Night Waking of 2 1/2 Year Old - I'm Going Nuts!

That's crazy because my son has done this also and I was wondering if it happened to other kids. He'll wake up screaming and its weird because he's not really awake. I always comfort my son and he falls "back asleep." He hasn't done it in the past couple of months though. I read some of the other comments on this and I agree.. I think it will pass.. just try to comfort her and hopefully soon it'll stop.

There are nights when my daughter (4 1/2 yr old) wakes up with a scream or crying and I wait for a minute to see if she continues. If she does, I go in and rub her back till she falls back to sleep. I see nothing wrong with soothing her. If she really wakes up and wants me to stay in there, sometimes I lay down with her or bring her into bed with me until she falls back to sleep again. She has nightlight in her room so it's not pitch black in there. My daughters only happen once in a while though.

I don't think your daughter is doing this for attention, I think she's really scared when she wakes up. I know you're tired but I think you should sooth her then go back to bed.

J.

Hi J.,
I have 2 boys and my oldest who is now nine had night terrors from before he was one till he was eight. So I know what you are going through. I tried to find research on night terrors, I asked all kinds of people, from my pediatrician to spiritual leaders. I tried all kinds of home remedies from aromatherapy,(I used lavender massage oil on his hands and feet before bed) to making monster scare away spray. I tried regular bed times and routines. I tried night time prayers, I tried trying to wake him, to trying to ignore him. It pained me so much that nothing I seemed to do would help. Every night from ten to twelve he would wake up screaming and crying, sometimes he would even be so upset he would throw up. There was even one time when I almost called nine one one because he couldn't breath throw the sobbing.
So what I found that worked best was staying calm. Telling him he was okay over and over in a whispered voice. And actually I found the less I touched him, the better and shorter the episodes lasted. I would usually just pat his back lightly or stroke his head.
I've been told that particularly smart, imaginative kids develop night terrors because their imagination makes the dreams seem so real.
I don't know why my son's stopped all the sudden, whether it was age or because we moved, or what. But I am grateful it has stopped and HOPE my youngest son doesn't go through the same thing.
Oh and by the way, he hardly ever remembered what the dreams where about or ever having them. That thought helps me a little bit.
I hope some of this helps, K.

I had these issues with my now 9 yr old when she was around 3, it seems more a physical thing and will die down over time but the over all stage i have found can run until around age 5. i know it no comfort but all you can do is go in and speak gentally to her stroke her head or something soothing until she calms back down then go back to bed. the peak of mine lasted a few months then died off striking only occasionally until around age 5 now she just has normal nightmares. it always breaks our heart when we can't do anything but in this case i found just being there for her comforting for her and me, definetly don't try to wake her up but maybe a gentle stroking of the head or very light rubbing of the legs helped me.

If you are going to have her CIO, please make sure she has some form of light in the room with her. I've posted many times about night wakings, I have a night light in the bathroom next to my son so he can see, but I don't worry about the light keeping him up because it isn't directly in his room. How long has this been going on? If you are talking a week or two, I urge you to keep doing what you are doing. They go through these things and I would never let my son CIO at night. However, I realize that I might just be lucky and my next child could make me eat my words! It is the same, usually he isn't really even awake. I just have to lay him back down and rub his back for a minute. Then I go back to sleep and this usually stops after a week or two, then it will happen just every now and then. If it is really bad, I have to change his diaper and rock him, but still the whole thing only takes me 15 minutes. All I can say is that me going in to him has NEVER resulted in him getting up all the time for it. He wants/needs to sleep just like we do. i went 6 months without seeing him at night! Now I have to go to him about once every week or two.
I'm sure you will get through it! I have had the two coffee mornings on the way to work too!

My daughter started having night terrors when she was only 16 mths. I went through that for months with a newborn on top. Don't let her cry it out because she is having a terror just not one she will remember when she wakes up. They grow out of it. My daughter is almost 2 1/2 and we only have 1-2 every few weeks. What you need to do... wake her up when she is having a terror.Turn on the lights and make sure she is awake, then put her back to sleep. my pediatrician said I had 2 options to let her cry or wake her up, I chose the later and it worked. It is hard and you do get sleep deprived but your daughter needs you. i haven't had a good night sleep since she was born. my 9mth old still doesn't sleep through the night and i work too. i get up around 4-5 am to work at home 2 days a week,and the rest in the office so i know trust me. good ,luck.

Try to remember that being little is hard and that her favorite person in the whole world is MOMMY and that she loves you to no end. It is ok to help her thru this hard time buy going into her room at night to help her with this. She needs lots of love.

I went thru this just like you. I was very confused and did not understand why my daughter was not sleeping well.

I prayed to God to please help me and show me why she is not sleeping. I believe that if you listen to the LORD that he will talk to you.

He told me that it was because of her blanket. He said that it is EVIL.

Guess what it had, Princess's on it.

Cinderella.

I just bought it and she loved it. The LORD said that I needed to take all of the Cinderella things out of her room and pray with her at bed time to teach her to trust in him to keep her safe and happy.

I told my husband and he thought I was CRAZY!!!
I told my daughter and she was mad at me for wanting to take her Princess stuff out of her room.

I told her that this is like when mommy and daddy tell her to do something and she doesn’t want to do it but that she has to, this is the same for us “the LORD is our father and he ask’s us to do stuff that we do not want to do as well but we need to listen to him”.
I talked to my husband and he said just try it, see what happens.
So I prayed to the LORD and I told him that I wanted to do what he said for me to do. So I took the blanket off of her bed and put a different one with just flowers on it on her bed and I removed all of the Cinderella and princess things out of her room and that night I prayed with my daughter like the LORD said to do.

All of this was about 2 years ago and ever since that night she has had no more problems.

I am a CHRISTIAN and I believe in PRAYER and I TRUST THE LORD WITH ALL OF MY HEART.

I am not telling you what to do; I am only sharing my story.

I am not CRAZY. LOL

I hope the best for you and your little one.

God Bless you and your family.

Hi, I myself have 3 year old triplets..unfortunately I gave in to the sleep deprivation and when that happens..whoever is screaming comes to go to sleep in our bed..when they are sleeping we carry them back(sometimes)..Good Luck

Hi J.,

I just want to clarify something about Night Terrors...
Children who suffer Night Terrors (not a bad dream every now and then) DO NOT KNOW they are doing this.....they are not AWAKE and will not respond to you when you ask if something is wrong...

I know this because my now 9 yr old had them for a year starting when he was about 18 months old! As a single mom who worked FULL-TIME too I know it is very Scary at first! And VERY tiring! I was terrified the first few times I when in his room. I kept trying to get him to tell me what was hurting, etc... He looked fully awake, his eyes were open and he was screaming. After like the third time i thought he was mad at me when he would not respond to me comforting him. It was very heart breaking knowing I could do nothing for him to make him feel better!

But after it happened about 6 times, I took him to the doctor who told me it was night terrors and not to worry, that it would go way on its own! He told me that he doesn't respond to my comforting because he isn't aware that I am there. That he is in a fully UNconscious state, is not aware of my or his own actions. He never remembered the incidents the next morning when I would ask if he had any bad dreams in the night. My doctor told me to sit with him through the event and just rub his back if it made me feel better, but NOT to wake him up.

It took about a year, but they went away and I finally got to get more sleep!! I know it is frustrating, really i do, but you wont even remember it happen until 10 years from now you read a post and go Oh, my gosh, I totally forgot about that!! LOL!

I wish you the BEST!!

HI. My nephew also went through about a month of night terrors. Night terrors can be very scary for the parents because they don't know what's going on. The child usually doesn't know either. Children dont' realize they are screaming/thrashing/etc. My nephew's pediatrician advised waking him completely when this happens. I would suggest the same thing. Wake her up, take her to the bathroom, maybe get her a drink, and put her back to bed. Waking up completely will help for it to not reoccur.
It will end on it's own
Good luck

As a single mom who needs her sleep too b/c I work full time every day, I am a big fan of letting them cry it out and soothe themselves to sleep, ONCE you're SURE there's nothing wrong, causing them pain, etc. It's the surefire way to cure a bad habit and yes, no doubt she is expecting comfort now every time she wakes b/c it's gotten to be the norm. You're the only one who can change that and even though it's hard, I believe it's best for the child (and the parents) to learn to soothe themselves back to sleep. It only takes 3 nights of crying it out to change the behavior, as opposed to weeks of going back and forth or trying other, less strict methods. It's totally up to you what you can take and what you want to set up as the norm.

Good luck! Write anytime you need support! I know I'm going to be in the majority, but honestly, it works for me and I believe wholeheartedly I'm doing what's best for my girl.

K.

Hi J.:
My name is T. Spock and I am a 52 years old and have an amazing 11 year old boy. Up until this year, I was a career person with a highly stressful job. I can relate to what you are going through as my husband and I went through the same thing with our son. It's frightening when this first occurrs, but we learned from our pediatrician that this is not unusual for children to experience Night Terrors. In fact, my son occassionally has them or he walks in his sleep.

What we learned was that when they have the night terror, not to wake them up. Quietly get them back into bed. We would stay with our son for a few minutes and rub his back and simply try to reassure him everything was ok. We also learned that sometimes if he had a very active day and was tired, this would trigger the night terrors, so we would make sure that his day was not over whelmed with our daily earrands plus his activities. If it appears that your child becomes out of control, we would turn on a soft light, wake him up and reassure him he was ok. Sometimes this required just bringing him into our bed, or just sitting with him in his room. They are very disoriented during this time and have no knowledge that this is even going on.
We recently moved from Marietta Ga to Jax FL, but when my son was younger, our neighbor across the street had a pool put in. My son ws invited to come over and swim after his T-ball game. This was a Saturday and Friday night he had baseball, Saturday baseball, birthday party, swimming, and then went into the pool.
About 11:00pm we heard him calling out and went into his room to check on him. We found that he was standing on his toy box ready to dive into the pool. He was calling his friends name and was upset because his friend would not let him dive into the pool. Of course we had to grab him and wake him up before he did a half gainer into the carpet.

I am not certain about your child, but my son's episodes were always about the same time every night. When he was 2 1/2 years old, his bedtime was 7:30pm and we would read until 8:00. I could tell what time it was based on his episodes, which was between 10:00pm and 11:00 pm most nights. If your child is in day care, it's possible that her activities during the day could trigger it as well.

When my son turned 7 yrs old, the night terrors were less frequent and now at age 11, he may have an episode 2-3 times per month, but these episodes are more night walking and chatting. But I quietly get him back into bed, whisper to him and he is none the wiser. The next day he never recalls any of it and had no idea he had even gotten out of bed.

I hope this information is reassuring to you and helps. It is scary and at first I thought my son was having psychological problems. It was great to learn that it is no an uncommon problem and that simply reassuring your daughter by whispering to her and getting her back into bed will take care of it. You may want to keep a journal for a week or so of her daily activities and the time she has an episode. You may be able to find a link between her activities, including foods, and her episodes.
We learned that if my son had any type of sugar would contribute to it. He is no longer allowed to have any deserts, sugar type drinks etc after 7:00pm. This cause restlessness which contributes to the night terrors.

Let me know how it goes.
Regards
T. Spock