Plz share your experience if your dc had fears at bedtime and what you did about it

[HappyGrace]

As I mentioned, ds7 has developed a fear at night of going to bed. For at least two hours each night he keeps getting up constantly-will not stay in bed due to fear. We've tried everything-discipline, cham. tea, bribing, music in room, nightlight, on and on and on. Even if dh stays up in our room, ds is still scared. (Thankfully once he's asleep he's ok.) It's affecting him during the day because he is so tired from it. NOTHING is working. We have been under a lot of situational stress (chronically ill other child, dh laid off, etc.) and this is the last straw.

 

I asked on here a couple wks ago and people said to sit in his room, etc. I really don't want to start that habit though! But we're getting desperate.

 

If you've had a dc go through this, can you mention what you did and what worked and what age they were. If you did something like sit in the room, how long did it take to transition out of that? HELP!!!!!!!

Edited June 19, 2010 by HappyGrace

[AngieW in Texas]

At 6yo, my youngest developed a fear of sleeping in her bed. As soon as she laid down, she was certain that poisonous snakes and lizards would crawl up from underneath her loft bed and bite her. This happened right after she saw part of the movie Holes (which had poisonous lizards).

 

We had to switch her from her loft bed to a regular bed and put snake traps underneath it (just an empty box lid with double-sided tape, but she believed us when we said it would trap snakes). We also had to put a 15 watt lamp in her room for a nightlight. It took her a little over one year to get over this fear.

 

She still sleeps with a nightlight, but she wears a mask so she can't see it while she sleeps. She still wants the light so she can see if she hears something, but she wears the mask so the light won't bother her while she sleeps.

[HappyGrace]

I think it is a common age for fears, around age 6 or 7. Agh-I hope it doesn't take a year!

[ChristusG]

Is he okay if you leave the light on? If so, I'd just do that. Yes, it is wasted energy....but I'd rather have wasted energy than sleep issues.

[HappyGrace]

Tried the light on, doesn't work :glare: Thanks though! And yes, I wouldn't care a BIT about the wasted money at this point! I'm about to call Supernanny and pay her plane fare-lol!

[Food4Thought]

Is it possible to move another child in the room with him? When my son was going through one of his fear phases, we moved his little sister into his room. Yes, this creates all sorts of new problems... however, it significantly alleviates the boy's fear to have someone there with him.

 

If that's not possible, I'd probably put a mattress in my room for a few nights and let him catch up on sleep. It might be that the lack of sleep is making the fears seem even worse.

 

I feel for you, though! It sounds like no fun for any of you! :grouphug:

[Parrothead]

I urge you to find the answer fast. And I have no advice except to say whatever you do, do not suggest he sleep on the twin mattress at the foot of your bed for a few days.

 

Dd has to go back to her bed by the time she is 11.

[ChristusG]

I agree with the above poster about just letting him into your room for a while. Sleep issues are HARD. It effects everyone, makes them grumpy, feel bad, etc. I am all about doing whatever works LOL. Our kiddos sleep in our room and I have never had a bad night's sleep due to a child's sleep issues. I need my sleep LOL.

[Peela]

Can he sleep with your other child- literally right next to each other? My kids slept together in a double bed from ages about 2-3 till - I can't remember- maybe 7 or 8? Then they still slept in the same room for many more years.

It sounds like trauma/stress rather than a discipline issue. As tiring as it may seem, I think I would just go in there and lay with him till he falls asleep, holding him and talking it through night after night. It will pass.

[Slartibartfast]

It sounds like your child has anxiety. He is likely also stressed from all this stuff or picking up on your stress. He needs some coping help.

 

Can you discuss it with his Ped?

Edited June 19, 2010 by Sis

[OrganicAnn]

You did not in this post say if he was afraid of something specific. I think you need to work through the fear. You indicated that leaving the light on didn't help, so it is not fear of the dark.

 

Does he watch scary movies/read scary books? Is it something specific like monsters under the bed or in the closet? I would use the question, "what would happen if there was ..." or "then what would happen" (for adults it might be what is the worse that could happen).

 

My DD 6 and mine conversation went something like this.

 

DD: I am afraid there might be a monster in the closet.

 

Me: A real monster or like Elmo on Sesame Street monster.

 

DD: A real monster.

 

Me: Then what would you do?

 

DD: Scream.

 

Me: Then I'd hear you scream and come in. Right?

 

DD: Probably.

 

Me: And I'd hit the monster on the nose for making you scream.

 

DD: Don't hit the poor thing.

 

Me: Don't hit the silly monster.

 

DD: No it is just a poor little monster.

 

Me: Can I tell him to scram? Skedaddle? Hit the road?

 

DD: No he was lonely. That why wanted to come and visit my stuff animals.

 

Me: New rule, monster can not sleep with stuff animals. They must sleep in the shed especially if they are stinky.

 

DD: Silly mommy.

 

Giggles and fear diffused.

[RobinF]

Our 6 yo is Aspie so the anxiety is come with him. One of the things we do if he says he is scared at bedtime, is to give him positive affirmations.

 

He will say "I am scared." We will say "No, you aren't scared. You are courageous. You are brave."

 

Then we have him repeat that back to us, several times. This really helped calm him. Because of his anxiety issues we don't encourage him to sleep in our room. All our boys have slept in our rooms. They can now come sleep in our room on a sleeping bag if they are scared but it doesn't happen very often.

[whitestavern]

We had the same exact problem with our ds7. It had been going on for a while and we tried all sorts of things (many that you mentioned and many that others mentioned). He would get out of bed many many times and come to the top of the stairs and talk to us (we were downstairs). Sometimes he would ask if he was going to have a bad dream, or if there was going to be a thunderstorm that night or if he was going to have a stomach ache (he threw up once at night and is still afraid it will happen again), or he'd say he heard a noise outside, etc. Finally, in a moment of desperation, I made a "ticket" out of cardstock. I created it on the computer. It is a coupon good for getting out of bed and must be presented to dh or I upon use (therefore it can only be used once). Well, believe it or not, it's worked miracles! He will still come out of bed almost every night, but he happily brings us his little coupon and asks his one question. Then he goes back to bed until the morning. We were very nice about it all when we gave it to him...just let him know that it was important that he get all his sleep at night so he needed to cut his trips to the top of the stairs. It's absolutely amazing what that little ticket did. Oh, we did tell him if there were some kind of emergency and he needed us, that that would be fine. We didn't want him thinking he couldn't come out of his room if there were truly a problem.

[LibraryLover]

None of our children had issues going to sleep, but we always read our kids to sleep when they were little. We would snuggle up and read. It saved us all of this, I think. 4 kids, no bedtime issues.

 

 

When they were tiny, I nursed them to sleep. (Family bed). When they were a bit older and woke in the night, they could crawl into bed with us, or one of us would go to their bed and snuggle. Our kids usually slept at least past midnight before they got lonely for us, so it was no big deal for us at all.

 

Dh and I never/dont watch network TV etc., so reading them to sleep did not interfere with any program etc. We used to laugh and say that 30 mintues in the early eveing gave us the whole evening....although when the children were little we often fell sleep in each other's arms, we were so tired from the day. But here we are, together, and the oldest is 21, the youngest just tunred 11. Nobody sleeps with us but us. :D;) Although, I admit, when dh is away, youngest does sleep with me. She says Daddy snores too much, but I don't. :)

[OrganicAnn]

"30 mintues in the early evening gave us the whole evening." You don't know how lucky you are. I could read to my DD for 4 hours before she would fall asleep. We read at least 1 hour a night and she has never fallen asleep while we read. Ever.

[myfunnybunch]

I would use the question, "what would happen if there was ..." or "then what would happen" (for adults it might be what is the worse that could happen).

 

My DD 6 and mine conversation went something like this.

 

DD: I am afraid there might be a monster in the closet.

 

Me: A real monster or like Elmo on Sesame Street monster.

.

.

.

Me: New rule, monster can not sleep with stuff animals. They must sleep in the shed especially if they are stinky.

 

DD: Silly mommy.

 

Giggles and fear diffused.

 

We did this too, except I told my ds in a stern mom voice, "I do NOT allow monsters in our house. If any monsters come to our house, I will tell them to go home. If they won't go home, I will call. their. mothers." It actually worked. (To my surprise, 'cause I was mostly joking and I'd already told them umpteen times monsters aren't real.) None of the boys have talked since about being afraid of monsters.

 

My 7 y.o. ds is now afraid of bad dreams. It took a while and some conversations and thinking to figure this out. Every night, I blow the bad dreams out of one ear and whisper good dreams in the other. I always whisper three things, like puppies, playing in the mud and strawberries. I remind him to think of those good dreams if he starts getting scared.

 

He finally drew his most scary recurring dream for me (flood), stuck it on the shelf by his bed and looked at it for a few nights. When he was ready, he drew the solution (helicopter rescuing him). He keeps the drawing by his bed.

 

And, whatever you choose to do, this won't last forever. The key really is to develop a sense of security and bedtime as a cozy time, and that will come with gentle consistency, routine and lots of reassurance. Listening to them and talking to them about their fears without either minimizing or encouraging will help you get a sense for what will work best in the long run. :)

 

Cat

[scmama]

Ok I'm going to have to have this talk with my 3 yr old about the monster not living in the house, and probably going to call this monster's mama!! I love it and didn't think of that....I have been having this same problem with my child for the last month...it's getting bad. Every night he goes into this huge security check list. "Mama are the windows locked? Mama, are the doors locked? Did you know that little monster can open doors??" I mean this is a very intelligent little monster! And the same exact description of him every single time he's asked. But when we went to FL 2 weeks ago, the monster thing subsided and we didn't hear about him the entire time we were there. We are back home and the monster is home too! Go figure!

I'm definitely going to use some of these helpful tips for my son, who does still sleep in the middle of his father and me in a king size bed...UGH!

Didn't mean to high-jack anything, just wanted to say thank you too!!! These are awesome ideas!!

[LibraryLover]

"30 mintues in the early evening gave us the whole evening." You don't know how lucky you are. I could read to my DD for 4 hours before she would fall asleep. We read at least 1 hour a night and she has never fallen asleep while we read. Ever.

 

My youngest is a night owl. So.... she is not the one we sucessfully read to sleep, truth be told. I always forget about her because she is no trouble at all. Her being up didn't bother anyone. We would put her in our bed, we'd read, we'd come and go, she got up and moved, she played, we left the light on. It was simply no big deal.

 

Some kids don't need the sleep we think they do. She is stillup at 12:15. But she is drawing & listening to an audio book, not bothering anyone. When she was little, she would play or watch a little video, or whatever. It's never been an issue.

[LibraryLover]

"30 mintues in the early evening gave us the whole evening." You don't know how lucky you are. I could read to my DD for 4 hours before she would fall asleep. We read at least 1 hour a night and she has never fallen asleep while we read. Ever.

 

I dont think I could read aloud for four hours! I know I could not. I could lay by a child and listen to an audio book (and doze off lol) . My youngest is a night owl. So.... she is not one we sucessfully read to sleep, truth be told. I always forget about her because she is no trouble at all. Her being up didn't /doesn't bother anyone. When she was small, we would put her in our bed, or on hers. We'd read, we'd come and go, she might watch a little video in our bed (the kids don't have TVs in their rooms), she got up and moved, she played, we left the night light on. She played with her flash light, whatever. It was simply no big deal.

 

Some kids don't need the sleep we think they do. She is still awake at 12:15. She is drawing & listening to an audio book (ear buds) in her bunk with a little night light so she doesn't wake her sister, and bothering nobody. It's never been an issue in over a decade.

 

Four kids and no bedtime drama. I don't know what else to say about it.

Edited June 19, 2010 by LibraryLover

[Firefly]

DD had a similar issue around that age. I made up a "monster spray" for her (just some distilled water with lavender in it). I don't think she ever actually sprayed it, but it comforted her knowing she had that by the bed, just in case. ;) It eventually went away on it's own.

[Guest mrsjamiesouth]

As I mentioned, ds7 has developed a fear at night of going to bed. For at least two hours each night he keeps getting up constantly-will not stay in bed due to fear. We've tried everything-discipline, cham. tea, bribing, music in room, nightlight, on and on and on. Even if dh stays up in our room, ds is still scared. (Thankfully once he's asleep he's ok.) It's affecting him during the day because he is so tired from it. NOTHING is working. We have been under a lot of situational stress (chronically ill other child, dh laid off, etc.) and this is the last straw.

 

I asked on here a couple wks ago and people said to sit in his room, etc. I really don't want to start that habit though! But we're getting desperate.

 

If you've had a dc go through this, can you mention what you did and what worked and what age they were. If you did something like sit in the room, how long did it take to transition out of that? HELP!!!!!!!

 

 

Whenever mine went through that phase I refused to cater to it. I told them there is nothing to be afraid of and they were not allowed to get out of bed. If leaving the light on doesn't help, it sounds to me like it is not really fear but a discipline issue at this point. I might put on a small nightlight and insist he stay in bed. Every time he gets out refuse to speak to him, just put him back in bed until he stops getting out.

[Lolosoli]

I've always stayed with my children until they fell asleep. We read a book or two and then lights out. The deal is that they need to go to sleep. They always have. I spend never more then 5-10 minutes cuddling them to sleep. Then I leave.

 

Sometimes I cannot lay with them and they are fine with that.

 

I have never felt that anything that soothes or connects us is a bad habit.

 

They all eventually no longer want or care for you to be there anymore.

 

My daughter was 2 when she wanted her own bed and 8 when she no longer wanted me staying with her while she went to sleep....I miss those times.

 

My son at seven reached that stage...

 

The only one left now is my five year old. Twice this week he went to sleep on his own....

 

You won't regret spending that time with your son....especially if he needs it. Just make sure set limits and boundaries.

[HappyGrace]

Great advice, thank you! I'm going to reread through all of these later with dh and we'll try to come up with a strategy.

 

I know it will pass eventually, it is just so hard when you're in it! :)