Less than 3% of children experience true night terrors. Why must Emily continue to demonstrate how exceptional she is?
Perform a search for “child night terror” and, after reading the entirety of the first 10 search results, you will come to believe that a night terror is a sleep disorder, usually occurring in children aged 3 to 12 years, characterized by periods of extreme agitation with manifestations of intense fear, crying, and screaming in the middle of the night. Though still asleep, the child will sit up bolt upright in bed, with their eyes wide open, and scream. These episodes may last anywhere from 1 to 40 minutes and the child rarely remember any of the events of the episode after it has passed.
Now allow me to describe for you how our personal experience has differed from the clinical descriptions that we’ve read.
On almost any given night for the past couple of months, sometime between 11pm and 3am, Emily will wake up shouting bloody nonsense from her bed. If we’re lucky, she’ll settle down and fall back asleep in a minute or two. Just as likely, though, she’ll get out of bed and roam the house looking for something/someone to shout at. If this happens, we’re doomed. She’ll come into our room, disoriented and screaming, and we’ll try to escort her out so as not to wake up Sebastian. This just makes her even more upset and then the fireworks really kick off. If we try to speak to her to calm her down, she screams over us and tries to hit us. If we try to touch her or hold her, she runs away and hides in a remote corner of the room like a feral child. Then she tries to hit us again. Then she spits and hisses at us. All the while, shouting at the top of her little lungs, which all of a sudden don’t seem so little. The poor thing has no idea what’s going on. It’s a violent and scary episode which can last upwards of an hour! It’s hard not to try to interact with her but the experts assure us that there’s nothing we can do except make sure that she doesn’t hurt herself.
But the most incredible part of this intense and traumatic experience (for us) is when, after the terror has apparently run its course, she simply snaps out of it (wakes up), looks at me, and says something like, “would you like to play with the blocks and build a tower with me, daddy?” in the sweetest little voice imaginable. She does not remember very much, if anything, from the terror.
So I’m thinking my kid is seriously messed up, emotionally scarred, or, at best, possessed. But before flipping through the Yellow Pages in search of an exorcist, we thought we’d ask around to see if any other parents had been through anything similar. I was so relieved to find out that most of people we asked had experienced similar episodes – of varying degrees. Emily appears to have much more intense terrors than most but they seem to have settled down (a bit) over the past two weeks. I hope this is just a phase and that it comes to an end sooner than later – for her, for Sebastian, for us, and for our poor poor neighbors.
Is it because of starting school (i.e. a major change in her life)? Not that it’s a negative change by any means, but subconsciously it is a big step for a little one. Just a thought… Daniel goes crazy when he takes Dalsy, we think it is the colorant in it (one of those nasty e-numbers). That could be another factor, does she eat or drink anything garishly orange? (a serious question, although it may sound strange)
It absolutely may have something to do with starting school. It appears that these episodes can be brought about by either stress (like from starting school) or being overtired (like from starting school). No garishly orange food or beverages, though. Hmm…
Aaah poor you… I do feel for you all, it’s a horrible feeling when they are panicking and you feel helpless (not to mention the stress from missed sleep…) Sam went through a phase of nightmares though not night terrors, and that was bad enough. It did happen though around the time we were moving house and definitely seemed to be linked to changes, upheaval, a sense of being unsettled.
Have you thought about leaving some very peaceful music on in her room while she’s asleep? Certain types of classical music for example can have a very soothing effect and might help by drifting quietly into her sleep and soothing her. Just a thought, though no idea if it would actually help. Tell Emily her friend Pancho says hello
and a big hug to both you and Jan and a little kiss to Sebastian xxx
Thanks, Chris! Music might be a very nice idea. I’ll do some research to see if it should actually help and to make sure that the music I choose is a “relaxing” one and not one of the ones that freak you out subconsciously.
Yeah, stay away from Berlioz. Pretty sounding music, but he was insane and obsessively stalking his ex-lover, and writing the music to represent her. There might be something subconscious in there…
Kat sometimes still comes and stands by our bed with half shut eyes (creepy!) and then when the moment is at it’s creepiest stands screaming before then falling asleep on my floor muttering to herself. Thriller melts into comedy. That thin line blurs alot in our house. xxx Hang in there!
Hey Josh –
Sorry to hear this is happening. My buddy suffered from night terrors through most of his toddler life. Mostly caused by stress or fear. Try to eliminate or lessen the fear or stress in Emily’s life. Playing soothing music is supposed to help. So might Chamomile tea. Good luck!
xo
steve
That sounds awful. So sorry that all of you are having to go through that. We haven’t had that experience with Xavier. However, I strongly recommend some acupressure/acupuncture. Denise says to rub and massage her legs gently in downward motions. Then massage a point, Kidney 1. http://www.compassionatedragon.com/images/acupuncture/ac_points/ac_k1.png
Try and make it a nightly ritual. Hope it helps.
my ex boyfriend and a friend of mine both suffer from night terrors. as far as i know this had nothing to do with them both knowing me. interestingly enough it is supposedly where the ledgend of the sucubus came from. i assure you nothing is scarier then be woken up by the person next to your screaming and clawing at their chest. freaky stuff. im sorry to hear emily (and you) suffer from these! xx
Ouch! We never even considered the fact that this might last into adulthood! Thanks for the wake-up call. It’s gotta be terrible having a full-grown adult freaking out like that. At least we can overpower our three year old if need be.