Son Is Scared and Not Sleeping in His Own Bed

Great article in Mothering magazine (may be last month at this point?) called "Who wants to sleep alone". It may not be what you want, but it may provide lots of understanding from a different viewpoint.

Good luck, J.

Living in the South, I've learned a lot. Also, being Native American. My daughter's family lived in the country, and my granddaughter kept seeing someone in the corner, near the top, of the bathroom. Native American. Also, a neighbor down the road, when mentioned about it, told a story regarding blood in the bathroom commode. The man thought it was the wife's. But it turned out not to be. There have been other things happen. Don't discount your child's ghosts or "monsters". Find out about the house. Find out if the ghosts or monsters want to hurt the child or help. You may have to move to get rid of them, or they may follow. Find a clergy that believes in this, have him sanctify the house. Don't discount what you don't know about.

I sprayed "monster go away" in my sons room and it helped alot. It was just a spray bottle of water and fragrance but he didn't know that.(try lavender, it's soothing) It worked for monsters and bad dreams. I told him it kept the monsters out of his room and sprayed it under the bed and in the closet, around the whole room.
Just a suggestion..lemme know if it works.

K.

I'm experiencing the same nightmare with my 4-year daughter. She's afraid to sleep alone. I'm open to suggestions as well.

My son did this when he was about the same age. The dark can be a scary place, especially for a child. I came up with a solution that not only worked but made my son feel empowered. He loves Star Wars so, I bought him a flashlight and took a marker and colored the lense red. I told him whenever he saw a monster, he should grab his laser sword and zap the monsters. He not only stopped being scared, he felt proud of himself the first time he slept in his bed all night. He is about to be twelve and has long since outgrown seeing monsters in his room. However, that $2 flashlight with the marker red lense is still sitting by his bed.

i have a 2 year old son who is geting ready to turn 3 in may and i have the same problem , he says there's monsters or "he " is in there and comes to our bed no matter what we do he still comes and sleeps with me and my husband in our bed. Like you i have tried taking him back to bed and i just dont know what to do anymore. I sometimes wonder if i am giving in to his imagination or is there actually something else there.

so i am confused and tired as well, i just hope someone else out there went through this and could help us with what to do
sincerly A.

I have only had that situation with my boys a few times. However as a child I recall thinking I see monsters I really hated having my closet open or part open (still kinda do). May I suggest night lights if you don't have them already and make sure there's nothing on the walls that make images that look scary. Also maybe some of those stars that glow in the dark up on the ceiling might be neat for him to have as well. I now have for my 8 yr old a clock that has the read out of time you can point to the ceiling or wall and it's a radio plus sound machine...he loves it he's always been one to come in our room telling us he hears sounds, so we finally did something about it.

It's very difficult to deal with a child that's lost sleep and makes you lose sleep. The you wonder if what you are doing for him/her is right. Well, I have figured that if I make my kids bed time as comfortable as possible. You yourself may want to see if lights are coming in his window making scary shadows on his walls (like head lights from people on the street). You may also want to lay down yourself and see if somethings that have shadows on the walls appear scary to a little person. Sometimes kids just out grow this I think. I'd also see what he's watching on tv...I make my kids skip the news when I watch it to graphic these days. Not sure what triggers it but I hope some of my suggestions might be worth looking into, I can say the radio/clock have help and nights lights for my other boys has also been a big help. Oh, I forgot everyone at our house also gets a flash light for under their pillow....that's helped us get more of them in their beds and less in ours.

I started my son out with a sleeping time cd, but before
we would talk, read a short book and say our prayers. Maybe you could pick up a little prayer book and say one along with his own. Let him know that sleep is a peaceful time. During the day talk to him and let him know that you'll protect him and when he goes to sleep you are just in the other room and would never leave him. Sometimes kids need reassurance from us. Make it routine every night no matter what and try not to get frustrated. When he comes into your room take him right back. Best wishes.......

Hey T. - My name is L. and I have a 3 1/2 year old son who has also had issues with staying in his bed at night and stated that it is due to the shadows on his wall and the monsters in his closet. I don't know what your faith background is but what worked for us was a Veggie Tales movie called Where's God When I am Scared? It teaches a story about a character who watched a scary movie and was unable to sleep as a result. The kids are taught a song about how "God is bigger than the boogie man and He's watching out for you and me." My son now walks around the house singing the song at all hours of the day. It has calmed his spirit and allowed him to sleep in his bed without disruption. I hope this is helpful. Hang in there.

Hi T.,
Does your son ever watch Scooby Doo or has he ever seen Monster's Inc.?
Anyway, here is what I would try and I don't worry about what people say about it. Try letting your son sleep in his sister's room with her or have them switch rooms. My daughter is three and she would start in her room but would constantly come into our room in the middle of the night! We also would take her back many times and she would just return. She started this at two also. She would tell me that she's scared of her room or that she was scared of her bed. It was hard because my husband was overseas during all this. On the weekends my son would ask if he could play sleep-over in my daughter's room and I would let him sleep in there with one of those pull out cartoon character couches. They both slept on one on her floor. She didn't wake up. Then she would want to go into his room and play sleep-over because he would want to sleep in his bed. So I would let her take her fold out couch to his room and sleep. After a while I said who cares and took her bed over to his room and told her if she wanted to sleep in his room, that she would have to sleep in her bed. No problem! She learned to love her bed and then the bed went back into her room and she followed. Of course big brother stayed on her floor a few times first. I think her biggest thing was hearing someone else sleeping near her. Yes, I snore and she was probably use to hearing that while she was in me and my son has allergies so his breathing is louder than normal and I really think that is what she wanted. We even put a tv in the room to let her fall asleep to but when the tv was off for a few hours, she would still get up. When my son was younger and having nightmares about T-Rex (his best friend!) we told him his favorite stuffed animal George was there to keep everything away. I use to ask my son about what the monsters or whatever was scaring him look like and would get him to talk about it. I love the monster spray suggestion and not to sound totally nutsy... being part asian and having many superstitions, we would throw salt on us to keep spirits out before entering our home after going to a funeral or something so salt became like a ghost repellent for me as a kid. I wouldn't let any hand-me-downs come into my room without me throwing salt on it before coming into my room, LOL!!!! I remember jumping on to my bed so the monsters couldn't grab my legs as I got in. Sorry for going on an on but I hope you can find a way to help ease your son.

My 5 year old was having the same problems. I started thinking and realized that he was watching Scooby Doo and Ben 10. Those both had aliens/monsters and ghosts. My son would tell me stories about aliens laying next to him in bed and touching his forehead. After a few nights of stories I was getting freaked out. We are a christian family so I started praying with him at night for God to protect him and I started not letting him watch those cartoons. I told him that if he was going to be scared by them then he wouldn't be allowed to watch them. Between those two things I haven't heard of any visitors in about a week.. Good Luck.