Night terror or bad dream?

Posted on November 12, 2008 by Sandi

My son woke up and started scream­ing. I don’t mean the usual squeaks, I mean “holy crap! I need help! Some­thing is really wrong up here” scream­ing. Both my hus­band and I bounded up the stairs and rushed into the room. Our son was mov­ing across the bed and still scream­ing. He has woken up our daugh­ter who was start­ing to cry too; not that I blame her with the ruckus that was going on.

I picked him up and tried to con­sole him but he was rigid. His eyes were wide open but I don’t think he saw me. I tried stroking his face and whis­per­ing in his ear and that had absolutely no response. The hus­band took him so that I could con­sole her. My hus­band took him over to the win­dow and raised the blind to see if the light from the street would snap him out of it. He didn’t stop cry­ing but I could see that he was respon­sive. My hus­band tucked him back into bed and it took a good 15 min­utes to get him to go back to sleep.

I met the hus­band in the office and we both think that it could have been a night ter­ror. After din­ner while we were clean­ing up I started laugh­ing because our daugh­ter stepped on some ice and started to hop because it was cold. He didn’t like that I was laugh­ing so he grabbed a piece of ice and started to chase me and try to put it down my shirt or pants. I shrieked and laughed and tried to get away. Our son was frozen and looked scared and even though I tried reas­sur­ing him that I was fine he started to cry. I for­get that he is such a sen­si­tive soul. I thought all was well because he stopped cry­ing and I changed him into his paja­mas and we headed to bed.

Need­less to say both my hus­band and I feel hor­ri­ble. To think that us goof­ing around scared him so much that he took that energy to bed makes me quite sad. I for­get that this age they have no con­cept about pre­tend, every­thing is real. No more rough play in front of the kids. I don’t want to deal with any more night terrors.

Related posts:

  1. a plan for night weaning
  2. Girls’ Night Out
  3. a kid-free night!
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One Response to Night terror or bad dream?

  1. Corina says:
    November 13, 2008 at 8:06 pm

    I have not had to deal with night ter­rors with my kids, but I know some who have. I hope that every­thing works out with Secret Agent Boy, and you all are able to get rest.