My 2.5yr old DS is terrified of monsters...how can i calm him down?
Out of nowhere monday night Ian was putting Skylar to bed and he heard Skylar yelling "help daddy" so he ran in and Skylar was in tears because there were monsters in his room. Ever since then he's been terrified of monsters. They're in everyone's bedroom and they were under my sister's hearters yesterday.
We told him that our cat ate them and it worked for the first night. How can I tell him that there's nomonsters and have him understand? I'm sure this is just a phase but it was out of nowhere. He didn't see anything on tv or a book that would have made him scared. The only monters he knows is the kissing monster and the tickle monster....oh and cookie monster but they're all good.
How did he twist up in his mind that monsters are bad????
Hopefully he grows out of this real fast. He's never afraid of anything.
Thanks in advance
much love
-Lindsey
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Lindsey, mama to Skylar (7-12-01), Leah (10-29-04), Addison and Riley (born at 25w4d, 6-17-08)
Married to Ian since 4-28-04
You can try any of several things - something to give him some control of the situation.
Monster spray - water in a spray bottle, scented water in a spray bottle, oust spray, etc.
Monster scarer - a noisy can - put rocks or pennies in a can, like you would use to train dogs or cats. Tell him the noise will scare the monsters away.
Hope these help!
We went through the "monster-phase". Intially we said the cat ate them, then we ate them--that didn't work. Then whenever dd mentioned monsters, we immediately said they didn't exist. We also gave her a flashlight next to her bed.
We stopped all monster talk(i.e. tickle monster, kissy monster). It soon passed.
I went thru this with one of my little ones. We got a squirt gun, filled it up with water & a couple drops of my perfume. That way if she "saw or heard a monster" she could spray it with the magic "monster away spray" & the smell of my perfume made her feel safe & comfortable. Also works for ghosts or whatever else the fear is.
I found that it helped to reassure her that she could always ask for help (not only with the monsters, but with whatever).
We also made a sign that said "GO AWAY, MONSTER!" and let her decorate it. She slept with that sign for about a month. At bedtime if she asked I would look for monsters and say that there were none. Once in a while she would say "there's a monster!" and I would say, "Go away, monster!" - just like the sign - and tell her it worked.
Towards the end she would reel off a list of different predators in her room, and I'd have to tell each of them to go away. It was probably partly a bedtime delay tactic, but I chose to believe that this was also a form of learning about how to communicate fears or other negative/scary feelings.
Isn't it an awful feeling to see your baby so scared??? Heck, I am afraid of monsters and I am 29. LOL. I went through this when Riley who is now 3.5 at the same age. We ended it up figuring out that it was the shadows from the nightlight. We had him help pick out a new light to sleep with and this really helped. The second biggest thing we did was tell Riley when he sees a monster to either tickle it or if he didn't feel like doing that he should say :Boo, go away...in a playful manner. To this day he has many monsters but luckily he plays with them. Good luck mama
Jennifer
My 2.5 year old has a flash light that he can take anywhere and in the night he can use it if he wants but he doesn't have any trouble at night in bed. I also do a magic spell to remove and vanish monsters and it works for him. You can even bless a small pillow in front of him telling him it words off monsters and such and let him sleep with it.
Good luck and love the childs imagination he is normal.
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Tricia Mitchell
Be as the stone cast upon the water, that the positive influence of your action may extend far beyond the power of a mere pebble in the hand of a man.
So no monster problems yet. But my sis had trouble iwth her twins and monsters. She did the spray idea. She put water and some sweet smelling stuff in it. Worked great. It was "bad dream spray" Keeps all bad monsters away!
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Brielle
mama to Jace
and Meadow
and baby #3
We told my daughter that the smoke detector outside her room was a "monster alarm". She helped her daddy check it every night for a while.
This seemed to work, until the night I burned dinner in the oven! But by that time, she seemed to understand that there weren't really any monsters, so we got over it ok.
__________________ Monie http://waitingforevie.blogspot.com/
happy mama to Emily (1997) and Evie (2004), and hoping for a son from China!
Evie's cat!
We did ' monster spray'. Dd loved it! I did some with bubble solution and some with yummy smelling body spray. We sprayed the 'trouble areas' every night till the monsters went away. Didn't take long and dd loved being the one to spray the monsters away.
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Helen
Single student mama to 3 wonderful people
Thanks for your ideas. I thought about the water, can, flashlight thing but Skylar would just sit there and play for hours with that stuff. I could see it now...monster squirt here, monster squirt there...a little more here....lol.
He does have a nightlight and I wonder if that might be the reason. I'll talk to Ian about taking Skylar to get a "monster- stopping light" that he likes.
Thanks once again.
much love
-Lindsey
When I was a nanny I had a child like this. I got a squirt bottle, added a little bit of lavendar oil and water, and made a label that said "MONSTER SPRAY". I told him it was a spray I bought at the store for him, and that if you spray it around the room before bed, the monsters don't like it and won't come in. I set it by his bed and explained that he could use it in the night if he needed to. I don't think he ever did because he believed me when I said it would work to spray the room before bed. I made a big deal out of spraying in the closet, under the bed, behind the chair, asking where else he'd seen monsters. Every place he named, I would spray. The parents did the same routine if I wasn't there, and it was a month probably before he didn't need it any more. Maybe it would work for your son .
Good luck.
Edited to say that I didn't read all of the other responses, lol. Sorry for the repeat, but it really worked well .
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Rest in peace, sweet girl.
Last edited by Soggy Granola : 01-08-2004 at 11:10 PM.
well when Gage was doing this, we did the monster song "go away monster, you can't sleep here" to any tune we could think of, we checked the bed, closets, etc...and gave him a spray bottle. But the BEST thing that helped him ease ALL fears was the movie MOnster's Inc. lol Now he LOVES monsters (or so he says) he asks if Sully or Mike are living in his closet.
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Dawn~~~ER RN Mommy to Gage 9/23/00, Trace 10/2/02, & the sweetest mountain baby Avery Ryann 3/17/04!!! Wife to the love of my life Robert since 2/13/99!!!!!
Monie 
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Wife to the love of my life Robert since 2/13/99!!!!! 
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