Hello all,
My 19 month old has had 3 separate events that sort of resemble night terrors, and I'm looking for some insight.
The wife and I decided sleep training was the way around a year old, and generally he sleeps through the night fully now - but three times in the last few weeks, this event set will happen:
He will wake up standing in his crib screaming as if he's being hurt, when we go to check on him he's inconsolable so after checking him for bodily harm, I bring him to bed with us with a bottle screaming the whole way. After a few minutes of thrashing about, he sits up and looks around, seemingly confused about his surroundings and he's fine; he gets his bottle and back off to sleep within a minute or two.
The confusing part for me is he is very aware my wife and I are in the room during these fits, when during a night terror they're supposedly in almost a trance-like state. The "waking up" motions he does is also baffling to me.
Thoughts?
My uneducated guess is that even though he's looking at you and your wife he's not conscious and still 'asleep' until the part where you notice him actually waking up.
The real answer is, if you're concerned about his health or safety because of this issue, you should ask your pediatrician. If it was me I'd probably just let it ride and see if it's a phase he's growing through. I had night terrors at different points of my life, even in adulthood, and it was infrequent enough I didn't worry about it much as distressing as it could be in the moment. It would always go away for a long while after a couple nights.
The only reason I'm asking here now is I'm kind of stopping myself from going down a rabbit hole at 1:45 AM.
The possibility that it may be a night terror didn't strike me until just before posting, otherwise we'd definitely be asking his ped.
That said, he's doing more than just looking at us - he's reaching for both of us. I know he's fine, I'm less worried than I am confused. Kids healthy as can be.