Concerns about child's imagination

[mummytotwoxo]

Is there ever a point a child's imagination becomes a concern. I don't know if I'm overreacting or not.. my son you could say is quite quirky he is 5 he has talked to himself for as long as I can remember. Often repeating anything said to him in a whisper. For around about a year he has had an imaginary friend (a 23 year old man) so he says. He's currently sat in the kitchen wrapping up "gifts" for his imaginary friends birthday he was also doing this yesterday. 2 nights ago he woke up in the middle of the night presumably hallucinating he got himself very upset and was saying things were there that was not for hours. I brought him downstairs at 4am to calm him down. I contacted the gp the morning after, we are waiting for an appointment. Last night he woke once freaking out and settled back down in minutes and then again a few hours later I caught him just sat up in bed in silence.

I'm really starting to be worried about him. Am I over reacting? He doesn't really watch tv/ screen time I don't let him in supervised on YouTube ect so I know it's not that.

Quite normal. A friend's son had an imaginary friend with a whole back story and a really quirky name. He's a police officer now.

Sounds like me as a child. I grew up to be a novelist.

Oh, and my 12 year old had dozens of imaginary friends when he was younger, including a ghost version of himself called ‘Sir DSname’ who, according to him ‘was dead for YEARS’.

Could be night terrors - DS1 used to have them when he was age 2-4yo. He’d wake in the night and we’d find him on the landing often babbling nonsense or sometimes screaming the house down. He acted like we weren’t there and he couldn’t hear us, so we’d just gently steer him back to bed and cuddle him till he calmed down and went back off to sleep. Doesn’t have them now, and has no lasting memory of them either.

Sounds like he’s having night terrors, which I believe are a different issue than his daytime imagination. I’m sure GP will put you at rest.

The whispering thing is called echolalia, your son is a little old for it maybe, but it can be a perfectly normal part of language development.

The imaginary friend or the little one?! 😀

When DD was that age she got in trouble at school for talking during a lesson. Quite loudly and with gestures and everything. Quite surprising both for me and the teacher , as she was a shy/quiet little thing. When I asked her what happened, it turns out she was giving a tour of the classroom to her imaginary friends . 😬

The night thing though, could be night terrors/very vivid dreams. It is incredibly hard to discern dream for reality after , especially if the brain is still fixated on them/replaying them , and the feelings are real and don't just go away because you're now awake.

It's good you have a GP appointment though, just in case.

Is there anything inappropriate/concerning in his roleplays with the imaginary friend?

Have you looked at palilalia op? My lo does it too and it’s this www.peacefulparenthappykids.com/read/palilalia-child-whispers-and-repeats-under-his-breath

Thankyou for your comment, my sons is called "shimmy" 😂

We had this, aged around 3 mainly. Night terrors, and seemingly responding to a world we couldn’t see. He spooked me out a few times, as he’d look around anxiously and warn me sombrely that the Noonoo was coming.
Night was slightly different, but again talking about people we couldn’t see and effectively absent.
He’s delightful now.

Not really when we go out he points to places and tells me that's where his friend works, he likes to make things for his friend, he likes to draw him it's all quite innocent

I've heard of this, he has done this for years, is it something I should be mentioning to the gp?

This is a good post which explains the differences between echolalia and palilia. It talks about children with autism, which I think is not a concern you have? My dc was eventually diagnosed with autism but very subtle presentation. We ended up getting him dx as he needed support at school with anxiety and other things

goldencaretherapy.com/understanding-palilalia-and-echolalia-in-children-with-autism/

My daughter had two imaginary friends for maybe a year around 4-5 or so. It was adorable and I miss them! She went through a phase of hearing fairies talking to her whenever she was outside too. Honestly it was lovely and much preferable to the preteen angst I have now!

My DD (aged 30 now) would say the most bizarre things and her imagination was pretty wild at that age.
She grew out of it though.

My four year old doesn't just have an imaginary friend but an entire imaginary world peopled with his own imaginary creatures, buildings, inventions and more - which he talks about, at length, at every opportunity 😂 I'm not worried, he'll either grow up to be an author, a screenwriter or a politician I should think. I do take notes on some of the stuff he comes out with because it's hilarious. But I think the flip side of a great imagination can be trouble with nightmares because he's the same. We got a dreamcatcher to put above his bed which actually seems to have helped him feel less worried about bad dreams.

I was diagnosed with maladaptive daydreaming as a child - it's my greatest pleasure as an adult and I'm v glad my dm ignored advice to stop me.

very normal! Imaginative play is hugely important for children and they engage in it a lot. My four year old is regularly running a complex fantasy completely with characters and story arcs alongside normal life. It’s all part of how they make sense of the world through play.

Had a vivid imaginary world as a child which I've never really grown out of. I'm an artist and am fairly sure they go together. I believe that children understand layers of reality we are encouraged to let go of as we become 'educated'

Completely normal and you are overreacting.

No you don’t have to take him to the GP (what would they do anyway???).

Some kids have big imaginations and see the work differently (love another post that said they did this and grew up to be a novelist!!!).

See it as wonderful and different and don’t go to something is wrong.

It's nice to know his imaginary friend has found a responsible career. Though I worry about the thoroughness of the background checks.

My son was the same, talked to himself all through primary school and had an imaginary friend. Everyone told me it was completely normal, that everyone talks to themselves and they all knew someone who had an imaginary friend as a child - turned out he was autistic and was diagnosed just before secondary school.

Echolalia can be normal when they are very young but not at 5 - have you posted about this before I'm sure I've read this before?

My son at around 3 when he had a bedroom of his own said quite cheerfully “ There’s a man in my room!”
He also mentioned the name of an imaginary child.

He’s quite “normal” and no mental health issues-
He’s an adult now.

One very eerie thing though was when he got very upset and frightened travelling through an area of UK
I asked what was wrong?

He replied ( with an incident that happened in that location long before he was born) like long past into the 20th Century

There was no way he could have heard of the incident, as was still at home and not at nursery

That was very strange.

Quite agree- Lots of children have great imagination, it’s a shame to squash it down.

Lots of these children grow up to have more creative careers.