waking up screaming

Noah goes to bed at 6 for quite long time now...the last week or so he has been waking up in the the middle of the night screaming...we have let him cio but it just doesn't seem to work lately...(we've done cio before with succes)...the only thing that seems to work is when we are in there...we've tried giving him a drink he pushes it away, he doesn't reach up to be held so we don;t although we did in the beginning and he stops, we'v'e tried giving him a chewy thing thinking it's his teeth and he pushes that away..if we go in and rub his back he lays back down and will get quiet but as soon as we leave he starts...or if he does fall asleep while we are in there he wakes back up 45 minutes later or more and starts all over again.
I have no idea what it going on. He eats at 430-5pm so I can't imagine he's hungry and he gets a drink of milk before bed.
Now he doesn't always eat a ton at dinner but that hasn't changed.I've tried giving him tylenol thinking it was teeth and it may be that is worked but who knows b/c he eventually falls asleep with different things that we've tried.
Last night muy DH lay on the floor until he fell asleep but after about 45 minutes later he woke up again crying..we let him go and he EVENTUALLY fell asleep.
I just don't know what this is..

 

When my Peter was about 1.5yo he would wake up with night terrors. He would scream and it seemed like he was not really awake. Some times you could not even rub his back or try to calm him down. The "episode" would only last a few minutes and then he would fall back asleep. This lasted a few months and then went away. Now at 3.5 yo everyonce in a while we will have a bad week and wake up with nightmares but after a few minutes of cuddles he is back asleep.

If they are night terrors there is not much you can do..but he will likely outgrown them

Hope you nights get better

 

Wow! I could have written your exact post!! Jonah does this pretty frequently. We have done the exact same things you have and nothing consistent really works. I think it is night terrors at least some of the time. There are definitely times when it seems like he doesn't know where he is and even though he's standing up screaming in the crib, picking him up just makes it worse. It's pitiful. Hopefully they will outgrow this soon!!!

Shannon

 

Generally, my boys are extremely good sleepers, but we have gone through phases when one of them would do this. I feel your pain - it's so frustrating because they are inconsolable and nothing you do works.

We would do sort of a Ferber thing: Go in, rub his back, speak quietly to him. Usually he'd calm down while we were in there, but the second we walked out, start screaming again. It's really distressing. I would not take him out of the crib. We learned quickly that taking him out and rocking and cuddling in the chair only prolonged the whole episode, because you'd put him back in the crib and he'd just keep screaming when you left. Seemed like taking him out just woke him up more.

Wish I had more advice :hug99: For us it was a phase that they would grow out of after a couple days or a week.

One more thought - any chance he has an ear infection?? That can cause night waking.

Michelle

 

he was just checked last week and was clear of ear infections...hopefully one didn't start again...he doesn't have any runny nose which usually seems to be the case when he has one..he seems perfectly fine..as a matter of fact he had a horrible time doing down to sleep last night..I went in, put my hand on his chest and just stood there for a while...told him I would see him in the morning and left..not a peep..he fell asleep soon after (630) and slept until 730 today ..its' so weird.

 

One of my twin girls does the exact same thing! She kicks me and screams like I have become part of her nightmare! I will say that taking her out seems to prolongue the event. I am going to try to rub her back...we chalked it up to gas.....sometimes turning on the nightlight has helped. let me know what works!!
Sarah

 

My DS does the same thing. He will stand up in his bed and scream like he is scared to death or being hurt. What works for us is to get him out of bed and bring him into the living room with us for about 10 minutes and then we lay him back in his bed and he goes to sleep. We think he is having nightmares or something. He has a nighlight in his room so we don't think he is afraid of the dark. I can't let him CIO because he sounds terrified and I want him to know that we are there to comfort him. When we lay him back in his bed, he isn't alseep, but he goes right back to sleep and we don't hear from him again.

He doesn't do this everynight, just occasionally.