My 19 month old son has seemed to suddenly go from almost always sleeping through the night (since he was 3 months old) to regularly waking up midway through the night screaming this past 2 weeks. He will lay back down when we go into his room, but as soon as we leave he will start screaming again. Last night we felt horrible, but after several attempts to calm him we let him scream himself back to sleep. He used to also wake up in the morning calmly and would play in his crib for a while......and now he also just screams until we get him up. We have no problem getting him down in the evening.....he even lets us know when he wants to go to bed!! Any suggestions or similar experiences would be suggested.
addendum: we do have a night lite in his room (always have) and we leave his door slightly open.....it has helped in the past when we lay on the floor next to his crib, but he cries as soon as we leave, thinking he is alseep
He has been sleeping through the night again this past week....yeah!!! I did turn on his closet light for him thinking maybe he was waking up scared of the shadows from the nightlight and I starting turning his humidifier back on again at night. Don't know for sure if those things helped, but as long as he sleeps I will keep doing them!!!
Have you tried playing any music in his room? Something soothing like classical. And let him know you're there. Tell him there is no reason to cry or to be scared. Music should help.
Take him out of the crib and put him in a toddler bed. Worried about him running around at night, make his bedroom door like an old style kitchen door with it cut in half. We did this when my daughter when she was 14 months old. We super-babyproofed her room, put a night-light in and some toys out. We also put a lock on the outside of the door on the bottom half so she could not roam around the house and the top half of the door would be open so she would not feel trapped. This way they will learn to put themselves back to sleep. We left her crib in there and gave her the option where to sleep, she eventually started sleeping through the night w/out help from us. It was hard at first but the rewards are better!!!
I agree with the light idea, unless of course you have one already! My son always slept in pitch dark and then around this same age, he would wake screaming. I still don't have a light in his room, but I put one in the bathroom next to his room and leave the door cracked. This solved it for us! On ocassion, he will wake crying and when I go in, he is standing up, but still asleep. I just have to touch him and rub his back for awhile and he is fine.
if that doesn't work, try laying on the floor next to his crib and see if he can fall asleep that way. If he is waking out of some kind of fear, this should work. This should just be a phase!
This could be anything from just not wanting to be alone, to night terrors....I would suggest putting a night light in his room and see the reaction you get from that. My son went through this, and after many failed attempts to figure out what was going on, the night light solved the problem...Depending on your son's speech, you may want to ask him whats wrong? Did you see something? Do you just want Mommy/Daddy to stay here with you?
At this age, they are really developing their sense of independence and there are some kids who just dont want to be alone....This could cause him to panic and yell out for you....
Just my theory...I could be off... :)
After my post, I read your comment on the night light... my oldest had a nightlight too. Around age 1, we had to take it out of his room because the shadows on the walls from the light were actually scaring him. He was better off in the dark than waking to the scary shadows. He was fine the day after I took out the nightlight.
Is it at all possible that he is having night terrors? Both of my boys had night terrors, my youngest starting around age 18 months (my oldest was younger than 1). Is he possibly screaming in his sleep (sleep screaming) or still dreaming and not really awake? If he's still dreaming, he may not know you're there or what's really going on. If he's screaming in his sleep (just like with a sleepwalker), you may actually make it worse by waking him. With both of my boys, night terrors being their situations, I did my best to assure them they were safe, it was not real, etc. and laid on the floor near them for a few minutes. I would even wonder about physical symptoms... could it be gas or upset stomach from milk or something before bed, etc.? Just a couple of thoughts.
