Nightmares/night terrors

[pillowpuff]

DD (4) has been having these for the last 3 months. Usually most nights. Always in the second half of the night, she will call out 'Nooo!' Or, 'Stop it!!' Etc etc. never thought too much of it until a friend mentioned they can be linked to something being physically wrong? I thought it was just an (unpleasant) phase, accompanied by the arrival of her sibling, due in July, weighing on her mind (despite the fact she's incredibly excited about this)

We went on holiday 3 weeks ago & she shared a room with us, we were away 4 nights & it didn't happen once. At home she starts off in her own room but ALWAYS ends up coming in with us (she has a blow up bed in our room as there's no way we would all fit else)

Anyone have any experience here?

Shameless bump...

@pillowpuff my DD always has nightmares, but she is naturally a very anxious child. We ended up buying her a dream catcher and told her it would catch all her nasty dreams and it did stop the nightmares. There is nothing physically wrong with her, she just "feels" a lot and has a lot of emotion. Is your DD similar?

@Blossomandblooms my daughter is very like this. I've been reading up on it and she's definitely a 'highly sensitive child'. we tried a dream catcher to help her nightmares but she still occasionally has night terrors where she will scream out or cry but still be asleep. a rub on the back normally settles her.

if it happens multiple times a night sleep terrors can be due to apnea - where they stop breathing for a short period and cry and startle themselves to start breathing again. if you think it could be that it's worth getting checked out. snoring can also be a sign of sleep apnea as is delayed growth.

@Blossomandblooms @NewNormalLife Thanks both. Interesting you say that as she is definitely sensitive & a 'thinker'. Due to house renovations he has been sleeping in our room since May last year, bar the last month, & now she's back in her room, she only lasts a few hours in there before coming in with us. The nightmares are always in the second half of the night, always after 2pm, which is typical of a nightmare rather than a night terror, only thing is on Google it says nightmares wake kids up, well she doesn't wake up, just cries out etc but goes back to sleep. Is there anything you said to your DC when you bought the dream catcher? I'm not sure how they work, do you tell them the dream catcher will stop the bad dreams or something different?

@pillowpuff yes we just told her that it would catch all her bad dreams and only happy dreams - about unicorns and rainbows - her fav- would get through. she hasn't really mentioned it much but it did lessen them

@pillowpuff my DD bought a really pretty one from Amazon (we got her to choose it) and you hang it above their bed, over their pillow. We told DD it would trap the bad dream and make sure she has lovely dreams. We read a nice, soothing book before bed and, for the large part, it did stop the nightmares. She did have a couple after having the dream catcher and she asked if we could send it back to Amazon as it wasn't working! But IME, it really has helped. DD is a very anxious child and will worry about all sorts (last bout of anxiety was when she picked a Dracula book to read from school and she ended up worrying about vampires for a few nights!)