A friend and I were talking about night terrors the other day and I decided to do a little digging. I learned that Night Terrors, Bed wetting, and Sleepwalking are all related. They all normally occur within the first 90 minutes of sleep. Your body will go through 4 stages of sleep and then go into REM sleep (where you dream and have nightmares). It is in stage 4 before REM sleep that a child will have a night terror, wet their bed, or sleepwalk. This is a very deep level of sleep.
A night terror can last between 5 and 20 minutes long. The child will normally not remember the night terror at all. Some experts say not to yell or shake the child awake, but you can try to comfort the child and wake them up with a soothing voice. Other experts say to move items out of the child's way so they will be safe and unharmed, but don't try to wake them at all. Just let them wake up on their own. I recently realized that Lexi is having an occasional night terror. She will wake up with a horrified look in her eye. When I try to talk to her she doesn't focus on me at all. She'll walk around the house and be softly crying. I didn't realize these were night terrors. I always talk to her in a soothing voice and usually steer her towards the bathroom. I always thought that she just needed to go to the bathroom. She always woke up while sitting on the toilet. They've never lasted for more than just a few minutes. I'll ask her about it in the morning and she laughs and never remembers it. She has done some pretty hilarious things during these night terrors. I know that my nephew Benjamin had night terrors and I think that my brother Ryan used to have them too, but never realized it. Night terrors are most common in children 2-6 years of age, but can still occur in adults. In fact, I'm pretty sure Doug use to have night terrors about 12 years ago. They say that stress can be a trigger. One time he tried to move the TV. Another time he flushed the toilet, pushed play on the answering machine, and came back to bed. Anyway...I have several of these stories...but I'll save them for another time. I'm pretty sure that he was having night terrors though .
Bed wetting also occurs during stage 4 sleep...deep sleep. Experts comment, "Have you ever noticed how your child is hard to wake up in the middle of the night or can sleep through anything?" This is a perfect example of Jordan. Jordan is 9 and is recently overcoming bed wetting. He is a very deep sleeper. We would have New Years Eve parties at our house with drums, party blowers, and pots banging at midnight...Jordan would sleep right through it. Bed wetting is very common. I've heard of SEVERAL different ways that people have tried to get their child to overcome bed wetting. Since Jordan is overcoming this problem on his own, I don't think I'll take any more action. Otherwise, I might have tried to wake him up during stage 4 sleep (within first 90 minutes) and made him go.
I've learned that this deep sleep where night terrors, bed wetting, and sleepwalking occur is often hereditary. You'll find that a relative also had/has this same problem.
I wanted to post this article to be informative, but also to see if you've ever had to deal with similar issues. I think these things are more common than we realize. So, please feel free to share.
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3 comments:
Our nephew Taylor has really bad night terrors, more so during soccer season, when he is very active during the day. He is now 17 and they are starting to get less frequent. His night terrors were scary, one time he came out of his room screaming that he had sticks coming out of his fingers and they really hurt. Sometimes he just comes and sits in the living room and talks to us, but he's sound asleep!
Liam has really bad nightmares, and I did too, my whole life. Poor Bill, when I married him for the first 5 years he had to put up with me sitting straight up in bed, screaming, shaking, sweating, crying, whatever, about 3-4 times a week, but since we moved here I don't get them as often.
We still have bed wetters, but ours are a little younger. Marion had 9 siblings, and out of all the kids only two weren't bed wetters, so that's common too I guess.
By the way, we were on the trampoline for the flying pictures, but the boys couldn't jump high enough so Bill crouched down and they climbed on top and jumped off. It took quite a while and a million shots to get some cool pics.
My youngest brother used to have night terrors. He would wake up crying hysterically and my parents couldn't calm him down, but they would make him go to the bathroom and then he'd quiet down and go back to bed. It wasn't until he'd been doing this for months when they saw a story on a show like 20/20 about it because, at the time, they were just starting to get diagnosed. And my parents felt better knowing that they weren't the only parents dealing with this.
My younger brother would have night terrors quite often. They would happen at night, or even during the day if he took a nap. He never remembered anything and often would not believe us when we told him what happened. Luckily, they don't remember so even though it is difficult at the moment, it doesn't leave a lasting memory to frighten them. Hopefully, Lexi will just grow out of it like my brother did.
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