My 4 year old daughter's personality is quite the drama queen, fun, life of the party, very loving, imaginative, creative, but then can have alot of melt downs too. Here's the problem, every night she cries in her sleep and wakes up with "stories" she dreamed of. Is this normal? I mean every night she cries out in her sleep. Today it was dinorsaurs chasing her and telling her not to touch the baby. Weird huh? We have a 12 year old son, no babies in our house. Will this pass? I told her this morning maybe she shouldn't watch tv before she goes to bed. We are very causious on watch she watches.
She eats alot of sugar, maybe that's it? No caffine before bed. I am just wondering if its because of her personality, that her brain never settles down, it keeps going and going. Oh and she does take Cingulair every night.
Thanks everyone for your help. I thought I would let you all know what I plan on doing. Pretty much everyone is saying the same thing so no need for any more advice. I am going to switch her to Singulair in the morning. I have attempted to try to take her off of it and the asthma attacks start back every time. Trust me I don't like me or any of my kids to be on a continous medication. But right now until she grows out of it, I don't have another choice, inless I go the natural route, which is a possiblity. Last night I didn't give her the medication and prayed over her more than I do normally and she slept like a baby. Thanks again for all the advice!
Medications such as Cingulair and others in their category give me bad dreams too! I can imagine what they do to a 4-year old. I would speak to her doctor about this and see if there is something else he can suggest for her.
BTW, except for the bad dreams, you have described my 4-year old granddaughter to a "T".
Sugar and caffeine are not healthy for anyone, let alone small people who are growing physically and mentally. Both destroy bone density, as well as put stress on the cardio and other organ systems. There are alternatives that are far more nutritious, such as juices, water, milk, soy drinks, etc. Also, Singulair is not rec'd by most physicians for kids so young. I would suggest getting a second opinion about her allergy/asthma (?) care, as well as her diet. Good luck!
Do research on Singulair!!! I have known several people give this to their children and it has these type of effects. LOOK IT UP....I would not give her anymore of that. Have the doctor give her something else. I teach and seen first hand HUGE differences in a child when off of that....I had no idea the child was on it and when I asked the mom "He seemed different today (in a good way), do you know what may have changed?" She said he did not have his allergy medication. It wasn't until later I found out it was Singulair and someone told me it had controversial findings on the neurological effects it was having on people....Please research it, call your pediatrician. My friend's daughter has night terrors, and I just found out she is on Singulair....I told her what I had read and she now has taken her off of it to see if that is what is causing her issues.
http://www.medications.com/drugs/singulair
Here is one site that shares a lot of peoples experiences with this medication.
Good luck and I hope this is a quick fix for you.
Hi T., PLEASE look at side affects of singulair online. It causes HORRIBLE things to happen to kids! I searched it when my son took it for 2 weeks and was so depressed and lethargic that he wouldn't come off of his bed or stop crying. It can cause everything from nightmares to bad behavior to psychotic episodes! What you will read will scare you to death, many terrible things have happened to kids and by kids because of the mind altering effects of singulair. I almost guarantee you if you take your daughter off of the meds she will stop having the nightmares. It does take a little while for it to get completely out of their systems but you will start noticing better behavior within a day or two.
You can find out more information here, click on the adverse reactions tab. There are millions of websites out here that tell horror stories.
http://www.parentsforsafety.org/17601/10794.html
I was a kid with very vivid dreams - some of which I can STILL tell you every detail, and I'm sure it wasn't every night, but it seemed pretty often in my kid brain. Sometimes I could relate it to something on TV, but most of the time, I think they were just random. As an adult, I still have these every once in a while, but it does seem to increase on certain prescriptions. Haven't had trouble with allergy meds, but you might try switching her Cingulair to mornings. If you are a family that prays, you might also try praying with her before bed for a peaceful sleep. Wishing you peaceful nights!
Some people remember dreams and have very active ones and others do not. Try cutting out the sugar and see if changing the singulair to the morning makes any difference, other than that, if she seems to wake up rested, I wouldn't worry about it.
If it persists, see your doctor, you might need to take her to one of those sleep centers to figure out what is going on.
I agree with Kathy to try having her take the Cingulair in the morning if that is possible. My daughter is the live wire in our house too. I have desert cutoff at 8 p.m. If they don't get it by then, oh well. They go to bed around 10, so that seems to help. My problem is more she has trouble getting to sleep.
Dear T.:
The Lord has given your precious little live wire many gifts, and she is exercising them. Please pray about how to guide and strengthen her in her walk with your family and with God.
Baseline: read foundation scriptures with her and help her memorize the Word of God. They will comfort her every day.
If you have a church in the area that has an AWANA program, I cannot say enough about the blessings of having children [pre-schoolers and grade schoolers] in it. In this day and age, as a grandparent, I see the souless nature of our world, and how children are robbed of being innocent in many so-called "progressive" ways... they are not.
This scripture is a wonderful one at any stage in life:
"For I am the Lord your God {Put her name here},
I am the Lord Who says to you, Fear not {name if you wish}, I will help you." Isaiah 41:13.
Our daughter had some terrible, screaming, choking, sobbing nightmares at a bit younger age. I was exhausted from taking care of her and another baby who was quite ill his first 2 years. My daughter's night terrors were so, so hard. Thankfully at that time, I read a wonderful article in the Home Life Family magazine, and it told of parents telling their little girl to Smile and 'tell' the "monsters and things" in her dream that she was praying for them. Do you know! She told her parents the next morn that she did, and that the monsters Smiled Back and Bowed their heads! We did this with our little 3 yr. old firecracker-cum-Curious Georgette, and she very rarely cried and screamed out any more.
God bless and bless! k
My 5 year old daughter is much the same, and she has experienced the same type of nightmares. Let me tell you what worked wonderfully for us. It was actually suggested to me by another mom friend of mine, whose kids are a little older. We bought a "dream catcher" (you know, those old Indian things w/ feathers and a web design). We told her that, as along ad you hang this over your bed, it will catch all the bad dreams and let only the good and happy dreams come through. I played it up quite a bit, just as she would need, since she is such a "drama queen". So, we hung it over her bed one night, and she was completely fine after. What it did was alleviate the subconscious anxiety, and when she thought having bad dreams wasn't possible, she didn't have any. :-) Now, every night before she goes to bed, we reference the "dream catcher" in some way. Its worked for us!
Hello T.,
definitely no tv before bed time. in fact may be make it no tv after 6pm. it doesn't matter what she's watching, the TV/computer over excites the brain and she won't get a restful sleep. I don't know if you have ever seen the disclaimer/warnings on some video/computer games and how it may affect some people because of the flashing lights, etc... just keep that in mind. By the way, that 'no tv/video games after 6pm rule it's tough to keep... but worth it...I don't always succeed either)
I saw your comment of 'no caffeine before bed time'... (Please note that I'm not trying to be judgemental) four-year-olds should not be having any caffeine... (well I understand there is a small trace in chocolate) but anything with measureable caffeine should be eliminated from her diet...
While looking at the sugars, first cut out the high fructose corn syrup --it may help a lot with the melt-downs. then work on the other sugar. my son cannot tolerate high fructose corn syrup and it's a pain to avoid it! if he drinks fruitpunch w/ high fructose corn syrup... a few hours (and up to 24 hours later) the slightest thing will set him off.... I mean it doesn't matter what you do, it's wrong. everything it's wrong with the world for about 20 minutes. It took me a long time to figure out what it was (over a year). I used to compare it to the effect alcohol has in some people that all it takes is one drink and then they start telling people what's wrong with them and everything they've done wrong for the past 10 years...it might sound kind of funny until I realized that it's messing with his brain! so HFCS banned from our house.
Personally, I think that all that hype about not using sugar... it's all marketing to get us to use something more profitable for he companies. And like the song says, a little bit of sugar makes the medicine go down. (I never thought I'd be quoting Mary Poppins at 6:30 in the morning!)
I don't know if you want to try and switch singulair to the morning time. Oh, when my daughter was on singulair for about a month, her personality changed and it didn't help her asthma/allergies at all. Good luck! ~C.~
Hi T.,
Try and monitor what she is watching right before she falls asleep.That may be triggering the nightmares.What may seem harmless or innocent to us may be terrifying to our kids especially right before sleeping.I had gone through the same experience with my son who is ten and my 4yr old too.I started reading right before they fell asleep and that seemed to help.Hope this helps!
HI T.,
I would pray and ask the Lord for wisdom about your daughter. You will be amazed what He will point out is the cause. My son gets scared a lot and I have been praying about it-it really worked! God showed me some things to do differently. I claim that he is a child of God and that anything evil has to leave and quit tormenting my child. It works too! (Of course I am assuming you are a Christian.) I would get the book The Power of a Praying Parent...it is awesome! I hope this helps and doesn't come across to "preachy".
Of course shes a livewire if you feed her a lot of sugar. You know that a child that age should not be having a lot of sugar. Get her diet in check then take it from there.
okay, this is strange, but this has been happening to us as well, and my 5 yr. old was taking singulair, I took him off and the dreams went away immediately! Please talk to her doctor about giving her something else. There is other meds to give. My little boy has what they call seasonal asthma caused by allergies , that cause chronic coughing. ( and I do mean Lots of chocking coughs!) I haven't started him on anything else, and his coughing is much better. I think the freeze helped. I'm not saying you shouldn't give your daughter anything, by all means but please talk with her pedi about her symptoms and see if there is something else to take.
T.,
If you are a believer in God, pray protection over your daughter's dreams. I pray over my young son's (7 1/2) dreams each night at bedtime...that God would protect His dreams, bless Him with good ones, be sovereign over him...even minister, bless, and "teach" him during the night.
Help her celebrate her great imagination. Create a 'dream' book. Nto a nightmare book. Have her color pictures to go with the stories. They are never scary on paper. At night tell her to dream of the rest of her silly story or give her something pleasant to think about....put the thought in her head. Also try some relaxing destressing music. She is so busy and it is hard to shut down. You are right on with extra stimulation at night like tv and sugar. Down time!!!! Then bed time!!!! Good luck! Soemday you'll have a great collection of bedtime stories.
