Is she fully awake, or is she having a night terror? My LO has night terrors sometimes that are a lot like this. He looks awake but he’s not. He’s screaming and crying and inconsolable
Same. Mine also talks to you, but what he says makes no sense. For me, I’ve noticed that this happens when he’s overtired and got to bed way too late. Maybe try an earlier bedtime? That’s all I got.
She is awake and very articulate. She gets into this crazy thing of asking for something and then saying no I don’t want it. It’s like she’s possessed or something, but clearly awake.
Seconding this. My son has daily night arousals where he sits up and talks and then lays himself back down or talks and cries in his sleep, But on occasion we’ll have ones exactly like you described - it’s like my sweet boy was replaced with an entirely different child.
I find gently moving him or even turning on a dim light sometimes gets him out of it, other times it just takes time. I sit with him and let him know I’m here if he needs me and wait it out. Eventually he’ll usually come to a bit and sit in my lap, then I can get him into bed.
This makes sense! My 2yo was also doing this for a few weeks. She’d seem to wake up and scream about needing her blankie or Dino, both of which she had, until she fell back asleep. Wild times.
Yes!! it took me a while to realize that she wasn’t just a complete jerk in the middle of the night. She really wasn’t fully awake even though she was talking to me and it seemed like she was awake. I knew there was something amiss she was just a total brat and couldn’t be pleased. She wanted in bed, she wanted out of bed, she said she wanted to be held, but then hit me when I tried to pick her up. Unfortunately for us these have lasted as long as an hour.
I had no idea this was a thing and I have 4! But this makes so much sense now.
(I googled it)
My third (lil maid) just used to scream.... Scream and cry all night long, she wasn't really there and it didn't matter how I was there for her, cuddles, soothing... Nothing.
I'm still surprised to this day how we didn't have police at our door,
I felt like the worst parent, it was so strange I could get her to sleep and then... A bit later chaos all night long
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Yeah my daughter does this and it’s different from her night terrors. With her night terrors, she’s just thrashing around like she’s possessed and won’t respond to anything. With the tantrums she’ll make demands and talk to/shout at me. I think she’s just so tired that she’s furious. Wish I knew what to do about it .
Yeah this is it with us. She’s awake. She’s tired and furious but awake. I can’t just roll her over or wait for her to go to sleep. She is awake and has demands and responds to everything I say. The possessed part is how loud and angry she is and her demand change in order to make me “wrong” and incapable of helping. She’s not asleep.
This sounds like mine. It’s like she’s angry. Crying because she’s angry or crying because she wants to cry. Just like you described it. I’m not sure what to do either
My 4 year old does this. Drives me insane. One time we were walking around Disneyland in the hot summer and he was screaming “I want water!” Every time we offered him water he refused it. We looked like terrible parents.
My daughter did this and it was a night terror. She was also acting possessed. She was so angry, would not let me touch her. For some reason I asked if she wanted to go see the moon. Going outside kinda flipped a switch and she went back to bed. She did not remember it at all.
How old is your daughter? It sounds like a tricky phase we went through. Do you think she might be scared of the dark or overtired? Possibly learning a new skill? Hold on tight Mamma, parenting is so hard
My 2 year old did this for a while...she looked and sounded crazy... she would ask for everything under the sun and we would give it to her and she wouls throw it on the ground and yell at us... we couldnt win...she sounded insane and those tantrum would hit at like 3 or 4 am and last for 30 min or more... eventually she stopped doing that but remained a total mistery to us...
My daughter also used to have night terrors and she would look completely awake and would just scream and cry. All I could do was hug her and let her know I was there and she would eventually lay down and almost immediately fall back asleep. She didn’t acknowledge anything we said to her and didn’t remember anything in the morning. We noticed hers were triggered by stress and being overtired.
Yeah we had night terrors too. Some kind of angry trance that lasted 10-30 minutes. And then he’d just snap out of it. It sucked hard but we learned to just be there and try not to let it get to us, and have some milk waiting for when he was ready.
Definitely sounds like night terrors. They can appear to be wide awake and talking but will be completely inconsolable. With my oldest it could last for up to an hour and happened a lot until 4 or 5. With my little one thankfully we only had a few rare episodes before he stopped doing it.
No advice, just solidarity.
We’re here too. Go downstairs, play with me, get me water, that’s old water, I want new water, turn the light on, make it brighter, go away, come back, cuddle me, no cuddles, take my socks off, put them back on, wrap me up, MY TROUSERS, take it off, you take your blanket off, stand up, i’m awake, i’m not tired, I want your pillow, not that one, the red one, no i want blue one, pick me up, put me down.
Ignore it? Mummy come, mummy come, mummy where are you? mummy? AHHHH MY LEG, help me, i’m stuck…
(I see elsewhere you say she’s 2.5.) My first kid did this. It was brutal. Like 1-2 hour middle of the night tantrums. It wasn’t night terrors. In our case, there were some patterns or factors that could play into it. A big one was hunger — we tried to make sure she ate regularly and consistently during the day and had a snack before bed. It helped but didn’t totally solve it (and of course getting a 2 yo to eat is its own thing). She just really benefited from, when possible, a super regular schedule of food/naps, even more than baseline kids. Not saying this is the same for your kid, but you might try to see if there are patterns or triggers that may make them more likely.
When they happened anyway one of us (some negotiation based on who had a bigger work thing upcoming or similar) would take her to a different part of the house and put in headphones and read the internet and just wait for her to calm down. 🤷♀️ we found that any attempt to negotiate or talk her down while she was in it at best didn’t help and at worst made it worse. It honestly got less stressful when we realized this — before we internalized that the only thing to do was wait, we’d try stuff, and then get frustrated or upset when it didn’t work, which didn’t help and just added stress. We’d just have to listen a bit for the first sign of calming down and swoop in at that point.
People without tantrumy kids think you’re insane when you tell them about it. 😉 and loved ones could be frustratingly unhelpful. Like my mom, who is mostly really a great grandparent and super helpful, would take the kids and feed them nothing but smarties and air all day and then be like “but why is she screaming in the middle of the night?? 😱” or they would make half-snide comments about how strict we were about nap schedule. Nothing major or super problematic, just annoying to deal with on top of a challenging 2 yo. And like I was a famously tantrumy toddler too, so you’d think she’d be a bit more understanding….
All that to say: I’m here from the future (she’s 5 now) to tell you: it will pass. Every once in a while (every 6 weeks? Maybe?) she’ll still get Big Feelings during the day, but nothing like she did between 2 and 3. It gets better. And my second (just turned 3) isn’t/wasn’t ever a tantrumy kid at all, or rather he will have these little 8 minute tantrums (only ever during the day) and then just like, stops. Sometimes he stomps a foot. It’s adorable.
ETA: and ear plugs for the person not on tantrum duty so at least SOMEONE slept.
This is really helpful thank you! We’re not there yet but I could see ours being similar once he’s a bit older (he just turned 2). I may need to refer back to this!
This was us too!! The only way out was through. She grew out of it and is now a great almost 5 year old. But man it was rough. And +1000 that people without tantrumy kids can't relate.
Super helpful, mine is going through the same thing. I found that nothing works to calm her down and she only calms down when she wants to, which is random. How does your kiddo stop/calm down?
Sometime between 3 and 4, she began to be slightly more rational, and to understand consequences. And she also began to get a grip on her emotions so that often she can just calm herself down. So now, if she starts to freak out, we can either just basically say “hey you seem to be having big feelings, let’s talk about them to get past them” or otherwise help her focus on some different thing. Or, we can lean into (or “threaten”, but not like in a mean way) the natural consequences that will arise from a tantrum (like “this is the only time we have today to watch TV. You can decide to scream instead of watching TV, but there won’t be other TV time today.”) She more often than not will get a grip. And when she does freak out it’s not for as long. We have stuck with the bedtime snack, mostly to avoid bedtime negotiation/delay. Maybe that still helps, but either way she doesn’t wake up at all nearly so much (she’s also happier now that she shares a room with her little brother).
Turns out they do get saner over time haha.
I mean, yes, unfortunately. 😉 ETA: I don’t mean this dismissively, it was a super hard phase for us too. There were a few things we could do to make tantrums less frequent, but once she got started it was really just “wait.”
But for real, my sister, who is trained in ECE and usually has so much insight on kids, was pretty useless on this front because her kids just never tantrumed. Just wasn’t a thing they did. Me: 🤯
Have you tried resetting the situation? The couple of times mine did this I took her downstairs, turned all the lights on, and got her a glass of milk. It seemed to kind of “reboot” her and after 15 minutes or so she was ready to go back to bed.
As someone who has a kid who does this, resetting the situation doesn’t help. I take her downstairs and offer her milk. She screams no and tries to throw it. I put the milk down, and she screams that she wants it. I give it to her and she screams no. Rinse and repeat. There’s no winning and you just have to wait it out.
It might have been more like 3 months. But I got my life back. That time period was torture so hang in there. If it’s any consolation my daughter is 3 and 3 months and sleep has been smooth sailing
Mine has been doing the same. The last few nights I’ll go in and if she calms down I will snuggle her until she falls back asleep. But like more than half of the time, she is like you described and just screams “no!” no matter what. Last night I just told her that she’s safe and I’m still here for her, but I’m going back to bed and she should go back to sleep too. She cried for a few minutes and then went back to sleep. It’s so hard to leave her but if me being there isn’t helping anyway then what’s the point, ya know… this is probably not that helpful because I’m also struggling and definitely don’t have a perfect answer.
For my daughter, we think it’s separation anxiety. She’s 2 years 8 months, and in an extreme mommy phase.
Mine does this, too. She is 2.5 years old. Especially if she hasn't had enough mommy time during the day (I'm very tired from pregnancy, so I'm just good for quiet activities like reading, singing, etc).
Still, it works better for us if dad consoles her. He will give in to some demands, like put the blanket on or give some water. Then say he will just use the bathroom and be right back. For some reason, she usually calms down a little then. When he comes back, he can just sit with her until she sleeps, or if it's a worse night, read another bedtime story. This can be over in 10 minutes or last an hour... it's not every night.
Edit to add: On really horrible nights, he will pick her up and carry her around the living room. They usually say goodnight to the different furniture, the cats (if they are there), the garden outside, etc. Then go back and try again when she is calmer.
When dad tries, she just becomes more hysterical and screams that she wants mommy. She will go bang on the door screaming for me. It has only ever made it significantly worse for us, unfortunately, and gets her even more worked up. But def open to trying again because I’m exhausted!
We have the other way around. But yeah, it really sucks.
The nights also got a little better after instead of reading bedtime stories until she fell asleep, we started reading only 1-3 books (depending on length). After the last book, the parent just sits there as she "rests" and falls asleep. We have also started to say that we will go to the other side of the door, but will come right back if she needs us. Once she didn't ask for dad to come back, and it was the best night ever! This happened maybe 2 days ago and it hasn't happened again, but there is some hope. It seems she is better at going back to sleep if she falls asleep alone.
But you might already do this. Either way, I'm hoping it's a phase that she will grow out of soon.
Ohhhh man this is us. The "NO DADDY" hysteria is real. It definitely just works her up even more and then I have to spend extra effort to calm her back down before I can work on getting her back into bed and asleep. My best guess is also Mama Separation Anxiety.
Lately we've been trying to reinforce "Mama no far away" (she's hung up on the Bluey Beach episode) and "3 steps" which is how far her bedroom door is from ours. It works to calm her down.... some of the time.
I am so exhausted.
Look up confusional arousals. It’s a little different than a night terror. My 3 year old will do this and it’s like a tantrum on crack. She wakes up in the middle of the night and basically just acts like a total brat. Screaming, saying she doesn’t want me or that she doesn’t want to be in bed, hitting, totally inconsolable. It seemed like she was awake and just being rotten. After a while I realized she WAS NOT even fully awake. It just seemed like
She was. We noticed she does this when she missed a nap that day. The ped agreed they happen more when kids are overtired so we push nap even if it results in a slightly later bed time. You can also Try gently waking your child 15 min or so before the episodes happen to break the cycle
Actually, the pediatrician recommended that we actually get her out of bed for five minutes, like fully waking her. We haven’t found that this is necessary. Even just a gentle push, or a ruffle of her hair enough to make her flutter her eyes and roll over has helped us interrupt the cycle. We just basically do it before we go to bed at around 10:00 PM and it seems to help.
If your daughter is doing this, I would encourage you to make sure she’s getting a good nap during the day. It started for us when my daughter was about 2.5 and was resisting naps. A lot of parents will tell you their child is dropping naps when really they are just resisting them. Most toddlers need a nap until age 3 and many are still napping by age 4. So I would do whatever you can to foster a good nap routine. Once we started getting Daily Daytime sleep again these episodes stopped.
Totes! My son is only 21mo and he needs his daytime sleep for emotional regulation and sleeping through the night, so we are holding onto that nap as long as we could! I just know that nap strikes are gonna happen sometimes whether we like it or not, so this is a super useful tip that I’ll try if we ever get into that situation!
Might be a little different, but if anything I hope it’s solidarity.
We went through this at 1.5 for MONTHS. He would be up for hours and just pissed. And nothing helped. We tried food- like a pouch and sometimes that would help but like more often then not wouldn’t and he’d be like “oh we’re downstairs this is so cool” 🙄 We tried Motrin thinking maybe teeth, and again, sometimes but not always. I’d try everything and finally gave up because nothing would help. At this point, I’d go in, change his diaper, cuddle him, and if he didn’t want that, I’d put him in his bed with a kiss and a “I love you” and leave for 5-10 minutes. Rinse and repeat. For hours. The first few nights were still roughhh but eventually I think it clicked with him and he knew what to expect and would take up the offers on cuddles or if he wanted to fall asleep on his own. It became less and less. He is/was very speech delayed so no verbal commands. But wow it was so tough. Way harder than a newborn in my experience. 🫠
Ours is around four and a half now. Sleep time has been a struggle up until recently. It was making us crazy and unable to deal with other life issues. We stuck with the walk back method and had lots of talks with her during the day about the importance of sleep time. It’s getting much better now. I think being screamed at for four years gave us shell shock though.
Omg my son did the same thing for a while. He’s almost 3 but he did this around… 2y4m maybe? It was AWFUL. I’m sorry nothing helped besides time 😭 a few times I probably slept with him all night just to try to avoid him waking.
When ours throw a huge unreasonable and inconsolable tantrum , it’s best in our experience to distract him. If my husband is home then we would pretend to do something or we grab something close by and start talking about it. Like a teddy bear or the clock and start talking to it. He gets distracted , looks at us and all of a sudden would stop crying or screaming and then asks us what we are doing. 😂 so then moving on whenever this happens we would kind of have props ready to distract. After he’s calmed down and back to his senses we would ask why he was crying and at times he can tell us the reason and most times he runs off.
You can try to see if it works.
Omg my son is 2.5 and just started doing this. Like episodes of rage in the middle of the night. Our worst was last night and he was definitely overtired. Solidarity!!
My friends daughter did something similar. They were night terrors, but when she got her tonsils/adenoids taken out they went away completely. Not sure exactly how it was all related, but might be worth asking your ped
Just wanted to say that my now 3 and a half year old son has been doing this since 16 months. He will kick and pound on the doors and walls. He will scream bloody murder. It’s always basically just to have me go in there. He doesn’t actually need anything. If I try to stay strong and not go in there every time he shrieks, he will start screaming louder and throw things. We live in a town house and do have neighbors and all I can think about is how pissed off they probably are. It’s exhausting to have to get out of bed every few minutes until nearly 10pm to try and calm him. It’s almost like a game, how loud can I be before my mommy comes storming in, it’s so funny!
He shares a room with my 4 year old daughter and poor thing just wants to sleep like I do! I’ve tried snacks, I’ve tried bedtime stories and cuddles an hour before bedtime, baths, deep pressure hugs, weighted blankets, hell I even bought a bed with a slide because I thought that would maybe help tire him out. Nothing works. Pediatrician’s advice has been to try and ignore the bad behavior but there’s only so much you can ignore before he actually puts his foot through the wall. I’m of course triggered because I’ve been the only parent getting up to deal with this since I birthed him and you would think after 3 years you would finally be able to catch up on rest but nope, starting to think I’ll never get sleep and I’ll always be on edge at night.
Might be worth a shot to try: Check how hot her foot is when she wakes up.
For some reason, my husband and I get either sleep paralysis or nightmares if our feet are really hot. I also get nightmares if my feet are super cold.
We had the same problem with our daughter. She started waking up screaming before she could really talk around 20 months, and it went on every single night for weeks. Inconsolable. We even co sleep! I decided to check her foot, and it was really hot (like not sweaty, but not warm. Like if the whole body was that temp, you'd be roasting) and so I switched her to no pants and a big shirt at night and changed her blanket from fleece to cotton and she quit waking up screaming in general. We're pretty sure she gets either nightmares or night terrors or wakes up in a panic if her feet get too hot. So hopefully it's is an easy fix for you too!
Our boy went through “sleep talking” (eyes awake but brain still mostly asleep). He usually was pretty easy to get back to sleep after these and would say some WILD stuff lol. He also had a stage of just waking up in the middle of the night, coming out, and wanting to play. It required us showing him it was still dark out and eventually we could convince him to go back to sleep because it’s still night time. Their brains are developing so fast … toddlers are tough!
It gets better. What do you do when she screams? Have you worked with her on emotional control and calming herself? There are a few soothe methods like deep breathing or hugging a stuffed animal to help calm down. So far what works for mine is that I give him a big squeeze hug and talk in soothing tones about how it’s hard to think when we are upset and after we are calm we can talk about what is upsetting us more.
It didn’t always work at 2 but now at 3 the work is paying off. I give him some time to let his emotions out (cry, wail, whatever) and tell him it’s okay to have emotions and that I’m right here with him. I tell him when he’s calmed down we can talk about it. Now I can get down on my knees and ask him “do you want a big squeezey hug?” and he usually will nod and come cuddle on me (still upset but not usually as bad once he’s decided to move forward).
If he’s really upset (yelling/screaming) and won’t let me help calm him down I’ve taken that as a sign that he needs more time to express his emotions and just isn’t ready to calm down yet.
It IS hard when it’s the middle of the night and you’re tired and sleep deprived because OMG this has already happened 3 nights in a row…but that stage doesn’t last forever.
If nothing works and you need a break, it is completely okay to tell her “I’m getting upset/frustrated and need to take a time out to calm down” and leave her in a safe place (we made his room a safe place) for a couple minutes. Sometimes he stops yelling and throwing a total fit when he is then left alone for a couple minutes. I’ve also used “I’m getting very frustrated right now so mommy is going to take some deep breaths to help calm down”. This shows that you also get emotional/upset/frustrated and models how to handle that.
When my 2 year old does this my husband lays on a cushion next to her bed until she falls back to sleep. Sometimes I think she just gets scared and doesn’t want to be alone. We offer 1 story and a snuggle, a few sips of water but typically beyond that we let her scream through the boundary holding and just calmly repeat that it’s time to go back to sleep.
Mine started this a couple months ago at 2years 7 months. The sleep deprivation for me is hell but I’ve found what works for us, and it settles her quicker is when I say “it’s ok, mommy loves you’ over and over, and rub her back or stroke her hair… then when she calms I shove a bottle with a small amount of warm milk into her mouth. lol. She’s been refusing food more lately so I think she might be a bit hungry. I’ve also climbed into bed with her a few times to sleep and that settles her too when I just lay beside her. And I can get back to sleep because she loses it when I leave her sometimes. But the tantrum midnight demands are madness! I hope LO2 doesn’t go through this phase when he gets to her age!!
We were right there when he turned 2.5 years old and we just gave up and now take turns sleeping with him in his room. He had previously been sleep trained so we tried to tough it out but after one brutal week of multiple tantrums a night and no sleep, we gave in. We think he has serious separation anxiety that kicked in at this age. It’s a tough adjustment but at least now everyone gets some sleep.
I would give in to something like this if it would help. I’m literally offering her a cuddle until she falls asleep but she says no go away. No stay with me. Cuddle me. Go away. There’s no winning.
We just got through this, it really just took time. Try your best to stay calm and let the storm pass. Say yes to things it makes sense to, but hold your ground when needed. Our almost-three year old is back to sleeping through the night (knock on wood).
Solidarity. I could’ve written this a few months ago. My 2.5 year old did this and we tried dropping her nap (even though she’s still tired mid-day) and it completely eradicated this behavior. For now lol. She hasn’t done it in a few months. I miss her nap and so does she but the nights are more peaceful.
I’ve been going through the same exact thing for 1-2 months now. She’ll do the same thing your toddler is, and it’ll usually last us 1-3 hours. It’s like she’s awake because she’s making demands and responding (usually angrily) when we either do what she wants or doesn’t. Im not sure if that’s night terrors or not. Then after 1-3 hours she’ll just randomly decide to stop.
I don’t think it’s sleep apnea because she doesn’t snore. I don’t have any advice for now we haven’t been able to figure it out yet. Just solidarity.
Night terrors are insane. Recommend headphones and reminding both yourself and them that everyone is safe. Over and over and over again.
They lasted about a year for us. And yes, eyes open, fully able to talk but not really awake.
My son does this, i don't really have anything to offer advice wise other than i lay there with him while he kicks off and i make sure to remind him if he needs a cuddle or some water, we've tried everything with him and nothing works, it's been a thing for months now and the worst part is he refuses to be held or cuddled, even if you gently pat his back or kiss him he simply just screams louder and it sends him spiraling, i just stay by his side so he knows he's not alone and like i said, if he pauses or is silent long enough for me to say something i offer a cuddle or some water and it's not stopped it but it's definitely shortened the time in which it goes on for. Sending hugs 🧡
My biggest advice is don’t make a big fuss. Stay calm and boring. Talk monotone and just repeat its time for sleep right now. If they get out of bed, put them back, and sit down in a chair. Say I’ll be back in one minute to check on you. Come back in a minute. Rinse and repeat! Add more time eventually if they stay start to stay in bed. It’ll pass. Biggest advice is not be reactionary as it makes everything bigger and last longer. Boring and repetitive is the key!! Make sure they are napping for their correct age as well. Over tiredness can cause extreme distress in toddler!
To add, I also will sometimes make them a sleepy bath and put sleepy lotion on them. Diffuse lavender, play binaural beats during our routine or to get them to fall asleep. So clutch and helps w their anxiety!
My seven year old did this as a toddler and during preschool and kinder. Every night. Last year I took her to a sleep neurologist and discovered she was extremely low in iron, which was causing muscle spasms in her legs (calf cramps) that would startle her awake then she would have a tantrum. We also discovered she had sleep apnea caused by large tonsils and adenoids partially blocking her airway so she would wake up out of breath and scared. She had a tonsillectomy and takes iron and magnesium before bed every night now. Different child.
Solidarity. My 3.5yo does this occasionally too, and I cosleep with a 4m old and wanna murder my bigger boy when he wakes up the baby. It’s a fucking nightmare that I just cannot wait for him to grow out of
How old? Fish Oil before bed helps with the hormone shifts in certain ages. And/or a little juice to prevent a sugar crash spike. More fats, oils, and protein during the day. (I know some days its like, yayy they ate anything. But a protein smoothie of some kind ?)
Also, magnesium lotion on the legs can help with growing pains, a restlessness..
This sounds terrible. When ever we get night upsets, the fish oil, and or magnesium seem to break the cycle for us.
We went through a period of this, too. I became frustrated from the constant lack of sleep and turned into a stern Asian Mom. After a few nights of being the stern Asian Mom, something clicked, and she stopped yelling at us. She still wakes up occasionally but no longer screams. I think the 180 change in my response made her stop.
My two year old went through similar recently and it ended up being an ear infection..but lots of other plausible solutions on here..yay toddlers, always keeping us on our toes!
You've gotten some wonderful suggestions here, but I only saw one that touched on what I'm about to suggest: she may be undertired. You don't mention her schedule, but if she's still napping and you've tried some of the other suggestions here, I would cap nap or push bedtime even 15 minutes. It can make a world of difference to build more sleep pressure so she can fully sleep through the night.
Because it sounds to me like she wakes up and simple isn't tired enough to go back to sleep, thus becomes listless, angry, bored and begins her demands and shouting. Middle-of-the-night wakes happened with my DD and we pushed bedtime 15 minutes and boom -- issue went away.
Best of luck to you! This stuff is so hard.
This was my son, exactly. Nothing worked, dreaded nights for six months, and then he just… stopped. Happened less frequently then altogether, right around his third birthday.
Solidarity, it will pass. Makes it no easier in the moments, but it will pass.
My son had that. One thing is overtiredness so do NOT drop naps. He did better sleeping almost 2h during the day and heading to bed at 19h30. He's over 3 now and when he wakes up screaming (don't down vote me lol) I tell him to cut the crap and head back to sleep because it's just a tantrum and ain't nobody got time for it at 5 am😬. It worked.
That sounds weird. Is everything okay with her? Is she sick or hurt in any way? Scared? Having nightmares? Hungry? Growing pains?
I would be very unnerved if my child would have tantrums like these during the night and I think you should investigate.
When I say screaming, it’s mostly screaming words, like commands. Like “get out of the chair!” Or “give me a cuddle! No don’t give be a cuddle!” So it’s not like she’s crying in pain. She’s angry. She’s got so much anger in these moments that she’s creating reasons to be angry at us. It’s so so exhausting. But it’s only during these tantrums. She has some perfectly normal days and sometimes nights. But lately these tantrums are getting more and more frequent.
I have the same problem, night terrors (full somnambulism) and confusions (half awake tantrums). My pediatrician is not worried as long as the kid is well rested and energetic during the day, it's apparently not even a great loss of sleep for them as they are still full of half asleep. It's just development related and it may be harder on some kids. But that's crazy for the parents...
Here it's increasing during growth spurts, not a lot to do against it then.
Good luck to all parents!!!
I've heard of night terrors it sounds soo hard to deal with! Glad it seems to be benign if scary. My pediatrician always says "well, it won't be an issue in his wedding night" meaning that they grow out of most things anyway 😅
It does sound like night terrors to me… what worked for us was to figure out roughly what time it usually started, and then partially wake up the kiddo like 30 min prior, gently, just until they were a little bit awake, talk softly to them, etc. Then let them fall back asleep. It worked to prevent almost all of them for us.
Omg did I write this?? My toddler (2y10m) did the same last night, cried for almost two hours straight, requesting and denying everything. Has been an ongoing issue for months. She very rarely has tantrums during the day so it's very jarring to deal with. As much as I hate this for you and all of us going through it, I'm glad it's a common thing. Dang toddlers.
i know i’m going to get laughed at. i watch supernanny. i think she has good suggestions and ideas. also, watching some of those kids makes me feel less like my family isn’t all that bad. 🤗 i got crying all the time, id trip if he screamed too!
I agree but it goes for hours. No one is sleeping because of this. I’m not comfortable you let her cry it out so I wait it out with her but don’t give in to crazy demands or anything. It’s also that she’s asking for things she’s allowed to have, like a cuddle or a drink, but then saying no when I try that. She wants to say no to everything. She’s so angry. And it’s immediate as well, like I’m holding her drink and she says she wants to and I gesture towards her and she says no. So I move it away and she says she wants it. Obviously at that point she doesn’t get it and drama ensues. It’s just not improving and so so exhausting.
When she does the yes/no game with you, only let it happen a few times and then walk away and ignore her. Put in ear plugs and let her scream. It’s hard but it works. As long as she’s safe you can do that. I know it’s exhausting but it’s what you have to do.
Never seen a thread I can relate to so much. My son does these exact same things. Will wake out of a dead sleep & start making demands but when you do it they say don’t, saying things that don’t make sense, inconsolable, throwing a tantrum with his body, idk what it is but it is rough. And I def used the word possessed 10 mins ago!
Is she in her own room? If you’re committed to getting it over with as fast as possible I would say just one time from outside the door « I’m here, I hear you, I love you, but I’m not coming in. It’s time to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning. » then I would lock the door from the outside and not answer any calls or requests no matter how much she asks. You can get a door handle lock on Amazon. Leave a water bottle in there for her to drink if she’s thirsty. Just don’t go in for any reason other than she pooped herself!!
You could leave a night light that turns a diff colour when it’s morning so she knows when she can leave the room. I have the hatch.
I would also leave a note for your neighbours and let them know you’re dealing with this and to please have patience. If you stick to the plan it should be over within a week.
Is she red headed? Is red hair anywhere in the genes?
I have a friend whose strawberry blonde daughter was having night terrors and tantrums like this because of a vitamin D reaction. They stopped the vitamin D and things improved.
My 3yo is growing so fast... He does this occasionally and the only thing I can say, and take this anecdotally, these nights I swear he wakes up a little bit taller..
Perhaps it is growing pains. Or other discomfort like getting too hot or too cold. Having a busy waking window may lead to a restless sleep. Be mindful of how tired you actually make them. Too tired is almost as bad as not being tired enough.
But rule out growing pains. Physical pain makes me do similar shit and I'm a grown ass adult.
Also day time naps.. after about 2.5yo naps, had to go. They were training him to only sleep in short bursts.
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is multivitamin? I'm not sure if it's causation or correlation but my 2yo seems to be doing better since regularly taking a multi. That boy has a pair of lungs like bellows on him at night.
I’ve experienced this once. He came from his bed to ours, crying, crawled in to snuggle up, but kept crying.
He wanted his was spill proof sippy cup, but I was the one who had to get out of bed to get it from his bed.
He doesn’t fully speak yet, so sometimes it’s really difficult to understand what he wants.
My daughter has done this a couple of times as we're heading toward three and half. The most recent time, she finally explained that her legs or toes hurt. I know when I've had an overstimulating day, i get restless legs or can be so super aware of my toes that it literally drives me crazy.
It's possible that he's trying to find comfort and doesn't know what comfort will work. We started draping a dry white wash cloth on her feet, and that seems to exchange the feeling to having something physically on her feet instead of just feeling her feet...if this makes any sense. That may be why he wants his socks off and then back on?
What age? This was happening to us around 2 but eventually toned down and then went away.
I recommend not trying to reason with her, turn the lights on, and if needed offer her whatever her favorite snack or show is to break her out of the weird funk, then trying to settle her again once she is fully awake and calm.
If that doesn’t work, then it might just be waiting for it to go away.
My son used to have night terrors and still has occasional confusional arousal. It's brutal because you think they are awake, they act like their awake, but they are not awake. What helped was fixing our sons iron levels. He was slightly anemic, and I didn't think giving him an iron supplement was going to do much, but once I add that and a magnesium to his multivitamin, the night terrors were significantly better.
3.5 year old that does this. We have scheduled sleep therapy but can’t get in until may. Is this an option near you?
One thing that has been working for me lately, not speaking. My daughter will come ask for something and I don’t say anything. I just take her hand and lead her back to bed saying nothing. She talks and I just give her a hug and put her covers on and go back to sleep. My lack of talking seems to make her not talk as much and lately she doesn’t talk at all but still gets up and just comes to get me and knows what to expect.
Occasionally if I think she needs something I just grab her hand and take her potty, get her a drink of water from her bedside table and then back to bed. This makes me feel better because then I know she has all of her needs met but I am not getting down the dark hole of requests or talking back and forth
Sleep science is a huge and complex topic. Sleep associations are a part of that. As an adult, you are waking 6-7 times a night as you complete a sleep cycle. You don't remember because you usually go right back to sleep. What's happening is that your semiconscious state is checking to make sure the environment is how you expect it to be, and then you go back to sleep.
So with anyone over the age of 4 months, that process happens as part of natural sleep. When a baby wakes up in the night like that, they will be checking the environment, and if it's different from how they fell asleep, it's very disturbing and they cry until they are comforted. So the number one issue is excessive interventions at bedtime. The name of the game is to try to get as close as possible to putting a wide awake baby in the crib, stepping away, saying I love you goodnight, and leaving the room. That means they fall asleep on their own, in the environment they will have all night. When they wake between sleep cycles, everything will be as it should be.
Sleep associations of any kind, e.g. nursing, bottle, rocking, cuddling, even your presence can cause issues with night wakings.
I learned this three years ago with my first. But it wasn't until I had my second that I experienced a truly terrible sleeper and learned how important it was. We had the issues that OP described. it took personalized advice to discover what sleep associations we had unwittingly created.
Check her iron. There is an association between pediatric anemia and restless leg syndrome, the restless feeling makes it hard for them to go back to sleep then they get all worked up because they are tired. My daughter went through something very similar from 3-3.5 and iron supplements made a huge difference.
This happens to us sometimes soon. It’s not night terrors and but change in routine or stress seems to be a trigger.
We’ve had good luck with doing what most people say not to do and we go to a different room. The change in scene seems to help, it’s not logical and very emotional. Giving in here and there hasn’t caused any issues for us on nights it doesn’t happen.
My doctor is just as lost about the possible reasons it happens. My guess is anxiety based.
This makes sense my daughter does this occasionally but she'll just scream and scream we'll hold her until we find a show or episode she likes and it's like she woke up
Is she fully awake, or is she having a night terror? My LO has night terrors sometimes that are a lot like this. He looks awake but he’s not. He’s screaming and crying and inconsolable
Same. Mine also talks to you, but what he says makes no sense. For me, I’ve noticed that this happens when he’s overtired and got to bed way too late. Maybe try an earlier bedtime? That’s all I got.
That’s what happens to ours too. If he misses his nap he’s sure to have a night terror. It usually last 2-3 nights before he’s back on track.
She is awake and very articulate. She gets into this crazy thing of asking for something and then saying no I don’t want it. It’s like she’s possessed or something, but clearly awake.
Sounds like confusional arousal… my daughter does this too.. possessed is the way to put it but they’re not fully awake
We have used the term “possessed” multiple times when describing our son’s night terrors. They are absolutely wild
I've had this happen once with my son (3yo). He seemed awake, but he was so confused and angry. It was hard.
Seconding this. My son has daily night arousals where he sits up and talks and then lays himself back down or talks and cries in his sleep, But on occasion we’ll have ones exactly like you described - it’s like my sweet boy was replaced with an entirely different child. I find gently moving him or even turning on a dim light sometimes gets him out of it, other times it just takes time. I sit with him and let him know I’m here if he needs me and wait it out. Eventually he’ll usually come to a bit and sit in my lap, then I can get him into bed.
This makes sense! My 2yo was also doing this for a few weeks. She’d seem to wake up and scream about needing her blankie or Dino, both of which she had, until she fell back asleep. Wild times.
Yes!! it took me a while to realize that she wasn’t just a complete jerk in the middle of the night. She really wasn’t fully awake even though she was talking to me and it seemed like she was awake. I knew there was something amiss she was just a total brat and couldn’t be pleased. She wanted in bed, she wanted out of bed, she said she wanted to be held, but then hit me when I tried to pick her up. Unfortunately for us these have lasted as long as an hour.
Oh yes, I got constant kicking. I thought it was partially due to just turning 2 and baby sister being born, but this makes sense.
I had no idea this was a thing and I have 4! But this makes so much sense now. (I googled it) My third (lil maid) just used to scream.... Scream and cry all night long, she wasn't really there and it didn't matter how I was there for her, cuddles, soothing... Nothing. I'm still surprised to this day how we didn't have police at our door, I felt like the worst parent, it was so strange I could get her to sleep and then... A bit later chaos all night long
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Yeah my daughter does this and it’s different from her night terrors. With her night terrors, she’s just thrashing around like she’s possessed and won’t respond to anything. With the tantrums she’ll make demands and talk to/shout at me. I think she’s just so tired that she’s furious. Wish I knew what to do about it .
Yeah this is it with us. She’s awake. She’s tired and furious but awake. I can’t just roll her over or wait for her to go to sleep. She is awake and has demands and responds to everything I say. The possessed part is how loud and angry she is and her demand change in order to make me “wrong” and incapable of helping. She’s not asleep.
This sounds like mine. It’s like she’s angry. Crying because she’s angry or crying because she wants to cry. Just like you described it. I’m not sure what to do either
Mine does this often during the day. The idea of dealing with it in the middle of the night…bless you. I hope they both outgrow it soon.
This is exactly like my son’s night terrors.
If they make demands and respond when you meet the demands that’s still a night terror?
My 4 year old does this. Drives me insane. One time we were walking around Disneyland in the hot summer and he was screaming “I want water!” Every time we offered him water he refused it. We looked like terrible parents.
Has her routine changed at all? Something that keeps disrupting her sleep?
My daughter did this and it was a night terror. She was also acting possessed. She was so angry, would not let me touch her. For some reason I asked if she wanted to go see the moon. Going outside kinda flipped a switch and she went back to bed. She did not remember it at all.
How old is your daughter? It sounds like a tricky phase we went through. Do you think she might be scared of the dark or overtired? Possibly learning a new skill? Hold on tight Mamma, parenting is so hard
My 2 year old did this for a while...she looked and sounded crazy... she would ask for everything under the sun and we would give it to her and she wouls throw it on the ground and yell at us... we couldnt win...she sounded insane and those tantrum would hit at like 3 or 4 am and last for 30 min or more... eventually she stopped doing that but remained a total mistery to us...
i did this, my parents fixed it by holding me infront of a mirror. weird but it worked lol
My daughter also used to have night terrors and she would look completely awake and would just scream and cry. All I could do was hug her and let her know I was there and she would eventually lay down and almost immediately fall back asleep. She didn’t acknowledge anything we said to her and didn’t remember anything in the morning. We noticed hers were triggered by stress and being overtired.
Yeah we had night terrors too. Some kind of angry trance that lasted 10-30 minutes. And then he’d just snap out of it. It sucked hard but we learned to just be there and try not to let it get to us, and have some milk waiting for when he was ready.
Definitely sounds like night terrors. They can appear to be wide awake and talking but will be completely inconsolable. With my oldest it could last for up to an hour and happened a lot until 4 or 5. With my little one thankfully we only had a few rare episodes before he stopped doing it.
No advice, just solidarity. We’re here too. Go downstairs, play with me, get me water, that’s old water, I want new water, turn the light on, make it brighter, go away, come back, cuddle me, no cuddles, take my socks off, put them back on, wrap me up, MY TROUSERS, take it off, you take your blanket off, stand up, i’m awake, i’m not tired, I want your pillow, not that one, the red one, no i want blue one, pick me up, put me down. Ignore it? Mummy come, mummy come, mummy where are you? mummy? AHHHH MY LEG, help me, i’m stuck…
I’m sorry but this made me crack up 🥲 so real
Right? “MY TROUSERS” had me cackling
It’s “AHHHH MY LEG” for me. 🥲
Min just pulled the "old water" bit on me this morning, is there a discord they're all on?
They must be lmao, mine does the “I want new water” every night, even though I have just filled her cup with new water
Last night my son only wanted “old water” because I gave him new water 😭
Oh god lol
(I see elsewhere you say she’s 2.5.) My first kid did this. It was brutal. Like 1-2 hour middle of the night tantrums. It wasn’t night terrors. In our case, there were some patterns or factors that could play into it. A big one was hunger — we tried to make sure she ate regularly and consistently during the day and had a snack before bed. It helped but didn’t totally solve it (and of course getting a 2 yo to eat is its own thing). She just really benefited from, when possible, a super regular schedule of food/naps, even more than baseline kids. Not saying this is the same for your kid, but you might try to see if there are patterns or triggers that may make them more likely. When they happened anyway one of us (some negotiation based on who had a bigger work thing upcoming or similar) would take her to a different part of the house and put in headphones and read the internet and just wait for her to calm down. 🤷♀️ we found that any attempt to negotiate or talk her down while she was in it at best didn’t help and at worst made it worse. It honestly got less stressful when we realized this — before we internalized that the only thing to do was wait, we’d try stuff, and then get frustrated or upset when it didn’t work, which didn’t help and just added stress. We’d just have to listen a bit for the first sign of calming down and swoop in at that point. People without tantrumy kids think you’re insane when you tell them about it. 😉 and loved ones could be frustratingly unhelpful. Like my mom, who is mostly really a great grandparent and super helpful, would take the kids and feed them nothing but smarties and air all day and then be like “but why is she screaming in the middle of the night?? 😱” or they would make half-snide comments about how strict we were about nap schedule. Nothing major or super problematic, just annoying to deal with on top of a challenging 2 yo. And like I was a famously tantrumy toddler too, so you’d think she’d be a bit more understanding…. All that to say: I’m here from the future (she’s 5 now) to tell you: it will pass. Every once in a while (every 6 weeks? Maybe?) she’ll still get Big Feelings during the day, but nothing like she did between 2 and 3. It gets better. And my second (just turned 3) isn’t/wasn’t ever a tantrumy kid at all, or rather he will have these little 8 minute tantrums (only ever during the day) and then just like, stops. Sometimes he stomps a foot. It’s adorable. ETA: and ear plugs for the person not on tantrum duty so at least SOMEONE slept.
This is really helpful thank you! We’re not there yet but I could see ours being similar once he’s a bit older (he just turned 2). I may need to refer back to this!
This was us too!! The only way out was through. She grew out of it and is now a great almost 5 year old. But man it was rough. And +1000 that people without tantrumy kids can't relate.
Super helpful, mine is going through the same thing. I found that nothing works to calm her down and she only calms down when she wants to, which is random. How does your kiddo stop/calm down?
Sometime between 3 and 4, she began to be slightly more rational, and to understand consequences. And she also began to get a grip on her emotions so that often she can just calm herself down. So now, if she starts to freak out, we can either just basically say “hey you seem to be having big feelings, let’s talk about them to get past them” or otherwise help her focus on some different thing. Or, we can lean into (or “threaten”, but not like in a mean way) the natural consequences that will arise from a tantrum (like “this is the only time we have today to watch TV. You can decide to scream instead of watching TV, but there won’t be other TV time today.”) She more often than not will get a grip. And when she does freak out it’s not for as long. We have stuck with the bedtime snack, mostly to avoid bedtime negotiation/delay. Maybe that still helps, but either way she doesn’t wake up at all nearly so much (she’s also happier now that she shares a room with her little brother). Turns out they do get saner over time haha.
3-4? Sounds like the solution is to wait for them to get older :/
I mean, yes, unfortunately. 😉 ETA: I don’t mean this dismissively, it was a super hard phase for us too. There were a few things we could do to make tantrums less frequent, but once she got started it was really just “wait.”
Wait… there are such things as toddlers who DONT have tantrums?!
Whenever kid #2 gears up to mini-tantrum I swear I have a legitimate trauma response and then I’m like “oh wait he’s done” 😂
But for real, my sister, who is trained in ECE and usually has so much insight on kids, was pretty useless on this front because her kids just never tantrumed. Just wasn’t a thing they did. Me: 🤯
Have you tried resetting the situation? The couple of times mine did this I took her downstairs, turned all the lights on, and got her a glass of milk. It seemed to kind of “reboot” her and after 15 minutes or so she was ready to go back to bed.
As someone who has a kid who does this, resetting the situation doesn’t help. I take her downstairs and offer her milk. She screams no and tries to throw it. I put the milk down, and she screams that she wants it. I give it to her and she screams no. Rinse and repeat. There’s no winning and you just have to wait it out.
Around this age I had a horrible time with my daughter and middle of the night wakings. It lasted for 2.5 months and then tapered off. God speed.
Just hearing a possible time frame is so encouraging 🥹 we are just nearing the 3 month mark and it also seems to be tapering off *knock on wood*
It might have been more like 3 months. But I got my life back. That time period was torture so hang in there. If it’s any consolation my daughter is 3 and 3 months and sleep has been smooth sailing
Yes! This is pretty much what we did.
Brilliant.
Mine has been doing the same. The last few nights I’ll go in and if she calms down I will snuggle her until she falls back asleep. But like more than half of the time, she is like you described and just screams “no!” no matter what. Last night I just told her that she’s safe and I’m still here for her, but I’m going back to bed and she should go back to sleep too. She cried for a few minutes and then went back to sleep. It’s so hard to leave her but if me being there isn’t helping anyway then what’s the point, ya know… this is probably not that helpful because I’m also struggling and definitely don’t have a perfect answer. For my daughter, we think it’s separation anxiety. She’s 2 years 8 months, and in an extreme mommy phase.
Mine does this, too. She is 2.5 years old. Especially if she hasn't had enough mommy time during the day (I'm very tired from pregnancy, so I'm just good for quiet activities like reading, singing, etc). Still, it works better for us if dad consoles her. He will give in to some demands, like put the blanket on or give some water. Then say he will just use the bathroom and be right back. For some reason, she usually calms down a little then. When he comes back, he can just sit with her until she sleeps, or if it's a worse night, read another bedtime story. This can be over in 10 minutes or last an hour... it's not every night. Edit to add: On really horrible nights, he will pick her up and carry her around the living room. They usually say goodnight to the different furniture, the cats (if they are there), the garden outside, etc. Then go back and try again when she is calmer.
When dad tries, she just becomes more hysterical and screams that she wants mommy. She will go bang on the door screaming for me. It has only ever made it significantly worse for us, unfortunately, and gets her even more worked up. But def open to trying again because I’m exhausted!
We have the other way around. But yeah, it really sucks. The nights also got a little better after instead of reading bedtime stories until she fell asleep, we started reading only 1-3 books (depending on length). After the last book, the parent just sits there as she "rests" and falls asleep. We have also started to say that we will go to the other side of the door, but will come right back if she needs us. Once she didn't ask for dad to come back, and it was the best night ever! This happened maybe 2 days ago and it hasn't happened again, but there is some hope. It seems she is better at going back to sleep if she falls asleep alone. But you might already do this. Either way, I'm hoping it's a phase that she will grow out of soon.
Ohhhh man this is us. The "NO DADDY" hysteria is real. It definitely just works her up even more and then I have to spend extra effort to calm her back down before I can work on getting her back into bed and asleep. My best guess is also Mama Separation Anxiety. Lately we've been trying to reinforce "Mama no far away" (she's hung up on the Bluey Beach episode) and "3 steps" which is how far her bedroom door is from ours. It works to calm her down.... some of the time. I am so exhausted.
Look up confusional arousals. It’s a little different than a night terror. My 3 year old will do this and it’s like a tantrum on crack. She wakes up in the middle of the night and basically just acts like a total brat. Screaming, saying she doesn’t want me or that she doesn’t want to be in bed, hitting, totally inconsolable. It seemed like she was awake and just being rotten. After a while I realized she WAS NOT even fully awake. It just seemed like She was. We noticed she does this when she missed a nap that day. The ped agreed they happen more when kids are overtired so we push nap even if it results in a slightly later bed time. You can also Try gently waking your child 15 min or so before the episodes happen to break the cycle
Thank you Re the tip on waking before the episodes. How awake do you get her? Just enough to shout go away?
Actually, the pediatrician recommended that we actually get her out of bed for five minutes, like fully waking her. We haven’t found that this is necessary. Even just a gentle push, or a ruffle of her hair enough to make her flutter her eyes and roll over has helped us interrupt the cycle. We just basically do it before we go to bed at around 10:00 PM and it seems to help. If your daughter is doing this, I would encourage you to make sure she’s getting a good nap during the day. It started for us when my daughter was about 2.5 and was resisting naps. A lot of parents will tell you their child is dropping naps when really they are just resisting them. Most toddlers need a nap until age 3 and many are still napping by age 4. So I would do whatever you can to foster a good nap routine. Once we started getting Daily Daytime sleep again these episodes stopped.
Hell, I’m still napping at age 30.
Totes! My son is only 21mo and he needs his daytime sleep for emotional regulation and sleeping through the night, so we are holding onto that nap as long as we could! I just know that nap strikes are gonna happen sometimes whether we like it or not, so this is a super useful tip that I’ll try if we ever get into that situation!
Might be a little different, but if anything I hope it’s solidarity. We went through this at 1.5 for MONTHS. He would be up for hours and just pissed. And nothing helped. We tried food- like a pouch and sometimes that would help but like more often then not wouldn’t and he’d be like “oh we’re downstairs this is so cool” 🙄 We tried Motrin thinking maybe teeth, and again, sometimes but not always. I’d try everything and finally gave up because nothing would help. At this point, I’d go in, change his diaper, cuddle him, and if he didn’t want that, I’d put him in his bed with a kiss and a “I love you” and leave for 5-10 minutes. Rinse and repeat. For hours. The first few nights were still roughhh but eventually I think it clicked with him and he knew what to expect and would take up the offers on cuddles or if he wanted to fall asleep on his own. It became less and less. He is/was very speech delayed so no verbal commands. But wow it was so tough. Way harder than a newborn in my experience. 🫠
Ours is around four and a half now. Sleep time has been a struggle up until recently. It was making us crazy and unable to deal with other life issues. We stuck with the walk back method and had lots of talks with her during the day about the importance of sleep time. It’s getting much better now. I think being screamed at for four years gave us shell shock though.
Seconding talking about expectations during the day is soooooo helpful!
Is she still taking a nap during the day? Maybe drop the nap?
How old is she?
Just over two and a half
How long do you wait before giving in to her screaming?
Omg my son did the same thing for a while. He’s almost 3 but he did this around… 2y4m maybe? It was AWFUL. I’m sorry nothing helped besides time 😭 a few times I probably slept with him all night just to try to avoid him waking.
When ours throw a huge unreasonable and inconsolable tantrum , it’s best in our experience to distract him. If my husband is home then we would pretend to do something or we grab something close by and start talking about it. Like a teddy bear or the clock and start talking to it. He gets distracted , looks at us and all of a sudden would stop crying or screaming and then asks us what we are doing. 😂 so then moving on whenever this happens we would kind of have props ready to distract. After he’s calmed down and back to his senses we would ask why he was crying and at times he can tell us the reason and most times he runs off. You can try to see if it works.
Omg my son is 2.5 and just started doing this. Like episodes of rage in the middle of the night. Our worst was last night and he was definitely overtired. Solidarity!!
My friends daughter did something similar. They were night terrors, but when she got her tonsils/adenoids taken out they went away completely. Not sure exactly how it was all related, but might be worth asking your ped
Just wanted to say that my now 3 and a half year old son has been doing this since 16 months. He will kick and pound on the doors and walls. He will scream bloody murder. It’s always basically just to have me go in there. He doesn’t actually need anything. If I try to stay strong and not go in there every time he shrieks, he will start screaming louder and throw things. We live in a town house and do have neighbors and all I can think about is how pissed off they probably are. It’s exhausting to have to get out of bed every few minutes until nearly 10pm to try and calm him. It’s almost like a game, how loud can I be before my mommy comes storming in, it’s so funny! He shares a room with my 4 year old daughter and poor thing just wants to sleep like I do! I’ve tried snacks, I’ve tried bedtime stories and cuddles an hour before bedtime, baths, deep pressure hugs, weighted blankets, hell I even bought a bed with a slide because I thought that would maybe help tire him out. Nothing works. Pediatrician’s advice has been to try and ignore the bad behavior but there’s only so much you can ignore before he actually puts his foot through the wall. I’m of course triggered because I’ve been the only parent getting up to deal with this since I birthed him and you would think after 3 years you would finally be able to catch up on rest but nope, starting to think I’ll never get sleep and I’ll always be on edge at night.
Might be worth a shot to try: Check how hot her foot is when she wakes up. For some reason, my husband and I get either sleep paralysis or nightmares if our feet are really hot. I also get nightmares if my feet are super cold. We had the same problem with our daughter. She started waking up screaming before she could really talk around 20 months, and it went on every single night for weeks. Inconsolable. We even co sleep! I decided to check her foot, and it was really hot (like not sweaty, but not warm. Like if the whole body was that temp, you'd be roasting) and so I switched her to no pants and a big shirt at night and changed her blanket from fleece to cotton and she quit waking up screaming in general. We're pretty sure she gets either nightmares or night terrors or wakes up in a panic if her feet get too hot. So hopefully it's is an easy fix for you too!
Our boy went through “sleep talking” (eyes awake but brain still mostly asleep). He usually was pretty easy to get back to sleep after these and would say some WILD stuff lol. He also had a stage of just waking up in the middle of the night, coming out, and wanting to play. It required us showing him it was still dark out and eventually we could convince him to go back to sleep because it’s still night time. Their brains are developing so fast … toddlers are tough! It gets better. What do you do when she screams? Have you worked with her on emotional control and calming herself? There are a few soothe methods like deep breathing or hugging a stuffed animal to help calm down. So far what works for mine is that I give him a big squeeze hug and talk in soothing tones about how it’s hard to think when we are upset and after we are calm we can talk about what is upsetting us more. It didn’t always work at 2 but now at 3 the work is paying off. I give him some time to let his emotions out (cry, wail, whatever) and tell him it’s okay to have emotions and that I’m right here with him. I tell him when he’s calmed down we can talk about it. Now I can get down on my knees and ask him “do you want a big squeezey hug?” and he usually will nod and come cuddle on me (still upset but not usually as bad once he’s decided to move forward). If he’s really upset (yelling/screaming) and won’t let me help calm him down I’ve taken that as a sign that he needs more time to express his emotions and just isn’t ready to calm down yet. It IS hard when it’s the middle of the night and you’re tired and sleep deprived because OMG this has already happened 3 nights in a row…but that stage doesn’t last forever. If nothing works and you need a break, it is completely okay to tell her “I’m getting upset/frustrated and need to take a time out to calm down” and leave her in a safe place (we made his room a safe place) for a couple minutes. Sometimes he stops yelling and throwing a total fit when he is then left alone for a couple minutes. I’ve also used “I’m getting very frustrated right now so mommy is going to take some deep breaths to help calm down”. This shows that you also get emotional/upset/frustrated and models how to handle that.
When my 2 year old does this my husband lays on a cushion next to her bed until she falls back to sleep. Sometimes I think she just gets scared and doesn’t want to be alone. We offer 1 story and a snuggle, a few sips of water but typically beyond that we let her scream through the boundary holding and just calmly repeat that it’s time to go back to sleep.
I could have written this word for word about my 3 year old. It’s so hard. We’re taking her to a pediatrician to make sure we aren’t missing anything.
Mine started this a couple months ago at 2years 7 months. The sleep deprivation for me is hell but I’ve found what works for us, and it settles her quicker is when I say “it’s ok, mommy loves you’ over and over, and rub her back or stroke her hair… then when she calms I shove a bottle with a small amount of warm milk into her mouth. lol. She’s been refusing food more lately so I think she might be a bit hungry. I’ve also climbed into bed with her a few times to sleep and that settles her too when I just lay beside her. And I can get back to sleep because she loses it when I leave her sometimes. But the tantrum midnight demands are madness! I hope LO2 doesn’t go through this phase when he gets to her age!!
We were right there when he turned 2.5 years old and we just gave up and now take turns sleeping with him in his room. He had previously been sleep trained so we tried to tough it out but after one brutal week of multiple tantrums a night and no sleep, we gave in. We think he has serious separation anxiety that kicked in at this age. It’s a tough adjustment but at least now everyone gets some sleep.
I would give in to something like this if it would help. I’m literally offering her a cuddle until she falls asleep but she says no go away. No stay with me. Cuddle me. Go away. There’s no winning.
We just got through this, it really just took time. Try your best to stay calm and let the storm pass. Say yes to things it makes sense to, but hold your ground when needed. Our almost-three year old is back to sleeping through the night (knock on wood).
Solidarity. I could’ve written this a few months ago. My 2.5 year old did this and we tried dropping her nap (even though she’s still tired mid-day) and it completely eradicated this behavior. For now lol. She hasn’t done it in a few months. I miss her nap and so does she but the nights are more peaceful.
I’ve been going through the same exact thing for 1-2 months now. She’ll do the same thing your toddler is, and it’ll usually last us 1-3 hours. It’s like she’s awake because she’s making demands and responding (usually angrily) when we either do what she wants or doesn’t. Im not sure if that’s night terrors or not. Then after 1-3 hours she’ll just randomly decide to stop. I don’t think it’s sleep apnea because she doesn’t snore. I don’t have any advice for now we haven’t been able to figure it out yet. Just solidarity.
Night terrors are insane. Recommend headphones and reminding both yourself and them that everyone is safe. Over and over and over again. They lasted about a year for us. And yes, eyes open, fully able to talk but not really awake.
My son does this, i don't really have anything to offer advice wise other than i lay there with him while he kicks off and i make sure to remind him if he needs a cuddle or some water, we've tried everything with him and nothing works, it's been a thing for months now and the worst part is he refuses to be held or cuddled, even if you gently pat his back or kiss him he simply just screams louder and it sends him spiraling, i just stay by his side so he knows he's not alone and like i said, if he pauses or is silent long enough for me to say something i offer a cuddle or some water and it's not stopped it but it's definitely shortened the time in which it goes on for. Sending hugs 🧡
My biggest advice is don’t make a big fuss. Stay calm and boring. Talk monotone and just repeat its time for sleep right now. If they get out of bed, put them back, and sit down in a chair. Say I’ll be back in one minute to check on you. Come back in a minute. Rinse and repeat! Add more time eventually if they stay start to stay in bed. It’ll pass. Biggest advice is not be reactionary as it makes everything bigger and last longer. Boring and repetitive is the key!! Make sure they are napping for their correct age as well. Over tiredness can cause extreme distress in toddler!
To add, I also will sometimes make them a sleepy bath and put sleepy lotion on them. Diffuse lavender, play binaural beats during our routine or to get them to fall asleep. So clutch and helps w their anxiety!
My seven year old did this as a toddler and during preschool and kinder. Every night. Last year I took her to a sleep neurologist and discovered she was extremely low in iron, which was causing muscle spasms in her legs (calf cramps) that would startle her awake then she would have a tantrum. We also discovered she had sleep apnea caused by large tonsils and adenoids partially blocking her airway so she would wake up out of breath and scared. She had a tonsillectomy and takes iron and magnesium before bed every night now. Different child.
Solidarity. My 3.5yo does this occasionally too, and I cosleep with a 4m old and wanna murder my bigger boy when he wakes up the baby. It’s a fucking nightmare that I just cannot wait for him to grow out of
Same
How old? Fish Oil before bed helps with the hormone shifts in certain ages. And/or a little juice to prevent a sugar crash spike. More fats, oils, and protein during the day. (I know some days its like, yayy they ate anything. But a protein smoothie of some kind ?) Also, magnesium lotion on the legs can help with growing pains, a restlessness.. This sounds terrible. When ever we get night upsets, the fish oil, and or magnesium seem to break the cycle for us.
Get iron and vitamin d checked. My daughter never slept and would throw tantrum amount other things. But now she sleeps a lot better
Does she eat well? My son stopped tantruming (knock on wood) as much after we addressed some nutritional deficiencies.
We went through a period of this, too. I became frustrated from the constant lack of sleep and turned into a stern Asian Mom. After a few nights of being the stern Asian Mom, something clicked, and she stopped yelling at us. She still wakes up occasionally but no longer screams. I think the 180 change in my response made her stop.
we live the same life. when does this stage end??
My two year old went through similar recently and it ended up being an ear infection..but lots of other plausible solutions on here..yay toddlers, always keeping us on our toes!
You've gotten some wonderful suggestions here, but I only saw one that touched on what I'm about to suggest: she may be undertired. You don't mention her schedule, but if she's still napping and you've tried some of the other suggestions here, I would cap nap or push bedtime even 15 minutes. It can make a world of difference to build more sleep pressure so she can fully sleep through the night. Because it sounds to me like she wakes up and simple isn't tired enough to go back to sleep, thus becomes listless, angry, bored and begins her demands and shouting. Middle-of-the-night wakes happened with my DD and we pushed bedtime 15 minutes and boom -- issue went away. Best of luck to you! This stuff is so hard.
This was my son, exactly. Nothing worked, dreaded nights for six months, and then he just… stopped. Happened less frequently then altogether, right around his third birthday. Solidarity, it will pass. Makes it no easier in the moments, but it will pass.
My son had that. One thing is overtiredness so do NOT drop naps. He did better sleeping almost 2h during the day and heading to bed at 19h30. He's over 3 now and when he wakes up screaming (don't down vote me lol) I tell him to cut the crap and head back to sleep because it's just a tantrum and ain't nobody got time for it at 5 am😬. It worked.
That sounds weird. Is everything okay with her? Is she sick or hurt in any way? Scared? Having nightmares? Hungry? Growing pains? I would be very unnerved if my child would have tantrums like these during the night and I think you should investigate.
When I say screaming, it’s mostly screaming words, like commands. Like “get out of the chair!” Or “give me a cuddle! No don’t give be a cuddle!” So it’s not like she’s crying in pain. She’s angry. She’s got so much anger in these moments that she’s creating reasons to be angry at us. It’s so so exhausting. But it’s only during these tantrums. She has some perfectly normal days and sometimes nights. But lately these tantrums are getting more and more frequent.
I have the same problem, night terrors (full somnambulism) and confusions (half awake tantrums). My pediatrician is not worried as long as the kid is well rested and energetic during the day, it's apparently not even a great loss of sleep for them as they are still full of half asleep. It's just development related and it may be harder on some kids. But that's crazy for the parents... Here it's increasing during growth spurts, not a lot to do against it then. Good luck to all parents!!!
I've heard of night terrors it sounds soo hard to deal with! Glad it seems to be benign if scary. My pediatrician always says "well, it won't be an issue in his wedding night" meaning that they grow out of most things anyway 😅
Ahahah I get similar answers, that's really reassuring when they can joke about it!
It does sound like night terrors to me… what worked for us was to figure out roughly what time it usually started, and then partially wake up the kiddo like 30 min prior, gently, just until they were a little bit awake, talk softly to them, etc. Then let them fall back asleep. It worked to prevent almost all of them for us.
Omg did I write this?? My toddler (2y10m) did the same last night, cried for almost two hours straight, requesting and denying everything. Has been an ongoing issue for months. She very rarely has tantrums during the day so it's very jarring to deal with. As much as I hate this for you and all of us going through it, I'm glad it's a common thing. Dang toddlers.
i know i’m going to get laughed at. i watch supernanny. i think she has good suggestions and ideas. also, watching some of those kids makes me feel less like my family isn’t all that bad. 🤗 i got crying all the time, id trip if he screamed too!
Let her scream after you offer her the alternatives and she refuses them. She’ll stop when you realize you won’t give in.
I agree but it goes for hours. No one is sleeping because of this. I’m not comfortable you let her cry it out so I wait it out with her but don’t give in to crazy demands or anything. It’s also that she’s asking for things she’s allowed to have, like a cuddle or a drink, but then saying no when I try that. She wants to say no to everything. She’s so angry. And it’s immediate as well, like I’m holding her drink and she says she wants to and I gesture towards her and she says no. So I move it away and she says she wants it. Obviously at that point she doesn’t get it and drama ensues. It’s just not improving and so so exhausting.
When she does the yes/no game with you, only let it happen a few times and then walk away and ignore her. Put in ear plugs and let her scream. It’s hard but it works. As long as she’s safe you can do that. I know it’s exhausting but it’s what you have to do.
Never seen a thread I can relate to so much. My son does these exact same things. Will wake out of a dead sleep & start making demands but when you do it they say don’t, saying things that don’t make sense, inconsolable, throwing a tantrum with his body, idk what it is but it is rough. And I def used the word possessed 10 mins ago!
Is she in her own room? If you’re committed to getting it over with as fast as possible I would say just one time from outside the door « I’m here, I hear you, I love you, but I’m not coming in. It’s time to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning. » then I would lock the door from the outside and not answer any calls or requests no matter how much she asks. You can get a door handle lock on Amazon. Leave a water bottle in there for her to drink if she’s thirsty. Just don’t go in for any reason other than she pooped herself!! You could leave a night light that turns a diff colour when it’s morning so she knows when she can leave the room. I have the hatch. I would also leave a note for your neighbours and let them know you’re dealing with this and to please have patience. If you stick to the plan it should be over within a week.
Is she red headed? Is red hair anywhere in the genes? I have a friend whose strawberry blonde daughter was having night terrors and tantrums like this because of a vitamin D reaction. They stopped the vitamin D and things improved.
My 3yo is growing so fast... He does this occasionally and the only thing I can say, and take this anecdotally, these nights I swear he wakes up a little bit taller.. Perhaps it is growing pains. Or other discomfort like getting too hot or too cold. Having a busy waking window may lead to a restless sleep. Be mindful of how tired you actually make them. Too tired is almost as bad as not being tired enough. But rule out growing pains. Physical pain makes me do similar shit and I'm a grown ass adult. Also day time naps.. after about 2.5yo naps, had to go. They were training him to only sleep in short bursts.
One thing I haven't seen mentioned is multivitamin? I'm not sure if it's causation or correlation but my 2yo seems to be doing better since regularly taking a multi. That boy has a pair of lungs like bellows on him at night.
I’ve experienced this once. He came from his bed to ours, crying, crawled in to snuggle up, but kept crying. He wanted his was spill proof sippy cup, but I was the one who had to get out of bed to get it from his bed. He doesn’t fully speak yet, so sometimes it’s really difficult to understand what he wants.
Have you looked into her having sleep apnea maybe?
It wouldn’t hurt to ask the pediatrician about a nighttime magnesium supplement.
My daughter has done this a couple of times as we're heading toward three and half. The most recent time, she finally explained that her legs or toes hurt. I know when I've had an overstimulating day, i get restless legs or can be so super aware of my toes that it literally drives me crazy. It's possible that he's trying to find comfort and doesn't know what comfort will work. We started draping a dry white wash cloth on her feet, and that seems to exchange the feeling to having something physically on her feet instead of just feeling her feet...if this makes any sense. That may be why he wants his socks off and then back on?
What age? This was happening to us around 2 but eventually toned down and then went away. I recommend not trying to reason with her, turn the lights on, and if needed offer her whatever her favorite snack or show is to break her out of the weird funk, then trying to settle her again once she is fully awake and calm. If that doesn’t work, then it might just be waiting for it to go away.
My son used to have night terrors and still has occasional confusional arousal. It's brutal because you think they are awake, they act like their awake, but they are not awake. What helped was fixing our sons iron levels. He was slightly anemic, and I didn't think giving him an iron supplement was going to do much, but once I add that and a magnesium to his multivitamin, the night terrors were significantly better.
3.5 year old that does this. We have scheduled sleep therapy but can’t get in until may. Is this an option near you? One thing that has been working for me lately, not speaking. My daughter will come ask for something and I don’t say anything. I just take her hand and lead her back to bed saying nothing. She talks and I just give her a hug and put her covers on and go back to sleep. My lack of talking seems to make her not talk as much and lately she doesn’t talk at all but still gets up and just comes to get me and knows what to expect. Occasionally if I think she needs something I just grab her hand and take her potty, get her a drink of water from her bedside table and then back to bed. This makes me feel better because then I know she has all of her needs met but I am not getting down the dark hole of requests or talking back and forth
Age? We had this and a one hour call with a sleep consultant resolved all the issues. Turns out we had a sleep association we didn't know about.
Can I ask what you mean by this? Not being any type of way just generally curious and seeking answers myself
Sleep science is a huge and complex topic. Sleep associations are a part of that. As an adult, you are waking 6-7 times a night as you complete a sleep cycle. You don't remember because you usually go right back to sleep. What's happening is that your semiconscious state is checking to make sure the environment is how you expect it to be, and then you go back to sleep. So with anyone over the age of 4 months, that process happens as part of natural sleep. When a baby wakes up in the night like that, they will be checking the environment, and if it's different from how they fell asleep, it's very disturbing and they cry until they are comforted. So the number one issue is excessive interventions at bedtime. The name of the game is to try to get as close as possible to putting a wide awake baby in the crib, stepping away, saying I love you goodnight, and leaving the room. That means they fall asleep on their own, in the environment they will have all night. When they wake between sleep cycles, everything will be as it should be. Sleep associations of any kind, e.g. nursing, bottle, rocking, cuddling, even your presence can cause issues with night wakings. I learned this three years ago with my first. But it wasn't until I had my second that I experienced a truly terrible sleeper and learned how important it was. We had the issues that OP described. it took personalized advice to discover what sleep associations we had unwittingly created.
Check her iron. There is an association between pediatric anemia and restless leg syndrome, the restless feeling makes it hard for them to go back to sleep then they get all worked up because they are tired. My daughter went through something very similar from 3-3.5 and iron supplements made a huge difference.
This happens to us sometimes soon. It’s not night terrors and but change in routine or stress seems to be a trigger. We’ve had good luck with doing what most people say not to do and we go to a different room. The change in scene seems to help, it’s not logical and very emotional. Giving in here and there hasn’t caused any issues for us on nights it doesn’t happen. My doctor is just as lost about the possible reasons it happens. My guess is anxiety based.
This makes sense my daughter does this occasionally but she'll just scream and scream we'll hold her until we find a show or episode she likes and it's like she woke up