Child with "Night Terrors"

My niece had night terrors and nightmares when she was about that age. This may sound silly, but my grandma bought her a dream catcher and they hung it over her bed and explained what it was for to her and she never had another one. It's worth a try. Good luck.

I son has had episodes but not every night. He would have them maybe once a month. As far as I know there was no association with any foods and I quickly learned that nothing I would do to calm him would work. He would be screaming and flailing but when I would try to hold him he would push me away. I would just have to let him do his thing for about 10 minutes and then he would finally quiet down enough for me to snuggle with him and go back to sleep. He hasn't had one for months and he is now 4 1/2 years old.

I now have a thirty-two year old son. He also had those terrors, not only at night but any time that he was asleep.
He has grown out of this and is tha bravest child I have.

My daughter did the same thing. They are night terrors and they are scary because they look awake, but rest assured they are not, nor do they remember the dream they are having when it happens even when they wake up right after. I did tons of research and this is what I learned and what worked for us.
Night Terrors usually happen when a child is overheated.
1. Dress in light pajamas -no heavy fleece and ABSOLUTELY NOTHING COVERING THE FEET.
2. Sheets and blankets loose on the bed, I would untuck all her sheets and blankets so she could "escape" if she got too hot.
3. During a night terror, DO NOT try to wake the child this often causes more eratic behavior, I would speak in calm soothing voice and say Mommy is right here, can you see me, I am right here, let me help you, because they are often dreaming and you can interupt this process if they find you it comforts them.
4. If these are not working you can fill your sink or bathtub with cool water and wet a washcloth put her feet in the cool water and apply the washcloth to the forehead. This can sometimes cool the body down and they often will snap out of the night terror.
5. During the summer we always run her ceiling fan & an extra fan in her room.
What I have learned is that they often outgrow these, personally I think they can just cope better as they get older, but children that have these tend to be sleepwalkers and talkers. So we keep a baby gate outside my daughters room, we put it up after she falls asleep so she is not "aware" in her sleep that it is there. I hope the information is helpful, but I have found that just keeping her cool really helped put an end to them. Good Luck!

my 13 year old daughter had horrible night terrors. my doctor said the worst thing you can do is to wake them up. when you wake them up, you interrupt the "terror" but when they fall back asleep, it starts up again and they never get any sleep. when my daughter started to go through puberty she began to have really terrible anxiety. i took her to a specialist and found out that she has always had anxiety, but puberty usually magnifies it, especially with girls. you might want to talk to a psychologist and get their opinion on it. anxiety is a tough one. i have been dealing with it for many years with my daughter but had i known when she was small that she had anxiety, a lot of things she did would have made more sense to me. for example, she had terrible separation anxiety until she was maybe 9 or 10. i just thought she was a mamma's girl but come to find out, kids who have "anxiety" anyway, are way more likely to struggle with major separation anxiety and night terrors are closely related to anxiety. best of luck.

My youngest son had night terrors for a little over a year. I believe around two to three years old. Andy also has an autism spectrum disorder called PDD so he was under psychological care at the time. Andy's night terrors had nothing to do with his PDD, I just want to make that clear. What the doctor told me is that they are not dreaming at the time they have them, that they are actually in a far deeper sleep so that dreaming and nightmares are not possible. This was a great comfort for me because I believed at the time he was scared out of his mind. Another thing his doctor said is don't ever try to wake them up. Just stay close to make sure they don't hurt themselves. Another bit of advice from me, make sure you don't get hurt either. During that year I got four black eyes trying to keep him safe.

I never noticed any changes having an impact on when he had the night terrors. I tried diet changes, making sure he always had enough sleep. They just happened. This was five years ago so I really don't remember the doctors opinion on schedules and food reactions.

I hope this helps you.

My daughter is 5 and she started having "night terrors" when we moved into our new house. The doctor said not to worry, she will grow out of it when she gets used to our new house. She said they are sometimes caused from stress or something new happening in their life.

I hope this helps you. My daughters are coming less and less the longer we're here.

My daughter did the same thing when she was about 2 as well. It was night terrors. She would kick and scream and fight and if you tried to hold her or calm her it got worse.
The best that you can do that I have found is exactly what you had read. Let it play itself out. They are still asleep even though they look to be very much awake. I would sometimes sit in the floor and hold her while she fought me to keep her from hurting herself but doing that only helped me feel better than to let her be alone through it, it did nothing for her except make it worse. Just watch to make sure she doesn't get hurt is all you can do. They are so into the dream state that it is near impossible to wake them up when they are in the throws of a night terror.
I tried to figure out what could be causing it, ruled out a lot of things, got the help of 2 doctors and never did come up with anything that causes them.
A lot of children go through that and even some adults.
She will grow out of it. I know it is hard on you but it will be okay. She won't remember any of it in the morning or when she gets older. My daughter is now 16 and has no memory of it at all and she went through it for over a year on and off. The only thing she does now is talk in her sleep and not mutter, but talk just like she is having a full conversation in an awake state.
Just hang in there, it will go away in time.

I have a daughter who had a mild version of "Night Terrors". It is fairly common, and the advice to let her cry and comfort herself is correct. Kids process all of their day while they sleep, and while comforting themselves to sleep. Sometimes you will hear them talking about their day right before they fall asleep etc.... They are just learning so many things and need to go over it so they can process all of their activities in their mind. I found that my daughter would have these dreams if we had an extra busy day, or did something new. A trip to Sea World could trigger it. Who knows what a little one really thinks while walking through a glass tank surrounded by sharks. It really is so much to take in. Don't worry. She will grow out of it. My daughter and I started talking about our day during our bedtime routine, and it really seemed to help. If you wake her to comfort her now, she will develop the bad habit of needing you to comfort her every night, and not learn to comfort herself. It could lead to many disturbing nights for you. Good luck!

Jennifer

Yes, lack of sleep can cause night terrors. Also, is she watching TV? And what is she watching? Try cutting out the TV watching and see how she does.

When my children were little, we got them tape players with soothing Christian music they could listen to as they went to sleep. It didn't solve the problem totally, but the music helped calm and settle them. My kids out grew the terrors fairly soon. I was told it was part of their brain developing. Not sure of that accuracy, but they did outgrow it. C.

My nephew had night terrors around the same age. My brother and sister in law never found anything to settle him down, nor did they ever identify a cause. The doctor also told them that he would just grow out of them. The good news is that he did grow out of the night terrors. The bad news is that it lasted over 1 year. My brother and his wife had to take breaks every couple of months and let another family watch the kids for a weekend to save their sanity. It was a really tough time, but now he is 5 1/2 and you would never know there was any trouble.

My daughter experienced "night terrors" for several months when she was younger. She did eventually out-grow this. She would wake up in the morning and not remember even having them. The doctor told me there wasn't anything we could really do. I was also told that they may take several years to out-grown! I hope things get better for you.

My daughter also had night terrors at that age, she is now 6 and very smart with an active imagination. She has grown out of it for the most part. I try to keep her world fairly calm with not too much stimulus. I try not to yell too much and I discuss things with her instead of her getting in trouble. For her I believe it is hereditary. When it would happen I would call my husband up and he would lay with her and hold her and speak softly to her. I think she sensed that he was there and after a few minutes she would calm down and go back to sleep. This is not uncommon and it to shall pass. Good luck!

It seems sometimes my son will wake up crying and I'm not sure if it is a night terror or not. The only thing that makes me think it is would be that he never fully wakes up. I just give him his binkie and pat his butt for a few minutes and he calms down. The toosh patting is what really seems to help.

It could be a routine thing. We always have a warm bath before bed and rock to sleep. He is on a routine he is very used to. He is up at 6am gets his bottle plays and then has a nap at 11. Up again around 1 or 2 bottle ect,and then takes another "power nap" at 6. Around 7 he is up wanting his bottle plays and at 830 takes a bath and bedtime at 9. Before I had this schedule for hime he didn't sleep through the night but at 2 and a half months he sleeps all night.

I think using a night light would help so she doesn't wake up in total darkness. You mentioned she doesn't want to be touched but maybe picking her up and holding her close would help relax her if you haven't already tried it. Using a rocking chair or some kind of rythmic motion might calm her. Possibly something she watches before bed? If it's every night maybe something done in her daily routine is causing this? Does she take a nap during the day? If not maybe a nap would help to see if it is only at night. Also if you try it during the day maybe it wont be so startling if your not dead asleep when she starts crying.

It might be something she is eating, is there something she eats every night that you could relate to the night terrors? Something sugary I would think.

Maybe somekind of scent like lavender? There are those plug in airfresheners and maybe a relaxing scent would help.

I hope this helps. Keep trying sometimes there is nothing you can do but I know when I wake up the first thing I want is a hug!

You can go in about 15 minutes before she's been waking up screaming and gently stir her. Not enough to wake her, but it helps reset her clock so she skips over the 'scheduled' waking. HTH.

Both my children had night terrors. I think they were triggered by dreams. I told them their dreams weren't real and their parents were right in the next room. My son's dreams were about monsters. So I had him name his monsters and make friends with them. I would rub my daughter's back to calm her down. I didn't let them "scream it out" but I didn't make a big deal out if it either. But yes in time they both got through them. They are adults now. My daughter struggles with sleep apnea.

Hi, L..
My daughter also hae night terrors. They started when she was about 2 or so, and they were a lot like what your daughter has. She would scream, flail around, even have her eyes open. Nothing would calm her. What I would do would be to bring her into my bed (she shared a room, and we didn't want to wake up her sister), and gently rub her back, arms, legs and sing or hum to her quietly. I don't think she ever woke up when she would have a terror, but somehow the soothing rubbing and singing got through and helped her calm down. The episodes each lasted about 30-45 minutes. They worst are the cycle night terrors. They are repeat episodes that happen every hour or so all night long--just one right after the other. My daughter is almost 4 now, and while she still has the night terrors, they have become very few and far between. She will grow out of them, and they are not related to food or anything like that. What I've been able to determine is that they are often seen in children of high intelligence with very active imaginations. This is after a lot of research trying to find something to help my own daughter. The best you can do is just wait them out. They will stop eventually.
S.

My son (3 1/2) has these off and on. He had them every night for a long stretch last summer. They started after we came home from vacation and I blamed it on the change in routine. At first I didn't know what was going on, so I tried to calm him down, and like you said, he only got more upset. I did discover that he isn't really awake during these episodes. He would just stare at my husband and I in terror and scream "NO!" if we tried to touch and soothe him. I do think they happen more when he is overtired or has been out of his usual routine. All we could do is wait him out. Now he has them only occasionaly and usually on Sunday nights (end of the weekend, routine has been disrupted, etc.) When I first hear him cry out, I don't go in there (It's hard!) and often, he calms back down right away. Sometimes we go in and just tell him "it's ok, it's ok" and try to get through to the "awake" part of him and he goes right back to sleep. It is horrible, but I think all kids outgrow it.

My son who is now 4 also suffered from night terrors for a time, but has outgrown them over time. They seemed to occur when he was overly tired. When he did not get his nap for one reason or another, he was most prone to them. They really scared me at first, but once I realized what they were, I was able to deal with them more easily. You just have to sit by them and make sure they don't hurt themselves. He never had a memory of them in the morning and now thankfully he seems to be through with them. Good Luck to you!

My 9 yr. old used to wake up screaming in the middle of the night a few years back. He seemed like he was in a daze & stared off into the distance. We would just hold him as close to us as we could & walk him around or rock him & kept repeating it's okay mommy or daddy is here. It would take him 20 - 30 mins. to calm down. Sometimes we would turn the lights on, so that it might wake him up. It was terrifying for us. He would eventually calm himself enough to go back to sleep. He never remembered them in the morning though. He did eventually grow out of them. Now we have a 2 yr. old grandson that is going through that same thing for about the 6 months. He doesn't have them every night, just once or twice every few weeks. We just hold him tightly & use soothing words & reassure him that mama & papa are here & he eventually calms himself down & goes back to sleep also. It only takes about 10 - 15 mins. with him. I wish you luck. He can be very nerve-wracking & scaring. Let me know how things go & if this helps. Tami

I went through this with my son when he was about the same age. He had a couple of weeks worth of them and then they were done. It seems like it coincided with my husbands work schedule changing and not enough sleep (no naps) When this happens there is nothing you can do. It may seem terrifying to a parent. All you can do is make sure they are safe, not going to fall out of bed or hit something, especially if they thrash around (happens only sometimes) On the bright side, they don't remember these episodes at all and they do seem to outgrow them as quickly as they come on. Good luck to you!

L.,

The good news is she will grow out of it. The bad news is that in my experience you can do very little about them other than ride them out. Our daughter had them as well. We tried all kinds of soothing techniques at first. Then our ped. said that we were better off letting her get through them and that we should simply be close by to ensure she did not hurt herself. I guess if you wake them up, then you may increase the chance of a second episode that night.

One thing that was clear was that they were much more likely to occur if she was overtired or had been off the normal routine. When we kept bedtime routine constant and early, things were better.

L., you are definately not alone my son who is 9 now, went through that for 6 months at the same age. I researched it completely too. Its very scary to see your child that scared. They DO NOT know you are there. The best thing to do is not alow them to do anything that could hurt them selves. REMEMBER they are sleeping with their eyes open. My son was screaming for me saying he was scared and I was holding him and he didnt know I was there. He even tried to hit me to get away. This will pass, just hang in there. In the morning he will not remember a thing. He still doesnt remember to this day of going through it. Im not one that beleives in useing meds for certain things but this is one issue the doctor suggested a small amount of benadryl at bedtime to put them in the stage of sleep were they dont dream. It works. I dont know your beleives but I looked this up in the bible refrences too and saying a prayer that is "When I lay down to rest, my dreams will be sweet" I said it with my son everynight and he never had bad dreams on those nights. He is 9 and we STILL say this. Now I say it with my 3 year old little girl for a preventative and pray she doesnt go through this. :) Any questions just ask.

My son also had night terrors untill he was about 10 yrs old. He would wake up in the middle of the night screaming but when we would try to calm him he would still be in the dream state. We found that turning on the TV to his favorite show would calm him down enough to wake up. Sometimes we would also walk him around the house untill he woke up. He is now 14 and hasn't had a night terror in 4yrs.

My stepson had night terrors. And they were exactly how you described. Supernanny and Good Morning America has done pieces on these in the past also. They and everything I found on the internet along with our doctor all said NOT to try to wake them during it. As horrible as it is, you have to let them go through it. With my stepson, I would just hold him and let him cry while gently rocking him. He did this between 2 and 3 years old and he did grow out of it. Try a CD a night with calming sounds, played on a CD player that will keep repeating it all night, like with heavy raindrops (no thunder), or get her a fan to be turned on at night so she'll hear the droning sound of it in the background. That seemed to help also.

My daughter also had night terrors from about 2 years old to about 3 years old. Same kind of thing, she didn't recognize us and it would get worse if we tried to talk to her or touch her. What we found that worked well for us was to take her to the living room, turn on a low light, sit next to her and read her stories. We always ask her questions when we read to her, "do you see the tree?, etc". We would read to her until she began to respond to the questions, then we knew she was awake. Sometimes offering her a drink of water would speed up the process. Once we recognized that this worked (and maybe she did too?) we could get her calmed, awake, and back to bed in 20 min. Not a time saver, but a more enjoyable 20 min. than listening to her scream and cry in terror and have her think one of us is a monster. One additional note: whichever parent was the first to enter her room and speak to her during one of these events she would react to negatively for the duration, so the other one would read the stories. My husband and I would joke "do you want to be the 'monster' or read the stories?" We felt that our daughter had more of these events when there were stressful events occuring in her life: little sister learns to walk, she starts preschool, etc. Hope this is helpful!

I'd suggest checking with her pediatrician, even if you just call and ask his nurse. I had night terrors as a child, although I was older, and I can remember them. My mom woke me up by sponging me off with a wet washcloth. I became afraid to sleep, and my parents had to fight with me every night to get me to go to, then stay in, bed. Good luck.

My daughter's were clearly stress-induced (whether it was her own tendency to stress herself out, or situational/fatigue). Trying to wake them can make it worse. Just try to keep them from hurting themselves during the episode, and gently comfort them into going back to bed and sleep. Usually they outgrow it, but my family has experienced sleepwalking into the teen years, too, so keep that in mind.

Hi L.!

My son did the same thing only his started when he was about 9 months old. He "out grew" the night terrors when he was around 3 or so. We experienced the same things you mentioned. We had a really hard time getting him to wake up but once we did he would have this look on his face that seemed to say, "what just happened???". Then he would curl up in our arms or his bed and drift off to sleep as if nothing happened. He never eats sugary foods so I don't think that has anything to do with it and other than the night terrors has always been a great sleeper, even at naptime, so I don't think lack of sleep has anything to do with it either. Anyway, nothing we ever did seemed to work although we tried lots of things. Sorry I can't offer any help, just wanted to let you know that you are not crazy...there are other people with the same problem!!! Good luck with the baths (sounds like you may be onto something there) and let me know if you find any good solutions...we have a 7 month old daughter so we may find ourselves with this issue again soon!

K.

My daughter has had these before and I feel for you. I feel very helpless when she gets these episodes, but found relief by yelling her name to wake her up. My docter told me to try and find a patern of what time she has them then wake her up 5-10 minutes before then and keep her awake for a little bit. Try not to encourage play, but rather read her a book or something. Maggie never had a patteren so I was never able to try this, but makes since. Hope this helped.

My 2 1/2 year old has been having night terrors since he was about 6 months old. He typically has them if he has not had a nap or his routine has been changed drastically. In the past 6 months the number of terrors has dropped dramatically as long as he gets his nap and stays on his routine.
There is unfortunately nothing I have seen that helps with the terrors and doctors have said the child does not remember anything about it. We just try to keep him away from anything he may bump into and try to wake him up by taking off his clothes and putting a cool rag on him.
I hope this helps. Just remember it is more scary for you then for them.

As another person suggested, try waking her briefly 15-30 minutes prior to the time she usually wakes up screaming. I know they say you should never wake a sleeping child, but if it stops the terrors, it will be worth it.

L.

Those night terrors can be so alarming to a sleeping parent can't they.....

My daughter had those for a couple of years and yes she did outgrow them...(don't worry not all kids take a couple of years)

Some of the things I did to help her during this time was a blue light bulb so that she could open her eyes and immediately see the soft light (when she woke that is)

Using a warming blanket (low setting on electric blanket) to keep her relaxed.

Warm bath prior to bedtime and a lotion massage making sure that I rubbed outward to the extremities

soft music lullabys to help the brain shift gears

All prior to sleeping -

When the night terrors began I had a weighted blanket that I would lay accross her whole bed (helping her to 'pull in' the wildness) then I would use a methodical heavier patting and a consistent rythym like BUM, bum bum, BUM, bum bum BUM, the emphasis is on the third pat and NO WORDS.

This physical touch is rythimic and is on the buttocks if possible and if not the shoulder blades, or top of the thigh
I do not get close to the hands as the 'clawing' (natural response to terrors) can really rip you up.

I time the terrors to see 1. how long they last 2. which method of rythym is working the best 3. how frequently they occur and after what kind of day we had.

What I found was - too many errands in one day, no naps, diet and ways to wind down played a significant role in the length and intesisty of the terrors.

I went to the herbal store and looked for an all natural dissovable tablet called "restless child" and this was an amazing help.

Good luck