Hi Hanna,

My 12 year old son is noise-sensitive. He wears ear defenders at school and sometimes out in the community (if I remember them!) He used to wake frequently in the night as he was aware of background sounds such as rain, a car passing or birds chirping - that kind of thing. We downloaded the Pink Noise app a couple of years ago now. He has it on all night and it works really well. If it's stormy and the rain noise is particularly loud, he will just turn the volume up on his phone. 

Recently we were in the swimming pool changing cubicle and a baby started to cry. Usually, it would have been game over...my son would have run for the car and we wouldn't have been swimming. For some reason, in the moment an idea came to me and before he could run out, I said "quick put the pink noise on loud". He agreed and it worked! The pink noise drowned out the baby noise, we got ready for swimming and all was well! Since then the pink noise has saved us in other potentially tricky situations too. Another time at swimming there was a lady in the next cubicle singing Baby Shark to her toddler (can you think of anything worse ha ha!). I tried to ask her politely to stop but she didn't notice me as she was so into the singing! Again, I reminded my son it was ok as we have pink noise - it's been a game changer. 

So, what exactly is pink noise? Pink noise is a constant sound in the background, which is also known as ambient noise. It filters out background sounds. There have been some small research studies that have shown that pink noise has a frequency profile similar to the distribution of brain wave frequencies seen in slow-wave sleep and it can therefore potentially support a relaxation response. 

You can also in theory use white noise or brown noise etc - you can experiment with all the noises and see which one your child prefers. The reason we picked pink though is because in pink noise the higher-pitched sounds are softer than in white noise and because the lower-pitched sounds are louder than the higher frequencies, the sound is gentler, more soothing and less abrasive. So whilst it's your choice, I would recommend trying pink noise first of all. This is the app we use but there are lots of options out there. 

I hope that is helpful and if its not relevant to your family then I hope it was interesting and perhaps you know someone who you could suggest this to. 

Hanna

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