Need Help Dealing with Fears

My son turned 3 this week and has been doing the same thing since something at Halloween scared him. It has been a big fight every night just to get him in bed. Then i have to stay in his room until he falls asleep or he will cry and get out of bed. Even if he does fall asleep in his bed, in the middle of the night he comes into my bed. He used to be such a good sleeper with no problems. Now its ridiculous. Im hoping someone has a solution for me too, because im really tired of the bed time chaos. Some nights im too tired to fight with him and my husband lets him sleep in our bed then moves him to his later in the night, but i know we should not be giving in. We're just too tired sometimes. Good luck, im sorry i dont have an answer either!

Consider yourself lucky that the little guy is just now trying o climb out of the crib. Lots of kids start at 1 year or more. Maybe let one of his siblings sleep on his floor like an overnight to show him that there is nothing to be fraid of (cute word). Don't let him watch any more movies with scary characters in them. He'll get over it. Time heals everything. Good luck. p.s. don't bring him to bed with you again. That's the hardest habit to break and the fastest to fall into.

my son has started doing the same thing. he is also 2 1/2. i think it is the from the recent halloween stuff. now they are old enough to thought process and remember everything. that is when it started for us. i told my son that grandpa came over and put all the boodie mans in a suit case and shipped them to antartica. i figure it is a safe bet that we won't be visiting there anytime in my lifetime. i showed him on a globe where we live and where antartica are so that he could see it was far away. so far it has worked all but one night out of the past 2 weeks. good luck.

I think a "fear" stage is normal. When my son went through this, I tried to reassure him a lot, stay nearby when he went to bed (usually fold laundry in my room, or relax until he was asleep) and try to limit exposure on scary things (a lot of older children's cartoons have very scary images for little ones). Their imaginations go wild at this age. Even last night, my son told me that the bird in his book came out and made him sick. So I ran with it and pretended to remove the bird from the book, reprimanded the bird and told my son that it would be ok now. Trying to be creative and think like a toddler helps a bunch. Good luck!

Hi there, My 21/2 year old daughter is doing the same thing and I read on another baby site that you should calmly tell them that you are there and there is nothing to be afraid of then explain that you are going to spray the room with scared spray and that will keep all the scary things.away. You use air freshener so they can smell it and it works like a charm. We bought a night light for her room and put on some white noise to drown out any sounds. They say this is a stage and it will blow over but until then we want our sleep. I hope it helps.

I have a daycare home and find that neurotic fears at this age are the norm. Right now it is my own grandson, almost 3, who is going through this and when he was younger he was not a fearful child. I don't kknow this for a fact, but I believe that their ability to fantasize is developing in their brain and so they are scaring themselves with their own little minds. Of course, this can be exaggerated by their exposure to scary shows, books, and especially other children who are saying or doing scary things or who are feaful themselves. So I look at it as truly a phase they are going through and it will be awhile before they can learn to distinguish between reality and their imagination. So, I just talk to them about the imagination and reality and eventually they get it.

D., I'd say it's perfectly normal. My son went through the EXACT same thing at about the same age. He's 4 1/2 and over them, but it drove us CRAZY. I called it "pick-a-fear". It would be something different for about a week that he was afraid of (the ceiling fan, the vents, the drain, thunder-this one lasted a lot longer). It only lasted a few months and then he was "normal" again. My mother-in-law raised 5 boys and she told me it was pretty normal. I'd say do your best to ride it through. It is pretty rough now, but it too shall pass. Just do your best to try to let him feel comfortable right now with what he's choosing to be "fraid" of. Best of luck to you!

I think too much reassurance is a bad thing. Just like when they fall down, you don't make too big a deal out of it.

If you fuss and coddle him, he may think there may actually be something to fear. Just be matter of fact. Just remove what he doesn't like, but don't reiterate his fear. Don't say "does that bear look scary in the dark?".

If all else fails, just let him sleep in a lit room.

it is normal. often children in their second year ie 1-2 get seperation anxiety and stranger anxiety a little before that and then somewhere around 2 they often get night terrors/ fear of different things. This just means that they are beginning to have an imagination. Ames and Ilg have a great series of child development books that you might check out. They have one for each year of life. they are a little outdated on some of the parenting stuff but child development hasn't changed, so those descriptions are still good.
Your best bet during these episodes is to comfort. he will grow out of it but it may take some time.