toddler regression after frightening incident - help!!!

[ilovesushi]

Help I am loosing my mind here. My two year old and I had a very frightening experience where we were screamed at and chased. I was very shaken afterwards and he was terrified. He wanted to breast feed afterwards which was fine by me although he was weaned months and months ago.

I spoke to him about what happened at the time and gave all the reassurance I could but have not mentioned it since as don't want to ingrain it in his memory. Is this a mistake?

Since then he has wanted to breast feed every day for long periods of time. Have tried distraction which sometimes work. I am not overly worried about bfing him, what worries me more is that he seems so desperate for it.

He has a lot on his plate at the moment. We also have a new baby and my husband has been working away from home, so added pressures all round.

Not sure if I have addressed the scary incident in the right way and not sure how to deal with almost hourly crying fits and tantrums from him.

HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I don't know the circumstances of why you were screamed out - sounds apalling - but I would talk to him about it because clearly it is already in his memory and causing problems. Go through the scary part as it happened and admit to being frightened yourself. Then finish the story with... "and DC was very brave and then we went home home safe and there are no more bad people and DC was very happy" or whatever feels appropriate. You can kind of 'reprogramme' the memory that way.. acknowledging the traumatic part but adding a happy ending. Could be that dad needs to take some time out from work to help the process along

Thanks for the good advice! So worried about making the situation worse. x

It's possible that the wanting to BF is just as much about having a new sibling as it is about the scary incident, quite a lot of weaned toddlers want to BF when there is a new baby in the house. Keep on giving your DS love and support and he will be fine.

I second the suggestion that you talk the incident through with your DS. See it as a kind of debriefing exercise.

Poor you two.

I agree with SGB's wise words.
Lots of love and support - but don't feel bad about refusing to BF if you feel it is not appropriate and may be reinforcing the regressive behaviour.