I have sat in numerous hospital waiting rooms over the past few weeks trying to get to the bottom of why one of my children spends most of the night crying and complaining of leg pain. I had heard of these things called “growing pains”, but never realised they literally keep your child and indeed the entire family awake all night for weeks at a time.

My husband and I no longer sleep and apparently there is very little we can do to help our child who is in agony all night long and then beside herself with exhaustion during the day and cannot be reasoned with on any subject at all. If any of our readers have any tips on how to survive this, I would be most grateful to hear them.