My oldest son had night terrors around 4-5 years old. It would be around an hour or so after he fell asleep. We could not wake him up, and I had read not to wake him up - to let him work it out in his sleep. He would scream and sit up sometimes in bed. He would never remember it the next day. Eventually he just grew out of it. I think only one time he did the sleep walking thankfully.
I remember our neighbors thought something was terribly wrong and that we needed to dig deeper into what was going on. When I read up on night terrors, I found it wasn't a behavioral issue. He's grown up to be a well-adjusted young adult in college making the dean's list.
willandgrace40096.6975231481He does not take melatonin as i am not sure how it would react with his medication. He is on tenex for his adhd. He wakes up around 4 hours after i have put him to bed almost twice a week now if not more. Sometimes i can ask him in the morning if he had a good night sleep and he will tell me no i had a bad dream but he can never tell me what it is about. and then there are sometimes he dont know he was up at all. I dont let him watch any movies that might scare him and i try to keep him on a daily schedule to minimize stress. Nothing seems to be working to help him with these episodes..
I don't know how accurate this is but I've always heard that if the child has one of these episodes within and hour or so of going to sleep then it's a "night terror" because it's occurring in deep sleep. The child is inconsolable and doesn't remember anything.
If the episode happens closer to waking up then it's a "nightmare" because it happens during REM sleep. Usually you can wake he child up and it's possible that they can remember what the nightmare was about.
I don't know if the causes or treatments are the same but I know that the two are different. I wonder if a sleep study would help?
My dd used to have lots of night terrors - we noticed a difference when we cut out red dye. We cut out almost all dyes for almost a year and have slowly let them sneak back into snacks. She does not seem to have night terrors anymore. She also was a bed wetter and has only recently gone over 2 weeks without wetting at night.well things were getting better form my little one, the meds were working great and things seemed to be going really good for him. Now he is having really bad night terrors. He sleep walks now, he wakes up screaming, when i go to comfert him it seems like i am not doing any good. last night he walked into the kitchen crying and when i went to help him i put my arms out to him and told him to come to mommy, he did but when i got him half way to his room he looked at me and told me DONT TOUCH ME. He kept saying this to me until i got him to his bed and i layed down with im like i normally do after a night terror. He then rolled over and said mommy i love you. i feel so helpless and confused about all of this. I plan on talking to his behavioral health docto about this, but i dont see him for a few weeks. Does anyone else have a child that also has night terrors???? Any advice would help.
Does he take melatonin to sleep?My daughter had night terrors from about age 4 to 6. She was not taking