16 month old scared of men

[Overwhelmedmummy]

My beautiful dd is a happy, cheeky and relatively confident girl when with women or a group she knows well. However add a strange man into the mix and all hell breaks loose. She cries and hides behind/nuzzles into me or her gran. She usually stops crying after a little bit but if she looks up and a strange man makes eye contact or speaks to her she kicks off again.

We've been invited to a christening in May and I want to be able to take my beautiful girl with me. Any tips on how I can get her to not be so shy and be the happy smiling baby she is with women?

[Iggly]

You can take her. Just cuddle her tell her it's fine and she'll be ok.

[Newyearoldmum]

Thanks it's ages away so no need to make decision now so will need to see how she is nearer the time. I just hate seeing just how upset she gets. She's not usually a cryer. It seems to be the only thing that makes her nearly inconsolable.

[sittinginthesun]

Take her, and be prepared for lots of cuddles. At that age, my DS1 was scared of men, dogs and hoovers. At nursery, they used to have to take him into the office if any dads did pickup.

[MrsHerculePoirot]

My DD was a little like this although she is getting much better now at three. I have tried to be as normal as possible about it and always hug and give my male friends a kiss on the cheek when we meet in the hope she'll see i think they are ok.

Once when I picked up a friend (male colleague) that she had seen a fair few times before she burst into tears when he got in the car! She was about two I think. Last month when she came to my work she spent half an hour liking for him to say hello!

[Newyearoldmum]

Thank you for your replies. She'll get there eventually I know - I mean you don't see many 16 year olds hiding behind their mum when they see a stranger! . I just hate how upset she gets - its like she thinks they're going to hurt her but women get smiles and she talks to them, shows them her toys etc. Nothing has happened to traumatise her - just one day she went from smiling at everyone to crying anytime a strange guy looked at her. Can't explain it.