Find out why the middle school years don’t have to be the toughest time for your kids – or for you! Julie Ross explains.
In Parts I and II we've been talking about children who have trouble staying in bed. We discussed setting up a consistent bedtime routine, eliminating sugar, caffeine and television, and defined an effective disciplinary technique for the challenging child. In this article, we're going to discuss children who express fear at bedtime.
By about age fourteen months, many children develop nighttime fears. According to Frank and Theresa Caplan, in their book "The Second Twelve Months of Life", this occurs because children at this age become capable of playing imaginatively. When this happens, they have the ability to "...play out scary characters in dreams and nightmares..." They further suggest that it's not until about age four that a child will be capable of distinguishing fantasy from reality.
When a child is afraid at night, a consistent bedtime routine and the elimination of television prior to bed become crucial elements in easing his fears. The bedtime routine will give him a sense of security and the elimination of television will diminish vivid images which may prey upon his subconscious and turn into nightmares after dark. Once you've instituted these two steps, and if your child is still expressing fear, it is time to take action.
First of all, it's extremely important that you do not belittle, deny or ignore your child's fears. Likewise, it is important not to make light of her fear, even if you believe it is more of a manipulation technique than actual fear. Many parents fall into these patterns because they believe that if they acknowledge that their child is afraid, they will validate the fear and somehow make it more "real". However, acknowledgment of a child's feelings works in just the opposite way. Once a child feels that her parents are sympathetic, she feels safer, because, after all, if her parents truly understand her and they're not afraid, then maybe there isn't anything to be afraid of after all.