DS has fear of monsters

[oddwelshbird]

I've been wondering whether to put this in the potty training section or not, but i think what's going on seems more psychological...

My 3.3yr old DS has been potty trained for 6 months or so and all was very successful until recently (2/3 weeks) when he seemed to regress. He's been checked by the doctors and has no sign of an infection, and any major life changes are about 2 months old now so we assume he's quite settled with all that.

When in nursery he has started to pee in his pants and when asked by the teacher why, he said that the toilets were scary. The teacher kindly offered to go with him but he still didn't say when he needed a wee and peed in his pants again. My son has a very good imagination and has nightmares in which there are sharks in his bedroom and he pretends that there are tigers in the kitchen; but both of these creatures can be scared away by a loud 'boo' and telling them to leave!

This is all starting to sound very strange now isn't it!

Anyway, my husband asked him this evening what was wrong and he said that there were monsters in the toilets at school which is why he pees in his pants... has anyone else got experience of scary things like this; how did you get rid of them/did they grow out of it?

I'm totally guilt ridden and clueless as to what I should do now! My health vistor is suggesting positive reinforcement... but that won't get rid of the monsters!

Any advice gratefully received as this is really starting to stress us all out now!

We didn't have monsters in the loo - but in the bedroom - what we did and am sure your nursery would too - was get a special spray bottle that had 'magic' monster go away stuff in it (water and glitter) - we'd give it a spray at bedtime and the monster's wouldn't turn up.

Would say it was totally normal behaviour at that age, as their imagination develops so much (esp. with outside influences, ie books,tv programmes etc). They're also just beginning to differentiate between what is real and what isn't - it's quite confusing for a 3 yr old.

Anyway hope this has helped - think the positive reinforcement will help too.

I've got to the point where I'll try any suggestion and that's a great one! I wonder if school would allow him to use it there?

watch monsters inc

we have bartholemew the dragon as....

FACT - dragons are magic
FACT - and naughty
FACT - thet turn invisible during the day and follow you to make sure you are ok, sometimes you can spot him if you are quick.
FACT - Most monsters are rife at night dragons fly out the window and eat them all through the night.

Dragons generally appear one evening at bedtime and refuse to leave little boys no matter how hard mummy and daddy insist they have to leave, mummys think ds to young ds insist not so etc.

I know child psycholigists would probaby rate me terrible but we found the invisibility power great as it encouraged ds to not need actual toy as crutch but still had him with him!

This stoppoed all my DS fears at this age (it is normal phase after all)and beyond - Bartholemew (actual name size large from manhatton toys) stemmed my ds love of dragons he collects then and will be a dragonologist when he grows up. He is now 6 and if having a crisis of confidence reminds himself his dragons will be around.

cuddly dragon in our house worked wonders, possibly some one else may have much better advice then my madness, but I'm sure a dragon would get rid of toilet monsters.

My DD is a bit younger but she's just started on the monster thing (I actually read somewhere that you're supposed to join in the "game" and get rid of them in that vein - no use saying they don't exist, etc). Anyway, we used to be able to say

"Monster, no monsting;
Monster, no monsting;
Monster, noooo monsting;"

As per Swiper the fox in Dora the Explorer. That doesn't work any more so now, DD brings them to me. I smack their bottoms (I'd never, ever smack a child, obviously), and then whirl them around my head until they're dizzy. When they're dizzy I throw them out the window. This seems to work...

My friend's son was very similar sounding to your DS. He did grow out of this and it was quite sudden. Just stopped. Hope this is the case soon with your DS too.

DS had a fear of ghosts in his bedroom. I introduced him to my imaginary owl (who he christened Owly) and told him that if a ghost appeared in his bedroom, Owly the Ghost Hunting owl would flying straight through them and make them go FOOSH! and disappear...

Ownership of Owly duly transferred to DS, who found a place for him in the bedroom, and was reminded that Owly liked going out and hunting ghosts anywhere they could be found.

The intensive conversations to/about Owly might have raised few eyebrows, but he's ok in the dark if he's got his owl...

And an imaginary ghost-hunting owl is very portable.

I must be lazy- my anti-monster dust is actually shake n' vac

My dd was very similar. We got her a monster repelling t.shirt (actually 3 the same in case of washing issues). That did the trick.