Nightmares

Yeah this is a really sucky part of parenting cos we know what they are dreaming about is pure imagination, but for them it is very real, and seriously tough to deal with in the middle of the night when all you want to do is go back to sleep.

Brandon dreamt about vampires and Liam has giants.
With Brandon I got some coloured sand and told him it was fairy dust and there to protect him from all things scary, I also got him a pretty swizzle stick to use as a wand and if he woke up in the night he could wave it around to chase away the scaries.

With Liam I found a spray called "Monster Vanishing Spray" which has all sorts of essential oils like camamile, lavender etc, so smells really nice and giants don't like things that smell nice, so now they won't go in his room.

Then for both of them I recently read a book called "The Kiss Soldier" where the grandfather would kiss his finger and press it agaiinst the child's head board and a little soldier appeared whenever the LO woke up at night, so using that one as well.

And for really bad nights, I have glow sticks for them, which also seem to help, even tho they both have night lights on.

But also during the day I get them to tell me about the dreams and then we make up a game with it, or make new endings etc which makes the vampires and giants more friendly.

Hi there, she will get over it. What you can do is to explain to her when she is awake in the morning that what she dreamed is nothing to be affraid of because it is not real when one dreams it. Try and get her to concentrate on something different during the day, something that she really would like or enjoy. This will help her to get more relaxed and forget about the imaginations she is having that may cause her to have these strange dreams.

Unfortunately she is at a age when imagination is starting to play a big role and every child handles this big step in different ways, it could be why she is having the nightmares, because her imagination is running a bit wild.

So in the end, nothing to be concerned about. All normal.

Shame Nicolette, I don't have any advice for you , but interested to see what the other ladies have to say as Paige has had one or two nightmares ( well I assume that's what it is, as she wakes up distraught and screaming), but she is too little to tell me what its about.

Morning everybody! My little girl who is nearly three is having nightmares every night. Then she wakes up crying and when I ask her what's wrong she says funny things like: "the Easter eggs fell in the river" or " the cat took the Easter eggs". Evidently she's a bit pre-occupied with Easter eggs!!! This started recently but is becoming really disruptive - not only for our sleep (my hubby and I) but she is also very tired in the mornings and struggles to get up for playgroup and swimming. This was never the case in the past.
Do any of you have any suggestions? Will she just outgrow it naturally? Did you experience the same with your children? Any advice or just sharing will be appreciated.