The Curious Incident of the DD in the Night Time

[nailpolish]

dd has been sleepwalking lately, last night i found her kneeling at the fridge chomping on a fennel bulb! she usually just sleepwalks to the toilet or into her wardrobe or whatever.

she isnt affected by it all, has no memories of it

its just the fridge thing - what if next time she tries to eat a raw chicken or something?

should i get a fridge lock?

oh blimey - d'you not feed her?

in all seriousness, yes, i think you should - how old is she?

I'm sure some part of her subconscious would tell her not to eat anything dodgy, but yes, get a fridge lock just in case! DS1 used to sleep walk and I actually resurrected the stair gate to stop him going downstairs - is there anyway you could block off part of the house/flat to limit any possible harm?

Yeah i would too, just in case better to be save than sorry.

she is 4 and a half

ive tried to get a fridge lock before, but our fridge has quite a large door it seems cos i couldnt find a lock to fit

might have to get a new fridge

oh hassled thats an idea - i could just lock the kitchen door

(cheaper than a new fridge!)

And make sure that all outside doors have HIGH bolts on them.

omg fio

i hadnt thought about dd wandering into the street

all doors are double locked

When she was 6 one of my cousins sleepwalked out the door and half way to school in her pyjamas. I expect she will grow out of it, and it will do her no harm, but better to hide the raw chicken, chocolate, medicine, and lock the doors and windows. Fennel though

nailpolish, you should definitely think about some things to protect her from hurting herself. My dd gets night terrors and got them really really badly after we moved to the usa (not sure if it was just her age, just 3, or the disruption), but they were truly awful (there is nothing you can do to comfort them) and I consequently did quite a bit of internet research. They are related to sleepwalking and genetic and the advice was that the most important thing to do is to make sure that you make the environment safe for them to do their sleepwalking in, since you can't stop them from doing it.

Think it's quite funny that she chose a fennel bulb to munch on...that's the kind of thing my ds would have done (his favorite veg is artichokes).

I would be really freaked if my children sleepwalked. However, I'm such a light sleeper they wouldn't get downstairs without me getting up to see what was going on. I do have one who talks in her sleep, which is more comical than frightening, and one who walks around in the night but isn't asleep! Needless to say I'm not asleep myself very much of the time, and they're 10 and 8 now.

Anyway, good luck with your problem. What about some kind of alarm that goes off if she walks out of her room (my DD has one in her spy kit!!) that would at least alert you to get up.