Nightmares and night terrors in children: Causes and treatments

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Dark terrors in children–also known as "sleep terrors"–are sometimes confused with nightmares.

Both cause distress and disrupt sleep, and though terrors are less common than nightmares, they are hardly unusual–especially among young children.

What's the difference between nightmares and night terrors, and what can be washed most these conditions?

Hither is an evidence-based overview of each problem, with some tips for coping.

ane. Nightmares in children

Nightmares are frightening dreams associated with REM (rapid eye move) slumber. Because most REM slumber happens later at dark, nightmares are more than likely to occur after your child has been sleeping for several hours.

How can you tell if your child has frequent nightmares? That'southward not always piece of cake to tell, especially if your child is too immature to clear his or her anxieties, or has trouble remembering the content of dreams.

But overall, nightmares are very common. Well-nigh studies estimate that at least 70% of immature children take nightmares at to the lowest degree sometimes, and the incidence of nightmares peaks in later childhood — around the age of ten years (Gauchat et al 2014).

So it's likely your child will experience nightmares at some bespeak. And when kids experience peculiarly agonizing or frequent nightmares,  it tin can bear upon both their slumber and their daytime functioning.

In one written report, Dutch children aged vii-9 rated nightmares among their worst fears (Muris et al 2000).

In another, Chinese children who reported frequent nightmares were at higher risk for insomnia (Li et al 2011). These kids likewise performed a scrap worse on IQ tests — which may reflect fatigue (Lui et al 2012).

What can we practice about nightmares?

We need to be enlightened of common triggers, like stress, anxiety, traumatic events, and medications that interfere with REM sleep (Moore et al 2006). And there are a number of specific, research-based tactics parents can use to assistance their children cope.

For case, experimental trials on adults suggest that people with chronic nightmares tin can reduce their nighttime anxieties by using relaxation techniques and talking over the content of their nightmares and fears with a therapist.

This includes "rescripting" the nightmare, or re-imagining it with a rubber, happy catastrophe. The approach has reduced the severity and frequency of nightmares (Davis et al 2011). It has as well reduced the distress dreamers feel during nightmares (Rhudy et al 2010).

We need more research to determine how effective these methods are for nightmares in children. The studies that do exist are of limited value because the sample sizes are pocket-sized. But the results suggest that the techniques are helpful for children equally well every bit adults (St-Onge et al 2015; Fernandez et al 2012; Lewis et al 2015).

In one small study, parents read to their children (anile 5-seven years) from a book called Uncle Lightfoot, Flip that Switch: Overcoming fearfulness of the dark (academic version) by Mary Coffman.

The families too engaged in the book'due south activities, which were designed to aid children to confront and dispel their anxieties and rescript frightening aspects of their dreams. Later on a month, eight out of 9 children showed "clinically meaning reductions in anxiety severity" (Lewis et al 2015).

An edition of opens in a new windowUncle Lightfoot, Flip That Switch: Overcoming Fear of the Night (2nd Edition) is available for buy from Amazon.com.

One thing to avert: Be careful not to mirror your kid'south anxieties, or otherwise act distressed. Kids pick up on these feelings. To reassure your kid, you need to exist calm and relaxed.

For more than testify-based tips, see my article about opens in a new windowreducing nighttime fears in children.

2. Night terrors in children

Like nightmares, nighttime terrors in children are distressing and confusing. Only nighttime terrors differ from nightmares in key respects:

• Dark terrors tend to occur earlier in the night, when children spend more than time in deep sleep.  Slumber terrors arenon associated with REM sleep. Instead, they occur when a child is partially angry from deep sleep–usually 1-2 hours afterward slumber onset (Moore et al 2006).

• Children may announced highly distressed, and they seem to be awake. The distress is real, only the appearance of waking is an illusion. During a dark terror–which may concluding for five-10 minutes–your child isn't fully awake. Simply he will appear terrified, and he may weep, scream, or grumble. His center might exist racing; he may exist perspiring. He may too move effectually or slumber walk. Because he isn't really awake, he volition be unaware of your presence or your attempts to soothe him (Moore et al 2006; Moreno 2015).

• Children rarely call back slumber terrors. When kids exercise remember something near their experiences, they report memories of having to fight or flee from frightening monsters or other threats (Guilleminault et al 2003).

• Kids tin hurt themselves. Because they can involve sleepwalking and other forms of motion, night terrors in children can be physically dangerous.

All of this may sound quite exotic if yous haven't coped with night terrors before. But the condition is surprisingly common, peculiarly amidst very immature children.

In studies tracking big cohorts of children over time, the historic period of highest prevalence is around 18 months. More than one 3rd (35-37%) of toddlers this historic period experience sleep terrors (Nguyen et al 2008; Petit et al 2015).

Children tend to abound out of it, just lots of kids withal have night terrors during the primary school years. Studies gauge that betwixt xi-xx% of children aged 9-10 years experience night terrors (Shang et al 2006; Laberge et al 2000; Petit et al 2015, Kim et al 2017).

What causes nighttime terrors in children?

Nosotros don't really know, but like sleepwalking, sleep terrors have something to do with deep sleep. The normal grade of deep sleep seems to go off the rail.

Dark terrors may run in the family unit (Hublin et al 2001; Nguyen et al 2008; Petit et al 2015). And nighttime terrors in children are linked with overtiredness, feet, stress, and sleep-disordered animate (Crisp et al 1990; Petit et al 2006; Guilleminault et al 2003; Kim et al 2017).

Dark terrors in children are besides linked with television. Kids who accept televisions in their bedrooms are more than likely to suffer from both night terrors and nightmares (Brockmann et al 2016).

In function, this may reflect the fact that children with bedroom televisions go less sleep than other kids. For children prone to night terrors, running a slumber debt can be a trigger.

Finally, Sean Boyden and his colleagues accept floated the hypothesis that solitary sleep during infancy increases a child'southward hazard of developing nighttime terrors. Currently, at that place is no empirical prove supporting this speculation. But the researchers report that they have launched a study to exam their ideas (Boyden et al 2018).

Coping with night terrors in children

If yous suspect your kid suffers from dark terrors, consult your md. It's important to rule out other conditions that could be causing your child'due south symptoms–conditions similar nocturnal seizures, panic attacks, or post traumatic stress disorder.

In improver, it's important to determine if your kid'south nighttime terrors are associated with snoring or other forms of sleep-matted animate (SDB).

SDB can exist dangerous, merely it is treatable. And if you care for your child's breathing disorder, yous might as well reduce or eliminate her sleep terrors.

A study tracked kids with both SBD and night terrors. Researchers establish that kids who underwent surgery (removal of the tonsils and adenoids) for SBD were costless of slumber-disordered breathing symptoms iii-4 months later on. They were also free of night terrors (Guilleminault et al 2003).

More than recently, experts have developed not-surgical treatments, including orthodontic approaches and myofunctional therapy (Huang and Guilleminault 2017; Villa et al 2017).

Y.-South Huang and Christian Guilleminault (2017) notation that "pediatricians and pediatric subspecialists are often unaware of the advances and the remedies available," so when you inquire your doctor about treatments for SDB, you lot might bring along a print-out of the opens in a new windowabstract of their paper.

And whether or not your child suffers from SDB, there are other important steps y'all can have to meliorate dark terrors:

• Don't get upset or frustrated with a kid who is having a sleep terror. His eyes might be open, and he might be very vocal. Only he is asleep and not capable of responding to your questions or commands.

• Make sure your child is getting enough sleep. Sleep impecuniousness may trigger changes in the way your child'southward brain experiences deep sleep.See this article for help opens in a new windowdetermining your child's sleep requirements.

• Identify and treat your child's anxieties. For tips about opens in a new windowcoping with anxieties may fuel night terrors in children, see my article on nighttime fears.

• Avoid late night exercise (Moore et al 2006).

• Make sure your child'southward sleep environment every bit safety as possible. Remove heavy and sharp objects from the bedroom.

• If your child is sleep-walking, stay calm and gently guide her back to bed (Moreno 2015).

• If your child'south night terrors follow a anticipated pattern each nighttime, consider the treatment known as "scheduled awakenings." This treatment involves waking your kid upwardly well-nigh 30 minutes before you look him to suffer a night terror episode. Let him go to the bath, then return him to bed. In small clinical trials, this treatment had a lasting, beneficial effect on both sleep walking and nighttime terrors in children (e.g., Durand 2002; Frank et al 1997).

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Other manufactures almost slumber bug in children

• opens in a new windowBedtime problems
• opens in a new windowBed wetting
• opens in a new windowNighttime wakings
• opens in a new windowSleep tips for families

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References: Nightmares and nighttime terrors in children

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Content of "Nightmares and nighttime terrors in children" terminal modified 4/2019

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