep and naps). Some kids need more. Some kids need less. My kids always seemed to either need the minimum number of ours suggested or less. It's really important to have a good understanding of what your kid actually needs and work with that.

Does your daughter still nap? If so, does she go down right away or fight you for a couple of hours? If it takes a couple of hours to get her down, she may not need the nap anymore. If it takes a couple of hours, does she also nap late and resist going to bed at night? All signs she's ready to give up her nap.

If she misses her nap, is she an easy going kid or an absolute bear. Even if she's a bit of a bear, it's worth considering the possibility that she may no longer need that nap.

My oldest gave up his naps just before he turned 4. My youngest gave up his naps around his 3rd birthday.

I would relax about the food. Fruit and milk are part of a healthy diet. These are things her body needs. Yes they contain sugar, but they are just so important for her. And that amount of sugar really shouldn't affect her sleep. There's very little nutritional value in juice, but a little juice and candy here and there isn't going to hurt her and it isn't going to affect her sleep.

We sometimes joke about giving our kids a little dessert right before bed. Sugar might make them hyper for a couple of minutes, but next comes the sugar crash. It very rarely affects their sleep.

I think more than anything, you need to figure out how much sleep your daughter really needs and go from there. If her body needs 12 hours, figure out what's going to work best for all of you. Does she need 10 hours at night and a 2 hour nap or 12 straight hours at night. You'll probably have to play with that and see how she responds. Also, figure out what time you want her wake up time to be and work from there. If you think 10 hours at night with a 2 hour nap is perfect and a 6:00 am wake up time works, then you want her falling asleep around 8:00 pm. So you'll need to tweek the bedtime routine so that she's really winding down around 7:45 and ready drift off to sleep soon after.

Also, make sure she gets plenty of activity. Running around, trips to the park. You describe her as hyper, so she's going to have energy to burn. Make sure she has opportunities to do that or you're just fighting a losing battle.

Good luck!

Give the child her fruit back, please. It's not the natural sugars that are causing this problem.

She's eating healthily and has lots of energy. Sounds like she needs to be playing outside. Climbing, running, biking. As much as possible with as little supervision as is safe and possible.

Why with little supervision? Because when you aren't "running" the play and activity, she has to use her mind and engage her imagination...which is more energy expended.

Make sure she gets lots of runaround time.
In other words, take her to a park, preferably in the morning or afternoon, and let her runaround. Let her get adequate physical activity. It does not have to be planned activities. Kids just need to runaround. And get their yah-yah's out. And get their energy out.

At this age, they NEED physical activity. To expend all their energy. This is a very active age.

AND also, when a child is OVER tired, they can also get, "hyper."
Because, they are trying to push through, their tiredness.
My son is like that. When he is tired... he will actually become more, active. Because he is trying NOT to be tired and he is trying to push through it. BUT that is when, he NEEDS a nap or go to sleep already. Even if it is earlier than his usual bedtime.
Last night for example, at 7:30pm, my son TOLD me he was tired and wanted to go to bed already. He knows himself. So he did go to bed. Even if that was earlier than he usually goes to bed. Until then, I knew he was tired already, and he was just being so active just out of tiredness.

Over tiredness, also makes a child sleep worse. Not better.

What time does your child go to bed?
Maybe you have to, change her bedtime.
Make it earlier. If it is late.

And if your daughter is up at 4:00am... and making mischief, then you or Husband, has to correct her. Discipline her. And wake up too and go get her and take her back to bed.

Anony. We have a singleton, who is also high energy. It's helped us to talk to him about the importance of sleep, and thus far, it seems he's bought in. We explain that we need sleep to grow stong and to have energy to run, and jump and play. We also praise him for staying in his room and being quiet, and settling back to sleep. We have a gate on his door because we don't want him to have free reign of the house when we are in bed, and finally, we made a huge deal when his buddy cancelled a play date because she hadn't slept well and was too tired.

Good luck to you and yours,
F. B.

What time does she go to bed? Perhaps she goes to bed too early and is done sleeping. When my kids were three they slept about ten hours a night. They went to bed at 10:00pm and got up at 8:00am. If I were to put them to bed at 7:00pm, then they would have been up at 5:00am.

Sugar makes kids sleepy, not energetic. There may be a quick almost instant energy rush but that's usually just for a few minutes they we get tired.

Caffeine makes kids hyper as do some food additives such as Red Dye 40.

Updated

Sugar makes kids sleepy, not energetic. There may be a quick almost instant energy rush but that's usually just for a few minutes they we get tired.

Caffeine makes kids hyper as do some food additives such as Red Dye 40.

You can try cutting out:

Fructose
Hight Frutose corn syrup
corn syrup
Dyes,
Fake sugars

I would also suggest to try and find somone who does the EAV testing, they might give you insight to what foods could be affecting her.