The Weighted Blanket; Innovation finding solutions to sleeping disorder
The inventor of weighted blanket Keith Zivalich, explained how the idea of a weighted blanket was discovered. He was going on a family vacation when his daughter who was just ten years old at that time, placed a Beanie baby on his shoulders, he immediately felt calm and relaxed, then he had an idea of having a blanket that could provide the same level of calmness for people whenever they wanted to get rest. He immediately planned to call it a beanie blanket, his wife started working on making something similar to his description and he explained that after several attempts of breaking needles, they were able to come up with the first weighted blanket that he called Beanie blanket back then, this happened in the year 1997.
After the successful first stage of invention, Keith’s wife showed the blanket to few of her friend and they said they may probably never use such on their kids, they disregarded the idea but Keith had a neighbour who was a teacher to kids with special needs, she took it to her students and the following day the teacher wanted more of the blankets explaining how relaxed it made her students feel and this was the beginning of the distribution of Beanie blanket, although it did not get viral attention immediately.
Several others have created different weighted blankets and have named it differently, Keith Zivalich and his wife happened to be the original inventor of the weighted blanket and according to him he tried to get a patent twice which eventually failed and I think that is one reason why we have so many weighted blanket production company today.
The Science behind Weighted Blanket.
When people feel hugged, it produces a sense of relaxation to the body, the idea of this blanket is to make users feel like they are being hugged and for children with disorders, it made them completely relaxed. It is also explained that when people get under this blanket, either those with anxiety or not, serotonin is released in the body which in turn produces a sense of happiness and well-being, that is the reason why a hug is very important to people who are going through lots of pressure and anxiety.
Researchers found out that the idea of the weighted blanket, is to stimulate a cycle of cortisol which happens to be the stress hormone and increase the production of serotonin and melatonin which is the hormone responsible for sleep.
Although the weighted blanket is really expensive for an average person to afford, it is sold within the range of $200-$300. Years ago, weighted blanket was only used by therapists and psychiatry hospitals and clinics, but today this blanket can be purchased into any home by any family who can afford them. Therapists used this blanket as a way of providing deep touch pressure to the body of their patients and getting them free from stress and anxiety. Weighted blanket has become very popular in some parts of the world, but so many people have not heard about it too. I really like to get the opinion of my readers on this scientific invention, would you like to have one in your home?
@tipu curate