Friday, September 21, 2012

dealing with bad dreams

We aren't battling night terrors anymore. Which is awesome. But, Princess has been having a lot of bad dreams recently. Last night in her dreams the Electric Company pranksters were trying to kill her. So of course, we went through the typical rationalizing ideaslike, "It's just a show. The pranksters characters and the actors who play them would never try to kill anyone." The "change the dream into something happy." thing etc hasn't worked either. We tried praying as well as a few other things. None of these things have worked. But, I think we might have found a winner. The idea that seems to be most effective is making up silly stories that she will try to dream about. 

Tonight I came up with this dry erase chart which is along her bed. We made a list of  "things" or characters of the story, "places" and "actions" to make up a story. She enjoyed putting different stories together like "The unicorn went to New York and played the bongo." Later she made up a story where a pig stole a Picasso from a museum. She enjoyed helping to decide the places and things. I had to do most of the actions. But, that doesn't really matter. 

It was much more fun to go to bed to these ideas than to her expressing worries over what her nightmares would be tonight.

3 comments:

  1. The dry erase board is a great idea! I remember as a kid having terrible nightmares. So glad I don't anymore. I didn't realize the Electric company was still around. I remember it when I was a kid, if it's the same show.

    ReplyDelete
  2. They have a new cast on PBS and it is super cute. She usually loves the show. I like it b/c its helped her learn to read. She loves the dry erase board too:) I hope it works for her long term:)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Great idea....Kaden has bad dreams all the time. You are full of the best ideas! :)

    ReplyDelete

Please leave me a comment. I am desperate for adult conversation:)