Night Terrors - Norfolk, VA

My daughter started having night terrors at about the same age when she also started to refuse naps. I think it comes from them being too tired when they go to bed. The more I would try to calm her down the worse she would get. I finally learned to just look in at her but not talk to her or touch her and they would go away much faster. I know it seems cruel to not help them but any help I offered only made things worse.

As far as I know there is nothing to stop the terrors. My daughte had them at just over 12 months. We were in Alabama for a month for my husband's job, and sometimes i wonder if that change really affected her through night terrors but ther eis really no way to tell. If he gets too much sleep that could be triggering them but it is usually just a phase and the only thing you can relaly do is hold him and ride it out

Roughly one third of children under 5 will experience one night terror. A night terror is an awakening in the deep stages of sleep accompanied by loud screaming and frenetic behavior. The child's scream may be so blood curdling as to strike panic in the rest of the family, but the condition is normally benign and self-limited. Occasionally, night terrors are precipitated by daytime stress. If your child is having an every night occurence, perhaps you should call your doctor. AF

Hi,
My second daughter had the terrors when she was about the same age as your son and she didn't nap anymore either...but i think it was triggered by her bladder more than anything.
It will pass, just hang in there......
A.

Night terrors are common, and occur in boys more than girls. My brother had them years ago. The trick is to not try and wake them. We would softly start talking to him, rub his back, etc. If he was saying something, we'd start quietly responding. After a few minutes he would calm down and go back to a restful sleep.
Good luck.
M.

Prayer works....Proverbs 3:24 says....When thou liest down, thou shalt not be afraid: yea, thou shalt lie down, and thy sleep shall be sweet.

Take Care,
N. :) SAHM homeschooling 3 boys and married to my Mr. Wonderful for 15yrs. I love to help other moms reach their goals! Be sure to teach your children how to dream.

I feel your pain. My daughter is 4 and she has been going through this since about 2. Yes, not sleeping has a lot to do with it! You can go on line and pull up information, but my pediatricain gave us some info. One of the triggers is when the child is overly tired. It took me a long time to realize that I make it worse for my daughter when I touch her when she is having a night terror. I generally make sure she can't hurt herself and let her be. Every so often I will try to touch her. If she doesn't push me off, I'll pick her up and comfort her. After several more minutes, she calms down. You may have noticed that your son tends to go through this at a certain time. For my daughter, it was about two hours after she went to sleep. This is about the time they get into their deep sleep. I forgot the technical term for that period. One of the suggestions from the information we received is to wake the child up right before they normally have their terror. If you keep them up for a couple of minutes and then put them back to bed, that should prevent them from having a night terror. I tried that a couple of times. They are suppose to grow out of this. My daughter started haveing these several times a week and non they are almost non-existent. She did, however, have two episodes in one night earlier this week.

Does your little one believe in angels? When my little was put into her own bedroom for the first time we put a picture of an angel above her bed. We explained to her that the angel would be protecting her while she slept just like mommy and daddy do. After that she loved sleeping in her room and in her own bed.

I just wrote and I think my son erased it- If this is duplicated sorry-

Both my 5 and 3 year old have had night terrors. My 5 year olds started at about 18 months and continued till about 3. We found with him the tended to be worse when we had big days. Lots of errands or lots of fun for him these were high stess thing. My second son potty trained about 3 months ago and just started having night terrors... We are starting to think it has something to do with going pee... He seems to have to go durring the night terror and we set him on the potty, he goes and then he is fine and goes back to sleep- Lots of screaming and thrashing with both of my children durring night terrors.

Every child responds to their environment differently. To figure out what was causing the terrors we would kinda keep tabs on what we did the days that the night terrors took place versus what we did the night terrors didn't happen. Napping with my oldest was a key thing- especially on his high stress day. My 3 year old we figured out when he peed oon his dad durring a night terror. So we started making him pee right before bed-this doesn't allways work, sometimes he has to pee again after he falls asleep- but he has never peed the bed either. He reacted the same before he was potty trained. The urgge just seems to create a stress for him that causes night terrors.

Good luck and if you have anyquestions write...
L.

my daughter went thru this at the age of 4.she was on zyrtec for allergies, is your son on any medication?we did have to take her off of the med and it stopped but she would have them occasionally when she was overtired which her doctor said may happen.so the no naps may be contributing to the problem or if he is on or just coming off of any meds but it is a form of sleepwalking this i found out from her doctor so it may be something you want to mention to your son's doctor.we actually had to wake my daughter up before she would calm down from an episode.

Hi H.!

I just wanted to coment a little about night terrors, I am just pregnant with my first one so I dont know much about the nap but my husband has been sleepwalking and having night terrors to, so I we have been researching on it, we even went to a Sleep Study and have an appointment tomorrow to receive the results, but I have been reading about it, a place I thought was a good explanation is a site www.dreamdoctor.com, in the case of my husband seems that is good to turn on the light and be very patient until he wakes up, since he is in deep sleep and it takes time to wake up, or just confort him and not try to wake him up at all, because they become more agresive if you try to wake them up, the more calm you are the better.

If I find something good tomorrow in our appointment with the sleep doctor I will let you know.

I.

Both my kids had terrible night terrors for years, then it stopped completely when they got older (7 or 8 yrs old, I think). I believe it is a combination of an immature brain (normal for their age at the time) and sleep deprivation.

Things that I discovered that may help:

1) Daytime naps. Oddly, lack of sleep can bring on night terrors.

2) Early bedtime. The later they went to sleep at night, the more likely it was that they'd get a night terror.

3) Mineral suppliments in small ammounts. Calcium and magnesium suppliments for kids, especially magnesium. (I wish I knew this sooner).

4) If out of diapers, make sure they go to the bathroom before bed. If they had to pee in the middle of the night, instead of waking up fully, they would have a night terror first.

For us, this went on for a long, long time. For some people, it passes quickly. If it concerns you, I'd go see a doctor who knows something about toddler brain development, like a pediatric neurologist. Night terrors can be nothing at all and will pass. Or can be sign of other issues.

I found there was no use whatsoever in trying to comfort them. Only makes it worse. Hard to see them so terrorized and not react, but there is really nothing that helps once it starts.

Best wishes for a good night sleep for all concerned.

My son had problems with night terrors at this age too. We found that they were related to the food he was eating. We put our family on a program called Feingold which removed all artificial foods and household products. Naturally occurring salicilates found in many fruits are also removed at the beginning and then tested individually as you would with an allergy. His night terrors (and other symptoms) disappeared within 3 days of starting on the program. If you are interested in checking into it...the website is www.feingold.org.

Hope this helps!
J.

I know that a lot of times tv before bed seems to contribute to nightmares and night terrors. especially adult shows (the news, movies, etc) because they don't understand what they're seeing and their minds sort of take it and run with it. I have heard that trying to interact/comfort during a nightterror usually doesn't help and only works them up more, but I'm sure not interceding is pretty impossible.
good luck!

i think my son has night terrors as well. he will scream out in the middle of the night, and talk in his sleep and even kick. ive heard him recently kicking and screaming and when i went in to see what he was saying he was saying get off of me! but he was not awake. its kind of freaky. but he always goes back to a quiet sleep. he still naps too. maybe your son is growing out of his naps which they can do at this age. its ok to just give them quiet time and hope it turns into a nap or at some point turn off the movie and say rest your eyes for a bit. be sure that what he watches on tv isnt too stimulating so that falling asleep is easier. they say not to wake them during an episode. you can try to soothe but if it causes issues just let him be.

My Daughter had Night Terrors from about that age up until she started Kindergarten. How to deal with them is for each there own but one way to prevent them is to see when your son has them. He will have them each evening at about the same time. Time it for 2 or 3 days. Than what you want to do is see how many min after he goes to bed he has them and than wake him about 10min. before he normally has them. You have to make sure you wake him completely one way did with my daughter is i started potty training her at night so i would wake her to go potty. It's one way to make sure she was completely awake if she was up talking to me.
One way to avoid them is to make sure he gets a nap. Make sure he falls asleep. I would go to all measure to make sure. If that meant he stayed in bed a long time well so be it.
As far as what to do when they wake up. I started out going in there and supporting but not touching like i was told. I would set there and watch her throw her fit but not get involved. Sometimes i would take her right out the bed and go in the living room and put her down and let her throw a fit there. It was easier for me because her room was right next to our room and it would wake everyone.
The no nap IS the reason he has them.
If a tempter tantrum turns to laying on the couch i can see why he tries a temper tantrum he gets what he is trying to get. So why not try it the next time he doesn't want to lay down. Good luck

Hello H.,
My son is 22 months old and has been having night terrors since he was about 12 months old, they have slowed down in frequency but they are a "terror" for me as well! I have been told by his pediatrician the following:
1 -If the child is in a secure place, just watch him to make sure he doesn't hurt himself. (My son flails his body around when he has them)
2 - Don't move him during the terror
3 - Don't wake him up because he doesn't remember it in the morning
4 - Try to remain calm through the screaming.
5 - After all is done check to make sure he is okay physically.
6 - The night terrors will eventually go away between the ages of 3 - 4 years.

I hope this helps you.

My daughter had night terrors. They started at 18 mos. and ended around age 5-6. My doctor said they could go as long as age 12.
--for us it was related to lack of sleep or being off schedule. to this date she needs more sleep than most.

--When she was potty trained it was also related to needing to go to the bathroom which I believe is what would wake her

--If you go online there is a technique where you wake them around 4 hours after they have been asleep. We were desperate because the terrors were waking us every night. This technique worked but the terrors came back after a few weeks.

--As she got older her terrors turned into sleep walking. It is usually related to her needing to go to the bathroom so I direct her to the potty and she goes back to bed.

It is hard to deal with but they will pass. A neighbor who had a child w/terrors told me that she thinks terrors are more common in intelligent children. Her son is in high school and brilliant, my daughter is very bright also. So...it's not so bad and it will stop eventually.

My 8 month old just stopped having them last week after 4 heartbreaking weeks of it. My husband and i had no clue what was going on until I described the episodes to the pediatrician.

Night Terrors are caused by activity in the Central Nervous System during the changes of sleep cycles. They can be triggered by being over stimulated, over tired or ill. The child is unaware that its going on and has no recollection of it occurring. They are compared to sleep walking. They are relatively rare, however, there is a hgher occurance in boys than in girls.

We were told to let him cry for as L. as it took and that his body had to simply work it out on its own. I mentioned my concern that my son oftem vomits if left crying, and the dr said to clean him and his sheet with as little disturbance as possible.

Once I spoke to the dr, it only took two nights and one nap of letting him cry. We checked on him every 10 mins, but didn't pick him up, or try to wake him up. Its now been 9 days since he's had an episode. *knock on wood* lol

There is nothing in the conventional world to treat night terrors. However, in homeopathic medicine there is. If you have a homeopathic practitioner in your area, consult him/her. This is an area of medicine ridiculed by many in the conventional world because they don't understand it. However, it works better and quicker than conventional medicine. It is energetic medicine. Comparing it to conventional medicine is like comparing the atom bomb (an energy form) to dynamite (physical form). If you cannot fine a homeopathic practitioner, contact me on my web site www.sevenpillarstotalhealth.com.

L. Cheek, MD
28 Town Center Drive
Dublin, VA 24084
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