Toddler nightmares

[kymmy]

My 3 year old son often wakes during the night crying.
Sometimes he goes back to sleep quickly. Other times he needs comfort.
I asked someone on another thread about nightmares and she agreed
it is probably him having nightmares.
We try to avoid stress cos he has severe eczema and we don't want it to be worsened.
I now know he does have nightmares. Because he told me!
He loves trains and I am not suprised he dreams about them.
He said to me-"I had a scary dream"
I said- " a nightmare?"
"No, it was a dream..about a train...it was coming off the tracks and it crashed."
This is the first time he has told me about a dream he has had.

Does anyone else have a child who wakes frequently or even occassionally due to nightmares?
How do you deal with it?

[sarah81]

My DS had quite a few nightmares and night terrors the ones where they are crying out but you can't quite wake them, at about 2.5yrs. This was related to his dad starting a working away roster and having a new sibling I think, stress related. They have stopped completely now but is dad no longer works away.

With the nightmare we used to get up and cuddle him. With the night terrors we tried everything to wake him, turn on the lights etc but that seemed to make it worse so I used to just gently rub his back and say shhh lowly and continuously and that worked much better. It was quite a tiring time though getting up to both boys and DP working away :sleeping:

Hope that helps.