I know that I am not discovering anything new. More than three years ago Humana Pharma brought to Spain the melatonin, with trade name Melamil, which had been used in other countries to help children sleep, as a rejuvenating hormone and I don't know how many more things.
We talked about her at the time and I had almost forgotten her until a few days ago she knocked on the pediatric office a commercial in the laboratory explaining the benefits of this hormone, which has the ability to help children fall asleep.
What is melatonin?
Before I start talking about the product, I think it's interesting to explain what is melatonin. It is a hormone that our body produces endogenously, in the pineal gland of the brain, which is linked to the body's rest processes. Its production depends on the amount of light our eyes are receiving and that is why it is said that is related to the circadian cycle.
When it is daytime, it secretes very little, when it gets dark, it secretes more and prepares us to rest, sleep and prepare for a new day. People who have deficits of this hormone tend to suffer from insomnia and depression.
Does synthetic melatonin work?
Yes. Just as synthetic oxytocin causes contractions to women when administered, Melatonin helps people fall asleep earlier and sleep longer.
A meta-analysis was done last year to see all the studies in which melatonin was used to treat primary sleep disorders, both in children and adults, contrasting the hormone with placebo, and they saw that, as I say, supplementation with synthetic melatonin helps those who take it to falling asleep before, makes the sleep last longer and improves its quality.
The results are not miraculous and there is talk of a modest improvement, but it is better than giving nothing or giving something that has a placebo effect.
Do you have side effects?
Here's the thing. Melatonin It has very few known side effects and that is why it is being used more and more with adults, since it could be considered a preferable drug in the presence of benzodiazepines, which have a greater primary effect but also more side effects.
However, when talking about children, there is not enough data to say that its consumption is safe. Studies that have been done determine that synthetic melatonin is safe in the short term, but it is not known what the long-term effects are. That is why it is not recommended to administer to babies under 6 months and therefore in children from 6 months to 3 years it is not recommended to give for more than 4 weeks.
But who is this for?
The million dollar question. Looking for studies on the use of melatonin in children I see that most of them have been carried out with children diagnosed with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) who are taking drugs that disturb their sleep and children diagnosed with ASD (Disorder of ASD). Autistic Spectrum), which can have great difficulty falling asleep.
Similarly, there are studies conducted with older people, who already know that many have serious problems sleeping, or with people with sleep disorders as a diagnosis.
But what about our children? Do they have a sleep disorder? Well, no. Most of our children do not. So to the question of who is melatonin for, I answer that for all those children or adults with sleep disorders who need help to fall asleep and keep it at night.
Yes, I know that it is hard for our children to fall asleep and keep it at night, but that is how children are. This is the dream of children, so it has determined the nature and thousands of years of improvement that should be the dream of children. Waking up often to eat and to make sure he is still taken care of by his parents. Reclaim your chest and claim contact if you are not receiving it to feel calm again and receive the affection of your parents who, with horse rings and a schedule that does not give them respite, must meet during the day without having slept how well they would have wished
Whose fault is it, the child who does what he has to do or the society we have invented, which it does not differentiate at the level of schedules those who have small children from those who have already raised them, or do not have, and sleep soundly?
Melatonin is not for our children, although they sell it for them, because Melamil does not appear in the records of the Medicines Agency (then it is not considered a drug, but a food supplement). Circadin does appear, which is also melatonin, but which is aimed at adults, it can be prescribed by the doctor and whose use is not recommended beyond 13 weeks of consumption.
Medicating anything
If you have colic, remedies for colic. If you don't sleep, sleeping hormone. If you don't eat, supplements so you don't miss anything, or hunger enhancers. If you have four boogers, booger syrup. If you have a grain, creampie. If you have gases, syrup for gases. If you are apathetic, vitamins. And so remedies are emerging as normal things that children do seem to be problems, or make us believe that they are.
Silly I do not invest in any pharmaceutical company buying shares or something. If someone who knew a lot about this (and whose name I don't remember) said it in his day: the greatest achievement of the pharmaceutical companies will be get healthy people to meditate too.
Exogenous melatonin
What which the melatonin we use in my house? We have many different brands and doses. Miriam uses the tit, which is the one that has worked best for us to date, and I, as I don't have it, have had to pull creativity, experience and tradition. Now I use a walk / dance a lot watching music videos, sometimes singing in a whisper combined with caresses on the forehead and hair. For the elderly it depends, for the elder a "good night, I love you", to which a kiss is added, and he only takes the dream devouring books, and for the medium a "good night, I love you", added to a little Back massage under the pajamas, with which it is positioned to catch the dream. Then a "dream beautiful things" and I turn the door so that the child and I, with our dances, which alternate with the tit, do not bother them.
And all this I have a sigh of "po dio, how tired it is to sleep the children" and a smile "I will remember a lifetime." Could replace everything with a few drops, but no, step.
