Kid Passing Out Asleep After a Screaming Fit?

It's very draining to cry. I sleep hard after I cry too. My oldest daughter used to get super pissy when she was overtired. She would dissolve into tears and I would tell her to go lay on her bed. She would sleep hard and wake up with a new attitude. I dont know about the purple faced fits, but a good cry and a nap is very refreshing.

If you blow in her face when she is doing it it will force her to take a breath. Screaming for that long will make you tired. Have you ever had a long bout of crying? I have and it makes even me tired.My brothers son did this all the time when he was little and he is fine now. He is 15.

Sometimes when DD gets all riled up, it's the last hurrah before she conks out. She's just SO overtired, or DONE with the car/shopping/etc. that she'll yell and then wham! She's out. Usually it only happens after a certain threshold has been crossed. Once she screamed in a dressing room, would NOT eat (the snack would have helped) and then got back into the stroller and slept.

Sounds normal if you let the kid have meltdowns like that. At that age they should be able to speak well enough to express how they are feeling and what they want. if they have only be given a "YES" to everything when they hear a "NO" they just don't know how to process. Usually screaming may or will get them what they want and when it doesn't they just exhaust themselves in their frenzied state. When they wake they just don't remember that they were having a melt down.

My older daughter did this twice when she was a young toddler and only after she got very frightened. Both times she fell and injured herself and held her breath until she passed out. Her lips turned blue and it was terrifying. The doctor told me that as soon as they pass out, they resume breathing again, and you just need to make sure that they don't get hurt falling down. I learned to interrupt this when I thought it might happen again, by vigorously patting her back (not shaking her) and calling her name loudly to distract her. It never happened after that.

I have never heard of an older child doing this. Three seems a little old, and it is the result of anger instead of panic, so that is also a little different. Also, my child never "went to sleep" or turned purple. That is really frightening. I might ask a doctor if it is dangerous? Also, it sound like the mom and dad need to identify some way to cut this off before it gets to that point.

Stand in front of a chalk board and draw a straight horizontal line from the left side all the way over to the right side. Now go back to the left side and draw speed bumps and dips for a few inches. The suddenly draw mountains and valleys. The go back to the speed bumps and dips.

This is called Homeostasis and we all have this pattern through out the day. The speed bumps may be getting everyone in the van and off to schools. The dips may be the cup off coffee that we have once we get back home and just stop to take a breath. It's a pattern of equal reactions that take place to stimuli. A stressful time is the bumps and mountains and the relaxing and recuperating is the dips and valleys.

For instance; someone chews me out for a choice I made that I feel I thought out and made a really good choice. I get really involved with defending myself, I get higher blood pressure, my heart beats faster, I start shaking, I am fully emotionally involved in my argument. Then when I leave I cry, I talk out loud and think of all the witty things I could have said, I start calming down, I get distracted, I start feeling sleepy and really want to go home and take a nap. When I finally get there I can't think what my name is or what I even want to eat for dinner. I go to sleep and don't move all night and wake up groggy but more refreshed as the day goes on.

That would be a mountain then a valley with a slow climb up. Homeostasis is this cycle. I have a friend who is bi-polar. She has mostly manic attacks. She has mountain after mountain without ever going all the way down on the valley side so she never is able to recover and gets worse and worse, more out of control.

This little one you are describing is just having a mountain and then having a valley. Her little body can only take so much stress then it is shutting down. She needs to find better ways to communicate what is wrong and be able to recognize she needs to be able to calm herself down. Hopefully someone will teach her to use her words and help her learn the words she needs.