By Mary Tynan, Head of Training, Childminding Ireland
We all know the effects of a broken night’s sleep and the difficulty we have functioning the next day. Constant disruption to our sleep can have serious implications from a health perspective as well as affecting our daily lives. As a parent of two children, now age 18 and 22, I vividly remember the exhaustion my husband and I felt when they were very young as both children had unpredictable sleep patterns, which continued for years.
We had a great routine with our children when it came to bedtime. We had wind down time then off to bed for a story. We don’t have any lasting memories of battles when it was time to go to bed. Our problem was, how long they would sleep for!! Most nights both children would wake up several times and needless to say they would awaken the household. Unfortunately we lost more battles than we won and gave in to them coming to sleep in our bed.
So why were they wakening? Well that baffled us. We searched the internet, read books, and discussed the problem with anyone we thought could help and tried every suggestion possible but failed continuously. Then a friend told us they were having their house tested for “Geopathic Stress Lines”. We had never heard of these before but on investigation discovered, along with lots of other interesting facts, if you position a bed over these lines, you will have a restless night’s sleep. Our simple understanding is there are small streams of water hundreds of feet below ground and the electromagnetic fields created by these streams work against the electrical system in our bodies as it is repairs itself while we rest.
Very sceptical about the whole thing, we decided we had nothing to lose and made contact with the Diviner who was promoting the awareness of these stress lines. We agreed on a day he would call to our house. He walked around the perimeter of the house carrying two dowsing rods which seemed to twist and turn randomly. He then came inside the house and noted where we had chairs and beds placed and informed us we had both children’s beds located directly over a stress line. He suggested the simple solution of moving the bed to a location where he identified there were no lines.
Despite having been warned it may take several weeks before we notice any difference, I recall anxiously waiting for bedtime that evening. To our disappointment, there was no change. The following night everyone went to bed as normal and when we woke the next morning, we were shocked to discover our son hadn’t appeared. At this stage, our daughter was age 6 and would generally go back to sleep if she woke during the night but our son was only 2 and he would always come to our bed when he woke. Incredibly, one week later, both children were sleeping right through the night and this pattern then became the norm.
Interestingly when I discussed it with my mother and aunts, they recalled how people years ago would suggest moving the bed if you had a child who wasn’t sleeping and while they never understood why, it seems Geopathic Stress Lines may have been the reason. I recall telling our story to a farmer who then informed me that in the past when people were building their house on their land, they would choose a location where the cattle would rest as they will avoid these lines.
Maybe this is all nonsense, I honestly don’t know. What I do know is something changed in our household within days of having our house checked and I would recommend to a parent going through a similar experience as we had to at least try moving their child’s bed!!