Was this a night terror? Do they normally last for so long ?

[fatbottomgirl12]

I'm after a bit of advice. I have 4 DC, my youngest is 2y2. He has always been a really good sleeper and we have never had a problem with him.

The night before last we had some unexpected guest to stay and the only spare bed was in his room. We took him out his cot and brought him into bed with us. We have done this on a couple of other occasions and he just snuggles in and goes to sleep. However this night he seemed awake and was asking questions. After about an hour we thought he was asleep then all of a sudden he screamed hysterically. He was saying that things were crawling on him. We tried to calm him and he would settle for minute and then scream again. He seemed scared of the shadows so we put the lights on for him but this didn't work. He was truly terrified, shaking and clinging on to us. I took him to different room but this didn't help. This went on for about 2 hours at which point my husband decided that he would try him in the car to see if this calmed him down. It was a disaster he screamed uncontrollably.

We brought him back in and finally at 6am ish he fell asleep for about an hour. He woke at 9am and seemed fine. The whole episode lasted about 5 hours, we were really frightened as he was so scared and convinced something was going to get him. I have never seen him so frightened and not soothed by me or his Dad.

Any suggestions ?

Two of my DDs had similar experiences: DC3 had a terrible night's sleep once when she was in her cot and truly believed that there were bugs crawling all over her. She was under 3 yrs but she can still remember it (she's now 6yrs). This was a one-off though and she's had bad dreams since but nothing on this scale.

DC1 had a really bad period of about four days where she had recurrent nightmares of being chased where she would shake uncontrollably, and actually try running away, on the spot on her bed - she was sleep but running and screaming and shaking but it didn't stop even when she woke up. She was about 6 yrs, but looking back I think she was stressed about school.

I have no advice, but thought it might help that both instances were short-lived with no lasting effects apart from the bad memories of it. Sweet dreams for DS tonight, I hope.