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Sleep

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Original poster

Nightmares help desperately needed

17 replies

MaggieW · 05/04/2006 08:29

DS, 4, has been waking on and off for many months with nightmares - mostly about dinosaurs and monsters. It's now happpening every night - earliest 1am, but usually 4am. When he does it basically means it's the end of sleep for me and him. I settle him back down but it keeps happening every time he drifts off.

I've put DD into the same room, as someone recommended that, and he's been getting into bed with her when it happens, but unfortunately usually manages to wake her up, so I have two of them to deal with! He has a nightlight in his room too.

I'm like a zombie now and am finding it hard to be sympathetic in the early hours. Does anyone have any ideas of how to solve this?

OP posts:

Gloworm · 05/04/2006 08:38

no ideas, but would also love to hear the answer to this one as our 4 year old is also too scared to sleep alone. at the moment he falls asleep on the sofa and gets carried up to bed later. these nightmares are really common among 4 year old so hopefully he will grow out of it. ours has also been ill, so I'll join your zombie club

jambot · 05/04/2006 09:08

Maggie - what's time does he go to sleep? Is he normally very tired by that time?

Hausfrau · 05/04/2006 09:36

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

lazycow · 05/04/2006 09:45

Have you tried reading Richard Ferber's book on children's sleep. I know a lot of people don't like controled crying so they tend to be anti him as he wrote about this but bis nook also has loads of good information about sleep problems like this and ways to tackle them. I think his specialism is sleep disorders in young people and I found his tone on most things very sympathetic and useful. It might be worth a read for some ideas anyway.

lazycow · 05/04/2006 09:46

god my typing is awful today - sorry but you can probably work out what I mean

Original poster

MaggieW · 06/04/2006 08:08

Jambot, he goes to bed at 7pm and is very tired - usually asleep within fifteen minutes. Normal waking time (on a night without nightmares) is around 7-7.30pm.

OP posts:

sunandmoon · 06/04/2006 18:59

Maggie, I won't really help by saying that myself as a baby, I use to have dreadful nightmares and the worse it is still happening!!! 34 years later I know it must be tiring for you but give him lots of soft cuddles and try to not wake your DS while he is crying, it can be very dangerous... But don't ignore his nightmare cries because I was ignored and maybe that's why I still do them...

Kittypickle · 06/04/2006 19:18

A dreamcatcher worked for my DD at that age. We had a kit that we made up together and she had in her bedroom. I told her that all the dreams got caught in the web. The bad ones were destroyed by the moon and the stars and the good ones were let out so she could dream them. Her nursery teacher had recommended it. I was skeptical but it did work for sometime.

One of DD's friends has recently had a lot of people close to her die and has started horrendous nightmares, to the extent that she saw a psychologist last week. One thing that she suggested was to do a relaxation with her which apparently has helped, but she is older and I'm not sure it would work with a 4 year old, but it might just help a bit.

jambot · 07/04/2006 18:35

Maggie. A suggestion. There's a school of thought that thinks there might be a correllation between nightmares and the degree of tiredness at bedtime. If the child has reached an overtired stage by bedtime, the body is actually pumping more adrenalin into the bloodstream in order to keep the body awake when it should already be in sleep mode. This is thought to possibly explain night wakings, early waking and nightmares.
I would suggest you have a look at bringing his bedtime earlier a little every evening until you are putting him to bed at 6:30. Hopefully tired but not overtired. You don't mention your bedtime routine, but is it calm and quiet, with a story etc?
You probably think I'm mad, but when I read about this theory, it made some sense to me.

FioFio · 07/04/2006 18:37

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted

SleepyJess · 07/04/2006 18:37

Was also going to suggest a dream catcher. They comes in some nice colours and you can explain the 'logic' behind them.. how, the 'web' filters out the bad dreams letting only good ones in.. it's quite convincibg and effective for little ones I have found.

SJ x

SleepyJess · 07/04/2006 18:39

Oh God Fio we are more similar than I thought... I had a ghastly gory dream a few nights ago about my sister having her leg amputated in front of me in a hopsital without any anaesthetic.. and then jumping off the op table and hopping around spurting blood everywhere while I screamed!!! God knows what it meant!!

[I got home ok btw... .. and did you see my text?]

SaintGeorge · 07/04/2006 19:03

A tip if you do go for a dreamcatcher.

On the rare occasion that one of my boys still has a nightmare, we make a big ritual out of 'emptying' the overfull dreamcatcher . We give it a good shake over the toilet and flush the badness away. Keeps the belief in the magic of the dreamcatcher alive.

Witchycat · 07/04/2006 19:31

My ds sometimes has night terrors (I think night terrors not bad dreams) in the hour or two after falling asleep. He is 4 too. It started when he was run down & had bad reaction to MMR & it seems to come back when he is over-tired or ill.

One thing that helped him go to bed was doing a 'magic spell' every night:
From window to door
and ceiling to floor.
No monsters anymore !

He would then say Ka-pow & wave his magic wand!

When he's awake is he worried about the bad dreams or is he right as rain the rest of the time?

I do sympathise with you. Must be even worse if he's doing this when you are trying to sleep as well.

Witchycat · 09/04/2006 11:43

Maggie - how's it going? Any better?

kipper22 · 09/04/2006 12:00

I used to have dreams regularly about a man chasing us - in the end my mum promised to put the man in jail in her dream. i never had the same dream again and didnt even think of it until a few years ago when i began to realise all the fibs my mum told to entertain us as children! might work if you dont mind being caught out in later years!

Original poster

MaggieW · 10/04/2006 18:30

Thanks for all your suggestions. I am hesitant to say this as I don't want to tempt fate, but we've had four nights of normal sleep. I think having DD in the same room has really helped and given him comfort. Jambot, thanks for that, it does make sense, so will try to bring bedtime forward a bit.

OP posts:

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