Night Terrors??? - Waynesboro,VA

When I can't get my little boy (22 months) to take a nap, and I know he's tired, I take him for a car ride. He's usually out in 5 minutes and then I put him in his bed.
I don't know if that will help, but I use it as a last resort.

My son went through night terrors at that same age. He had been a great sleeper since he was a baby and then all of a sudden he would wake up screaming and I couldn't calm him down. He was still asleep and would push me away and fight with me like I was a monster from his dream or something. It would take at least 30 min to calm him down and get him back to sleep. I tried just letting them pass without going in to attempt to comfort him and that worked best for us. He would scream for 5 minutes (while asleep) and then go right back to deep sleep. The night terrors cleared up quickly after that.

My son still takes a small nap, but his friends have all stopped. Their parents have gone through the same concerns that they're not getting enough sleep and feeling the effects in the afternoon and evening. Most of them have made bedtime earlier to make up for the lost nap. My son naps most days, but has started skipping some and he has an earlier bedtime on those days too.

Night terrors are not necessarily related to a lack of sleep. My son was still napping regularly when he had his. It's related more to the age. Hopefully your daughter's will end soon!!! Good luck!!!

Sure sounds like a night terror to me. My middle boy, Kieron, had night terrors. Egad, they were awful. Thought we'd never sleep again.

He was asleep, even though his eyes were open. When I tried to comfort him, he's thrash and scream that much more. Unfortunately, my good intentions became part of his terror.

From www.nightterrors.org:

Night Terrors Symptoms: Sudden awakening from sleep, persistent fear or terror that occurs at night, screaming, sweating, confusion, rapid heart rate, inability to explain what happened, usually no recall of "bad dreams" or nightmares, may have a vague sense of frightening images. Many people see spiders, snakes, animals or people in the room, are unable to fully awake, difficult to comfort, with no memory of the event on awakening the next day.

Night Terror or Nightmare?: Nightmares occur during the dream phase of sleep known as REM sleep. Most people enter the REM stage of sleep sometime after 90 minutes of sleep. The circumstances of the nightmare will frighten the sleeper, who usually will wake up with a vivid memory of a long movie-like dream. Night terrors, on the other hand, occur during a phase of deep non-REM sleep usually within an hour after the subject goes to bed. This is also known as stage 4. (A link to a sleep stages chart can be found on the navigation bar to the left -- its on the web page itself, not here) During a night terror, which may last anywhere from five to twenty minutes, the person is still asleep, although the sleepers eyes may be open. When the subject does wake up, they usually have no recollection of the episode other than a sense of fear. This, however, is not always the case. Quite a few people interviewed can remember portions of the night terror, and some remember the whole thing.

Me again. They do go away. I don't think its *directly* related to sleep or changes in sleep patterns (like no more naps), but it does seem to be linked to increased brain activity, which seems to apply in your case.

I used to make my son take 'quiet time' and tell him he did not have to sleep, but did have to rest. I put a small bedside lamp by his bed and a stack of books (he has control of rotating these from the family bookshelves). He's not allowed to get out of bed (unless to pee). I found by limiting the activity to reading(or looking at) books and telling him it was quiet time for everybody-Mommy's quiet time too, AND giving him some kind of control(sleeping or not, keeping the one and only light on or not), he didn't think he was missing out on anything important. That's half the battle, He actually told me once he didn't want to miss any of the fun. A time limit works too- when the big hand is on the 12 and the little hand is on the 3- You can get up. Mellow music works in conjunction too.
ANYWAY, 7 out of 10 times, he's be out like the light he swtiched off. If the night terrors don't stop after you get a grip on the resting part- I would talk to your pediatrician.

A friend of mine put her daughter(5) on a regiment of 'children's' fish oil suppliments after reading a medical article on the subject. She noticed a dramatic increase in focus and a more even keel to mood/energy. I know that sometimes my son gets SO tired, he's wired. So maybe your daughter would benefit from a different vitamin regiment. Good luck.

She will grow out of night terrors. In the meantime, when my son had them we put him in front of the TV..cartoons and he would be half asleep, but mesmerized by the TV and it would calm him down till he fell asleep. Then I would carry him back into his room. It is pretty scary but it does pass.

Hi Lynn,

My son just turned 1 yesterday and he has suffered from night terrors for about 3 months. What I have learned is that when they have a long day, without a knapp, it is more common for an episode to come on. I now know that when Ian is so tired, I must keep an eye on him because I fear he is going to have one. I get terrified when the Daycare tells me he has not had a knapp, and as soon as I get home, I feed him and let him go to sleep. Night Terrors are the scarriest thing, but I know that since he is in a deep sleep, screaming at the top of his lungs, the only thing I can do is to let him calm himself. If youare with her during the day, just ensure that somehow she gets a knapp in. It may be different for every child, let mw know.

I actually dealt with this for a short period with a very young child. Yours is the prime age (3-5 I think)

I read conflicting things. some said to console, others said to leave them be, and that you actually become part of the terror if you intervene.

For us, I had to attempt to console him, it just felt right. Changing scenery helped, expecially the computer, visually stimulating with odd sounds, and interactive. It helped snap him out of it.

Talk to your pediatrician, do some searching online for some articles on night terrors for her age.

I hope this is very short lived for her, and you.

My daughter used to do this and for a while we had no idea why and you could not ask her as she was not fully awake. it turned out she needed to go to the bathroom but was to asleep to know what she wanted, after we took her to the bathroom she would fall asleep instantly. Roll forward 21 years and the same thing started happening with my grandson who has always been the best sleeper i have ever seen. turned out to be the same thing. he was just so tired he knew he needed something but was just not awake enough to do anything about it. even if you ask them if thats what it is they will most likely say no. both happen around potty training age when they were dry during the day.

One of my boys had night terrors when he was in his 3rd year. His eyes were open, he was sort of aware that someone was there with him but that was it, he just screamed and cried. We'd try talking, but it was obvious he didn't hear us, we tried clapping right in his face to try and wake him and yelling his name but he didn't wake. We tried splashing water in his face and that worked a couple times but some were just so intense that the only thing that waked him was for my husband to step into the show with him. (not cold water - we weren't trying to be cruel!). He never remembered the terrors the morning after - which is a major sign of it being night terrors vs nightmares. Our pediatrician said there really is no problem with waking him from this state as long as we were there when he came to to comfort him in his confusion. She said it didn't seem to have lasting problems if we didn't wake him either. We just couldn't see him so miserable so we always waked him. It's very tramatic for the parents!!! After about a year of occassionally having them, he outgrew them and is now almost 6 and hasn't had one in a couple years. (thank goodness)

I didn't see any pattern realating to what may cause an episode to come on. He'd have them on days he napped or on days he didn't, it didn't matter.

As for getting your daughter to nap when she really needs to, our other son (we have twins) was like that. He, of the two, was the one that really needed to nap but didn't want to. It got to the point that on the bad days when he just was miserable with himself and everyone else, I'd lay down with him and just stay there so he couldn't get out. Somedays he cried and fought with me but I just stayed calm and really it seemed better if I didn't say anything. If I talked at all, he seemed to just argue, but the quieter I was, the quieter he eventually became. Somedays these seemed like a lot of hassle and frustrating but after the 'fighting' he eventually would give up and go to sleep. Usually at that point, I'd be worn out myself and nap also!! It's not easy going thru the transition years when they go from 2 naps to 1, or 1 nap to none. They don't just wake up one day and are mentally and physically ready to give the naps up, they may think they are but their bodies say otherwise.

Good luck, as she grows, it will get easier since she really won't need naps very often if at all, but just be firm but patient in the meantime.

Jules!

I think night terrors are caused by extreme tiredness, but I don't have official info to back that up. As for napping, my 6 month od baby was a very poor napper, but we used the book The Sleep Easy Solution and it worked completely. It addresses older children's napping problems, too. Please check it out. It really was a lifesaver for us.

Hi, Lynn-

One of my daughters had (she's pretty much out grown them now) night terrors also. The best thing I found was to keep her schedule consistent. You might have her go to bed earlier at night also. Make her bed time earlier by 15 minutes every few days until she is getting enough sleep at night. The more tired she is, the more night terrors she'll have. Hope this helps!

After being at the beach for the summer when my daughter was 3 1/2, and making her miss 3 days of napping in a row because it wasn't convinient, napping regularly was gone for good (word to the wise!) However, we have forced rest time - sometimes we have movie time, sometimes we have books in bed time. Whatever is working at the time, it requires not getting up, except to pee, and NO talking. If she is actually tired, she crashes every time, and if she isn't tired, just the stillness seems to improve her, as well as my nerves!

I would do that, and then move bed time up a half hour, in 10 minute increments if possible - as much as you can!

Haven't had the night terrors yet - we are just past 4 so it sounds like we are still prime age for them. I had them terribly, and think I still have them sometimes (thinking someone is breaking into our house and the scary feeling of not being able to talk to wake my husband. . . so I know how scary that must be.

Good luck!

Hello - please try and find out what may have happened 3-8 months ago that changed her habit. Did she watch a scary movie?, did you move?, I don't know if she's in daycare but did personnnel change?, change jobs?, it oculd be a number of things but you have to try to figure that out first. Be prepared to find out that it may be something simple, something terrible or nothing at all but you need to exhuast all options. Have you talked to your pediatrician? Can you act it out with your daughter using dolls to see what she tells you? Sometimes that is the only way to communicate for them - my daughter draws, my other daughter uses barbies. Nothing in the world will help until you understand better what is driving this terror of sleeping. If this doesn't work, have your pediatrican recommend a phsycologist who can help you out.

I was wondering if there was any change in her life, the people in it, or her routine (maybe small to you, but big to her) around the time she started having these issues? There are so many variables that could be affecting her sleep. My daughter will be 3 next month, and month ago, she went through a streak where she kept waking up hysterically yelling about a "bug" in her room. She would actually point to it in the dark, but there was nothing there. Just so happened her dad was out of town for a few days. When he came back we got her back into her regular sleep pattern over a few days time. If you've already tried to create routines and actually stuck to them for bedtime and you've tried all the other suggestions (we also believe in prayer) I would suggest seeking professional help for some ideas. Especially if she is losing a lot of sleep. Maybe there is some underlying issue that is leading to her anxiety.

I hope things get better for you both soon!!

My oldest girl had these between 2-3 and now my 3 year old boy gets them occasionally. It's excrutiating for sure, but my ressearch says totally age appropriate. There are no "causes" some kids get them some kids don't. Since it's like sleepwalking, don't try to wake them up or intervine (it just prolongs the whole episode anyway). Make sure there in a safe environment so they don't hurt themselves if they thrash about and just ride it out. They grow out of it, I promise.

All this info comes from my great peditrician and online research. Almost too simple of answer for something that looks so scary and violent, but there you go.

I would talk to your pediatrician and ask for some advise. I'm not sure what I would do if my kids woke up screaming for an hour or two. Something may be bothering that she's not sure how to express so its affecting her sleep. Good luck. Hope she gets past this.

Hi,
My 3 and a half yo. daughter had night terrors from when she was 2-ish until she was almost 3. It was so hard, b/c I didn't know what to do, or not to do. My other daughter never had this. And they both stop taking naps when they turned 2. However, my reading up on the night terrors was helpful, and doctors think that it is a state when they are not awake at all. There eyes are open, but if you look closely the pupils are huge, and they are just staring and screaming... and the best thing is to not wake them, but to make sure they will not hurt themselves when they start kicking etc..... It is the freakiest thing!!!! It mostly happens to children from 3-7 yo. and mostly triggered by their bladder. It happened after my kid refused to wear diapers anymore, so I was scooping her up (before I went to bed)and making her go one more time. They totally out grow it, as it came it'll go too. At least that's how it was w/ us. And I don't think it was nap related. Good luck,
A.