Husband has night terrors

[Ams422]

I was wandering if anyone else had a partner that suffers from night terrors. I'm 13 weeks and twice this week my OH has woke up shouting and even stood on my leg during his night terrors.
I'm getting anxious that when we have a baby in the room this could be a major issue.

Mine does - do you find they happen under periods of stress? It’s not an isolated symptom and usually part of generally more anxiety/work stress that isn’t being processed. I’d suggest a trip to your GP for OH as there are things you can take to reduce chances of interrupted sleep, as well as looking at the underlying causes - my Dh’s often can be managed a bit by cutting back on socialising and extra work for a bit, I don’t know if there’s a pattern you can look for.

Perhaps there isn’t a pattern or obvious signs in your OH’s case but sounds like you do need to go to GP. Mine has scared me half to death at times as he sounds like he’s being attacked and often that’s what he’s experiencing in his terror.

I suffer from night terrors myself and have done for years. Sometimes they are incredibly frightening (usually during stressful times - is your DH particularly stressed at the moment?) and other times I may just see something odd in the bedroom. They happen usually 30-40 mins after I fall asleep. Can you see a pattern of when your DH's terrors occur?

I went to a sleep clinic once who said the way to stop these was to break the sleep cycle. I think that's it. Anyway I had to be woken every night before the night terror would occur - so that meant DH waking me every night 20 mins after I fell asleep. Although it worked, I found it too stressful falling asleep knowing I was going to be woken again.... now I just put up with them.

Most the the time I'm kind of aware I'm having a night terrors although I can do odd things (like run out of the bedroom) before I realise what is happening.

My DS has these and they seem to be linked to anxiety. It's horrible to watch as can't help him, all can do is reduce stress in the day.

GP may have ideas. If he's say generally depressed or anxious counselling / CBT and / or anti-depressant may help reduce symptoms and hopefully night terrors will follow. I don't think it would especially be dangerous for a baby but likely to wake them and you. My DS does seem half-aware of surroundings.

I should add we think my dc has them too, but it’s too early to say for sure as she can only describe them as bad dreams but she’s so freaked out she’s terrified to sleep and melatonin has reduced the frequency of them.

Definitely go back to the GP, sleep research moves on and some drs are better than others at helping. I believe there are various things that can be tried.

My dh and dc can suffer from interrupted sleep in general and working on that can in itself reduce likelihood of night terrors.

my sister has these.terrible and for years.her partner is hit,shouted and scared often.but its never become fearful or something he couldnt handle in a violant or painful way.
she has tried so many things to stop.
anxiety,work stress,noise at night is deff a key factor.
you know when shes bothered by something because it gets a lot worse.
no caffeine now after 4pm
no phones hours before bedtime.and NO taking it in the room.
darkness in the room.

Also a shout out for weighted blankets - they are a bit marmite but they help improve sleep quality overall. They do nothing for some.

It is scary when a big bloke is half out of bed shouting like they’re being attacked though and you don’t know whether to wake them or not in case they mistake you for their dream attacker.

Thanks for all the replies. It's nice to know I'm not the only one. He has started counselling, I think he is a it anxious about us trying to get a mortgage so I think that's the trigger, we found that a nightlight or fairylights was a great way for him to settle down after a terror so he cpd see the room, we stopped that after he didn't get them anymore so should definitely go back to that.
Your right it is extremely frightening when a 6ft3 man thinks he is back in Iraq and being attacked.

I have them, I also sleep walk most nights, luckily I don’t do anything aggressive. I do however regularly think the en-suite is Twickenham and on fire, this either results in me waking anyone in my bed up to tell them, or attempting to put it out with my wee. Luckily it’s a wetroom so an easy clean up for me in the morning.

On a good night I will just sleep walk, I get out of bed, neatly fold over a lower corner of the duvet to make a triangle, I then stand and stare at whoever is in bed. If they look at me/say anything I slowly walk over, craw over them and just carry on with my sleep. I have been known to wander into other peoples rooms when I lived in a house share and do it to everyone.

My night terrors are linked to anxiety/stress and they tend to happen within the first hour of sleep. I take sertraline and I do regularly use melatonin, the melatonin does tend to reduce them so I generally only take it during periods of stress etc.

It’s definitely worth going to the GP, they may be able to provide help, could be medication, change in sleep hygiene etc.

Sympathies to all of you with it, it’s like your brain attacking you when you need to rest most, very distressing to experience.

So glad I've found this thread although sorry to see so many other experiencing or living with the same . My husband has had night terrors randomly but not too often the whole time we've been together I used to link it to when we watching something 'scary/ criminal ' right before bed so I just stopped doing it or we would alway watch something funny after it before we went to sleep.
We had our first child June 2020 and the night terrors got awful I woke one night and he was asleep but responding to me he said baby had woken so he was just cuddling her I was laid there with eyes closed thinking no reason not to believe him or worry then he said can you help me she's slipping so I sat up he was quite nervous with her and reshuffling her position when she was tiny I reached out carefully as it was dark and she wasn't there I started patting round in the bed I thought he had suffocated her I went fucking mental for a few seconds then I got my phone and shone it in the crib which was at my side and she was in there fast asleep. It scared the living daylights out of me after that I sent him to spare room thinking his anxieties would be better if not in the room /bed. He kept having terrors about squashing her etc even tho we never conslept even once because I don't think it's safe.
I would then go down the hall for a wee in the night poke my head in spare room he would be sat up bolt upright asleep having a nightmare absolutely dripping with sweat it was horrible to witness luckily whenever I roused him from one he was never violent or anything. They stopped eventually but it was horrible for him and I at the time.
Fast forward to now we have a 6 day old and he's straight back in the spare room as discussed because I want him on his A game to entertain the toddler (had emergency section) and I'm BF so happy to do night feeds. But the night terrors are back the last 2 nights he's woken me from down the hall and scared me so much I can never remember what he's shouting because I get such a fright I went in and he said it's actually quite terrifying. I just want to help him what can we do/ try? I would really struggle to get him to go to the doctors. He openly admits he was really nervous to have our first baby but I quizzed him this time with these terrors at back of my mind he said he wasn't nervous this time just really excited and a lot more confident so I was hoping they wouldn't happen