My DS is 7 and is a happy, (mostly) confident and yet fairly sensitive boy. He comes in our bed probably about 4 or 5 nights a week. If he wakes and comes in at around midnight or 1 - I send him back (much to his vocal objections) but usually it's about 4-5 ish in the morning. I don't mind - it's nice to have cuddles. DP and I have talked about whether we should be encouraging him not to - DP is of the mind that he's not going to want to come and cuddle us forever so we should enjoy it now - but agrees that it's only ok if it's that late on (we don't want him there all night). The only downsides for me are that he acts as a bit of human paperclip (ie lying on top of the duvet sometimes) but I mentioned it to someone recently and was met with a raised eyebrow that I allow it. Is it weird? Is he too old for this?
Linked to all of this - he's a bit scared being on a floor in the house on his own. Whilst this has concerned me - I've always been of the view that he will grow out of it. And indeed in the last few weeks, he's started going upstairs on his own (if he's e.g. forgotten a toy) but still won't go into the basement on his own. It used to be worse - we couldn't walk out of a room without him panicking and running after us. Someone suggested that I take him to see a child psychologist - but I think he's just a little boy who is a bit scared of monsters (he says that he's had dreams that they come out of the furniture). We have a nanny a couple of days a week - she doesn't like going downstairs now either - I think she's convinced that he must be able to feel a presence - it's not that though. Both of them use my (totally confident, entirely independent) 3 year old DD as a bouncer!
Whilst it is a pain that I have to go down with him if he wants to go to the loo, I don't think I'll still be doing it when he's 13! Similarly - I'm assuming that I won't be having a strapping teenager in the middle of us at night! Am I right to be relaxed about these things in the view that he will just naturally grow out of them or should I be doing more to encourage him to overcome his fears etc?