DD1 is 2.5 and is usually a very cheerful little thing. Recently however she's been really quite difficult and it feels to me like it's because she's anxious.
She has a black and white cat which she tells me at night is scary. For a few nights it worked if I told it not to scare DD1 and made it face the wall but now the cat has to leave the room at night.
She has woken up at night a few times crying quite frantically. Yesterday we were looking at a book and she told me the dog in the book had a bad dream. In the dream the dog was crying and dog's daddy came into the room but his mommy didn't come at all. Now at night when she wakes up DH tends to go and fetch her because his side of the bed is closest to the door, but she comes straight into bed with both of us. So was she was describing what happens when she has a dream, or did she actually have a dream where that happened? I just don't know.
The other thing to happen recently is that DH went away for a week on a cycling trip. We explained about daddy being away and she spoke to him on the phone every day but she was clearly annoyed with him when he got home (said hello very happily but then "remembered" to be cross and ostentatiously went to read her book) and was very very clingy with me while he was away and ever since.
So, I think she's anxious - but is she too young for these types of emotions?
And how best to deal with it? e.g. I took the scary cat out the room and told it off for making DD1 scared. DH dealt with it by making the scary cat into a crazy cat who bounced all over her bed and then went to sleep at the end of it. Are there any big dos or don'ts with this?
It's quite weird in a way, because until now all my worries about the DDs have been more physical (e.g. wakes up crying because teething/has a cold) and this is the first time I've had to deal with a mental issue that I can't take practical steps to "fix" (e.g. give teething gel, spoon of calpol).