Who’s Scared of Night Terrors?

Don't miss a thing! subscribe for updates.

So far, it’s only happened once. Once was enough. But it could well be an ongoing thing. At the time I had no idea what was going on. It was 3am. Ordinarily when Riley wakes up in the night she just trundles her way into our room, has a little help to get into our bed, snuggles up next to me, insists that I tuck her in nicely under the ‘noo-noo’ (doona) and nestles her way back to sleep. But on this night I could hear her crying and she was still in her room. That was odd.

I tried picking her up. A couple of times. Each time resulted in what seemed to be an unbridled, full-blown temper tantrum. Beyond the normal tantrum. Head banging, thrashing, don’t touch me tantrum. That was scary. Riley is a toddler who loves to be held and cuddled. Regardless of whether she’s mid-tantrum, mid-play or mid-sleep. She’s been that way since a baby. She was a cuddly baby – her favourite place to sleep was on my chest. She’s a cuddly toddler – she likes the tackle cuddle – running at pace towards my open arms, she likes sleeping cuddles and belly rubs when she’s going of to sleep, she likes story cuddles when we’re relaxing on the couch and she still likes to sleep on my chest from time to time. So this was unknown territory.

I took her into the kitchen to get her some milk. She starting slamming the fridge door, then dropped to the ground, pivoted around with her feet for some more thrashing and started banging her head on the kitchen floor. Josh came in to check on the commotion and either because enough time had passed or because his voice is louder she seemed to come out of it all of a sudden and wrapped her arms around my neck, ready to be taken into bed. It was over, finally. And once she was back in bed with us, she went into a deep sleep and didn’t even wake up when I went to work.

It was only in the morning that I connected the dots that she hadn’t really been awake. She’d been stuck between wake and sleep, in some kind of nightmare. And it was only later that my twitter family informed me that it had a name, and that it was surprisingly common.

She seemed fine the next day. I was a little shaken up. It’s never pleasant to feel helpless, particularly as a parent. I’m not sure what our approach will be the next time. I think, for her, the best thing is just to be there next to her and not try to wake her up, but I just don’t know yet. Maybe a gentle waking wold work just as well. As with anything, trial and error is probably the only way to go. I just know I would be quite happy if I never had to experience her thrashing her head around on the kitchen floor like that, ever again. I also know that most fear is in the unknowable – next time won’t be nearly as scary.

‘

Pages: ‘, ‘after’ => ‘

‘, ‘next_or_number’ => ‘number’)); ?>

Say It With Facebook

Tagged as: night terrors, nightmares, sleep, toddler

http://www.hawkercentral.com/sjh Sarah

I don’t want to frighten you, but it may very well be only the beginning. My son had a very full on case of night terrors & his went on for almost four years. We went to a peadeatrician who said they usually go in a wave, a few here & there then they become more frequent then taper off to normal again. It can be once a month to start with then once a week to once a night at it’s worse then back to weekly then monthly then gone. We got to the point however of having 5-6 every single night for 18 months, but as I said his was a severe case.

At this point there’s not much you can do. No matter what you try she’s not going to wake up, all you can do is sit through it. If she gets them more frequently the only strategy you can use is to wake her a few minutes before it’s due to happen (they’re pretty consistent time wise) and get her to sit up & have a drink or go to the toilet if she’s at that stage.

The night terror isn’t about being afraid, it’s a physical thing. Basically what happens is, as the brain goes from one stage of sleep to the next (I can’t remember which stages though sorry) it moves too quickly & causes the child to have a big “freak out” as such. The idea behind waking them before it happens is to reset the brain so to speak to stop it from happening.

It is one of the scariest things to go through & I really really hope it was a once off for you & your daughter. But you are right, at least next time (if there is a next time) you will be more prepared If you need someone who’s been there to chat to, I’m around on email

http://goodgoog.com Zoey @ Good Goog

Thanks Sarah!

From other people I’ve been talking to it definitely seems like it can be an ongoing thing – one person even told me that their daughter would scream for two hours straight every night and that lasted for months and months!

When I was talking to my mum she said I used to have them as well, although she didn’t really know what it was at the time.

I feel for you – 4 years of them! That must have been really difficult.

http://codenamemama.com Dionna @ Code Name: Mama

Oh my goodness, that is SCARY stuff. We have had nothing even remotely like that, but I have heard of them. I hope that you find something to help!
http://http//www.beafunmum.com Kelly Be A Fun Mum

My son went through a terrible night terror stage… and not only at night but through the day sleep too. What I found most helpful was to ask this question: “Are you scared?”

For some reason, when my son acknowledged what he felt, he calmed down. The other thing that sometimes works is going outside in the cool air.
bronstar

Oh Zoey! That sounded so full on! Poor little Riley I hope they don’t become consistent… It must have been really hard not being able to do anything. I find adult nightmares bad, I can’t imagine toddler ones!

Sending you and yours peaceful sleeps ahead!
http://ceaselesspraises.blogspot.com Carrie

Oh, my goodness, that must have been SO scary to see her hurting herself! My son has these occasionally – they’ve gotten less violent and scary over time, thankfully, but yeah, he’s not awake for 10 or 15 minutes, just crying and nothing will calm him. Since I don’t know what to do, I usually sit next to him and sing until he calms down. When he was younger (18 months or so), we had to take him to the living room, turn on the light, and read a short book, and then he was fine and would go back to bed! Now we don’t have to do that, just sing and cuddle in his room – sometimes I rub his back or tummy, too. The poor thing = I feel so bad though – it’s so hard! I hope it never happens again for you!!!!
http://adventureskids.blogspot.com Catherine

My son went through a stage of night terrors from about 2 to 3.5 y.o. It took us ages to figure out that he was still asleep and that waking him up was not the way to go. We would just sit with him until it was over, but every time was distressing for me. We did find that some things triggered him to have night terrors – being overtired when he goes to bed and later as he got toilet trained needing to go to the toilet (we would then carry him to the toilet and then back to bed). He still has a lot of trouble waking for the toilet during the night.
http://www.picklebums.com katepickle

Oh night terrors are so un-fun.

One of my girls was a regular from about age 3-5… hasn’t had one for a while now *touch wood*. The only thing that helped me cope was knowing she had no idea… no memory of any of it.

Some nights it was like exorcist was visiting our house, always just before midnight and always the confused state of wanting mummy but reacting like I was killing her if I touched her.

If it is ongoing do look into whether there might triggers for the nights it happens – food, activities that day etc…. or just wait till she grows out of it.