Q: How do I soothe my child's sleep terrors?
A: Remember from my post the other day, sleep terrors are different than nightmares. Taking that into consideration, if you have identified that your 18 month old+ is having night terrors, you may ask, what you can do to soothe them. Recall, your child is not awake during night terrors, so soothing is some what more for you than your child. If your child is out of their bed- gently guide them back to their bed (REMEMBER they are asleep and act accordingly). It is normal for them to last as long as five to fifteen minutes.
According to Dr. Marc Weissbluth in Happy Sleep Habits Happy Child "Night terrors appear more often when a child has a fever or when sleep patterns are disrupted naturally, such as on long trips, during school vacations, during holidays, or when relatives come to visit. Recurrent night terrors are also often associated with chronically abnormal sleep schedules. Enabling them to get more sleep is the way of treating over-tired children who have frequent night terrors. I have observed that night terrors disappear when the parents moved the bedtime earlier by only thirty minutes."
So friends:
-Don't freak out- as a out of control sleeping, screaming child can be concerning.
-Make sure they aren't sick.
-Take them calmly and gently back to their bed- you don't need to wake them up.
-Evaluate their sleep schedule- are they getting enough sleep. Make adjustments as needed.
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1 comment:
Courtney, H has night terrors (fewer now, I think she is starting to grow out of them), and I have noticed that they happen much more frequently if she is either overtired, like you mentioned, or if she goes to bed upset. Almost every time, if she is crying when she goes to bed, she will wake up a few hours later having a night terror. So we try to resolve any issues before she goes to bed (obviously, this is much easier to do if she isn't overtired in the first place). :)
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