2.5 waking up every night upset

[MummBraTheEverLeaking]

DD is now on night number 5 of being in our bed after 2am and we are stumped. She's always been a rubbish napper but an excellent night sleeper and has slept through from quite early on.

However this past week anywhere from 2am onwards although bang on 2 tonight and last night, she wakes up incredibly upset. Nothing soothes her, we've offered back strokes and shusshing, milk, cuddle...

She then starts screaming, wants to come into our bed but even when she's here she is still screaming and crying to the point she starts to gag.

We try asking what's wrong and she pushes us away and screams even harder.

She holds her throat but shakes her head when we ask if it's sore, and no signs of a sore throat in the day. She won't tell us what's wrong and we're stumped. We try asking the day after but she won't reply just runs off to do something else.

After about 10 minutes or so she wears herself out and sprawls out on our bed which means one of us gets booted out to her bed (a small single with a guard) and has a rubbish sleep, and the other stays with her and gets broken sleep if she stirs. We're knackered!

Any ideas what it could be? The only thing that coincides is her best friend at nursery has been moved up a class without her, and she won't be moving up till September. She hasn't been upset in the daytime though.

Sorry it's long 😴

Sorry that should read 2.5 years old.

DS is doing this. It's soul destroying. No advice but solidarity

If she’s waking up screaming and upset, is she actually fully awake? Sounds like night terrors, she’s prime age. It’s (I think) linked to a developmental stage... anyhoo, it usually resolves in 6 mos or so. No consolation but it doesn’t last forever.

I hope it doesn't! Doctor Google did bring up night terrors as a suggestion, it may be, her eyes are open and she does seem to be aware of us though. Right now she's flat out but is occasionally talking in her sleep and lifting her arms up, it looks like she's dreaming quite vividly.

Dont ask her questiond whem ahe wakes up.

Even if she could give you a coherent answer (which is unlikely), the time when she's screaming is not the right time to ask. Focus 100% on calming her down. In the moment, don't concern yourself with the cause, just on calming her down.

Do whatever is needed to calm her upset as quickly and effectively as possible. That might mean immediately getting to her, picking her up and swaying with her in your arms while shushing and stroking gently. It might mean bringing her into your bed and encircling her with cuddles until she calms.

Dont have conversations with her or ask, just focus in calming her as fast as possible.

The main struggle you'll have here is getting her back to bed after calming down. Get her calm as fast as possible and as soon as she's started calming (so is more coherent to conversation), give her a time check.

Something like "Good girl, love you. Five more minutes cuddle then back to bed". Keep on actively calming her and extend the time if she gets distressed again. You want 5 minutes of total calm before you take her back to bed.

Then do minute time checks - 4 mins until back to bed, 3 minutes, 2 minutes. One minute then back to bed. And so on. This serves to give predictability but also ensures she doesn't go into a fully deep sleep.

Then tell her it's bedtime now she's calm, take her back and do the usual settling you would do at bedtime if she needed TLC.

Our daughter is doing this too, same age and around the same time. NOTHING consoles her. It's almost like she is still asleep. She eventually just drops off because she is so exhausted. We also have zero idea.

Thank you BabySleep