4.5yr old needing skin contact to settle

[mrsharrycunningham]

Am hoping someone can help. I'm at the end of my tether and so tired.

My DS (4.5)used to be good at settling to sleep. Then last summer (2009) I had a stroke and spent 10 days in hospital. Since then it's been a nightmare. He's developed a habit of needing to be touching my skin to fall asleep. His hands are down my top (I sit by the side of the bed) and he's desperately trying to touch flesh - under my arms, tummy rolls (), tops of my breasts. Anywhere that's very fleshy. Then he will wake at some point during the night (usually around 2ish) and won't settle until he's in bed with us, again doing this touching skin thing. Then he'll wake in the morning and as he's coming to, he's again doing the touching flesh thing. Sometimes it feels like he's kneading bread and to be honest I'm beginning to lose patience. I just want to have a decent night's sleep again. I understand that it's probably linked to my time away from him in hospital but I'm just not sure what to do to break the habit.

I'm not sure if any of this is normal? Does anyone else have any experience of this?

Anyone?

Not first-hand experience but possibly something similar in my family.

My mother told me that when my youngest brother was born, the next brother up (then aged 3) started doing something a bit like your son. It just seemed to be related to the time she'd spent in hospital and insecurity about the new baby. She had to let him hold her hand / breast / tummy rolls (I never thought I'd hear of another child doing this!) while she fed the baby for a few months before he was OK again and just grew out of it.

As your son is a little bit older, perhaps you can talk to him about it and reassure him directly that you don't plan on going anywhere?