Parenting Forums

Posted: 16 June 2007 at 2:40am | IP Logged

For the last 2 nights Joshua has had bad dreams. I know in the past he has suffered with night terror's, and occasionally still does, but this is different. With the night terrors the child does not remember the dreams, just has a sense of fear, Joshua is clearly remembering the dreams and getting upset by them.

The first night he woke up and was crying that his friends were letting the dog bite his legs off. This was the same night I was up with him with his sore leg, so I didn't think to much of it, and assumed the two events were connected. I soothed him and got him back off to sleep. Then at some silly hour last night he wont up upset again, he came through to my room and stood shaking like a leaf holding his privates. I thought he had had an accident (which at that stage he hadn't) and I asked him what was wrong, he said that his friends were making the spiders bite his willy off. He then got upset, really upset, saying he didnt like it. I tried to calm him down but it took some effort. Once he was a sleep I found it hard to settle.

I spoke to his teacher today, who assured me that there had been no ill feelings that they were aware of between the children. If you ask Joshua during the day if he has fallen out with his friends he says no, and he talks about them as he always does. He teacher said she would keep a closer eye out, but after school she told me again that everything seemed fine. Joshua is very popular at school and has a lot of friends.

I dont understand why both these bad dreams would be about his friends doing mean things. I dont like bringing up the dreams with Joshua because I dont want to plant flase memories and make him upset, or conscious about them as he'd dream more about them if they are on his mind. He's been a little unsettled tonight, but so far no tears although it has been later in the night where he has been waking. I know Joshua has a very active imagination, but I dont like the nature of these dreams, particulary the second one. How would you approach this? Should I just try to ignore it unless it becomes a bigger problem?

Posted: 16 June 2007 at 9:40am | IP Logged

Hiya,

Well personally i think for the moment at least it is probably best if you dont make too much of a fuss about these dreams he's having, and try not to mention them like you said, it could play on his mind even more.
If everything is fine at school, then perhaps it is just his imagination working overtime as the tireder he is, the more he will ponder on things!
Id try doing something relaxing before bedtime, just spending half an hour reading a funny book together will give him something else to focus on when he drops off.
It is probably just a phase he is going through, as my oldest ds used to wake every night for about a fortnight...thinking there were clowns at the window, and until he realised that none of the things he was dreaming about were real... there wasnt really much i could do about it, apart from calm him down when he got upset and reasure him as you are doing.

Good luck with this, i hope he settles back down soon.
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Posted: 16 June 2007 at 10:14am | IP Logged

I've got no experience of this, but I agree that you prehaps shouldn't make to much of a fuss of it. My friend has a little girl a simular age to Joshua and she is going through the same. Maybe it's an age thing. Hope you sort it out soon hunni

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