Red light and melatonin for baby sleep and toddler sleep
A kids nightlight is a nursery and bedroom staple from birth and beyond. The right nursery light can not only add a beautiful decorative piece to your space but also provide a soft glow for middle of the night nappy changes and feeds. As your child grows the right nightlight can also be a source of reassurance and comfort when they start to experience fear of the dark or nightmares.
The ever-growing checklist of do's and don'ts for baby and toddler sleep can be daunting with the need to have the right darkness, temperature, background noise etc. One common area that is discussed is melatonin.
What is Melatonin?
Melatonin is a hormone that your brain produces in response to darkness. It helps with the timing of your circadian rhythms (24-hour internal clock) and with sleep. Being exposed to light at night can block melatonin production.
Research suggests that melatonin plays other important roles in the body beyond sleep. However, these effects are not fully understood.
To make the most of this naturally occurring hormone, you want to work with it, not against it. This is where having a red nightlight can be important - especially in the first year.
Contrary to what you may have seen elsewhere, a red light does not produce melatonin, it just doesn’t inhibit the production of it.
Benefits of using a red nightlight
You can be assured that sending your baby to sleep with the red light setting of a little belle elfin light or unicorn nightlight will not interfere with your babies sleep. Using a red based light has a much higher wavelength than white/blue/green light, which research shows does not inhibit melatonin. The red light is also much loved by parents with middle of the night nappy changes and feeds.
