Do you get the ‘night fear’?

[Organictangerine]

I do. I start feeling really anxious as it starts getting dark, and I’m not really sure why. I think it stems from DD having a loooooong phase of picking up bugs; meaning I was up all night looking after her and worrying, not getting any sleep etc. She’s mainly over that now but she also gets croup quite a lot which always starts as a night time cough. Just hearing her cough a little bit at night makes my heart start racing. But I get it even when she’s fine. Ahhhh.

Is there something lovely you can do for yourself at the same time to start tricking your brain out of it?

We started getting it when DC2 was born because DC1 was a horrific sleeper until 1 year old. It took MONTHS to get ourselves out of that train of though being worried and anxious as the day progressed into night.

We just had to keep telling ourselves every night that this baby and this evening is nothing like the ones we’ve had before. And eventually it passed. Every night dc was a little older and a little stronger to cope with things.

Yep. DS has type 1 diabetes and has an alarm that sounds if he is too low or two high. It’s a horrific noise and then have to go and wake him and make him eat, so check his bloods
is horrible. Then there is the fear that one night they won’t go off and I’ll find him in a coma in the morning.

It’s all fairly manageable in the day but the nights just feel overwhelming sometimes - he’s not even young - he’s 13 but it still feels really stressful.

Yes! Also get it in winter as the nights start to draw in.

Yes. DS2 suffered from night terrors from the age of 2 till about 9. Horrible, horrible experience. I could never relax after he'd gone to bed because I was always listening out for his screaming. The whole experience of him suffering with a terror was awful to witness.

He's grown out of them now thankfully but I'll never forget that on edge feeling that went with it getting dark and bedtime.

Not just me then!

DD was up in the night with a temperature and cough. It sucks because I can’t tell myself my thoughts are irrational/unlikely, when quite often they’re right 😢

I find it comes and goes at the moment.
Had it a lot between 7-12 months as she was a terrible sleeper and kept bringing all the bugs back from nursery, really coming to a head between 10-11 months. She would only settle for me and on her worst night would be up every 45/60 mins for multiple days in a row.
She's 14 months now and a much better sleeper all of a sudden, occasionally sleeps right through but more often up once or twice. But when she's poorly I get the fear again as I know I'll not only be up and down with her but that I'll inevitably end up with whatever she has too which makes getting up at night so much harder!

I've found it is slightly easier now to put the fear to one side though because I know she can and does sleep through, it won't last forever and since night weaning she will let her dad settle her too.