Help with Hannah's Nightmares?

Hi T.,

My daughter did this when she was about 8 months old for a couple months when she would nap I couldnt figure out what was wrong with her til i asked my mother in law what could be the problem and she said that it could be that she is cutting teeth and it hurts her to the point where she is crying in her sleep! Then i started feeling in her mouth and sure enough she had like 3 teeth coming in at the same time! I started giving her a small dose of tylenol(wit hte docs ok) during the day so she wont be in so much pain from her teeth it stopped almost right away so that MIGHT be what it is! I hope i could help you out and if i didnt maybe someone else can! Good luck hun!

Hi T., I have to agree with the others, it is probably either teething or gas and if you have ever had bad gas then you should know how much it can hurt! Try, before she lays down to give her some tylenol and try the mylecone drops, they are great and get some baby ora jel! it will do the trick and she should be just fine after that.. have you tried just patting her and trying to calm her down instead of waking her up? That way she won't be startled! Are her legs pulled up when she is crying? That would be sign of gas! Good Luck............

Not sure but it sorta sounds like my nephew who had something called night terrors. He was not in pain at all but he was hard to wake up. Sometimes, he would even appear to be awake but in some sort of trance or something. His did correlate with my sister getting divorced & he was about 2 yrs old at the time, not 7 months. I am not sure that 7 month olds can have night terrors but that is the only thing I can think of.
Hope that helps...good luck & I hope it stops.

We are going through a similar situation for the last few weeks with our 8 month old, although she is not asleep but awake. I would recommend reading up on night terrors as it sounds like it could be that since your child is still asleep. With our daughter she had an ear infection which we think turned into some sort of separation anxiety at night - she would wake up and start crying for no reason when she'd been able to soothe herself back to sleep previously. We are using the modified cry it out method - you don't pick your child up, but instead try to soothe them back to sleep by rubbing their back, giving them a paci or calmly singing or talking to them. It's taken a little bit of time and you could have a crying, screaming child for 1/2 an hour in the middle of the night but it is working. The episodes are getting fewer and farther between and when we do soother her now it is usually 5-10 minutes and she's back to sleep. Also, she has her 2 bottom teeth that we can see under her gums but haven't come through yet so it could also be teething. When she is absolutely inconsolable we do give her a dose of infant's tylenol as recommended by the pediatrician. Hope the advice helps and you get some rest soon!

It could possibly be teething or gas. The only thing I can suggest is to first give her some milicon to see if it is gas. If that doesn't work try a little ambesol. This will at least help to eliminate these possiblities.

My son began having nightmares at 5 months and my daughter is going through this now. I tried everything with my son. From giving him a rib sticking meal (usually oatmeal) for dinner so it wasn't hunger pains or gas, the cute musical things that go in the crib, sleeping with his bed sheets so he'd smell my "scent" at night. He still had nightmares. Nothing seemed to work. I did find that a cd of classical music made it better. Not go away, but less freguent. He's almost five and he still listens to the same cd at night. I don't know if this helps but I do think it is a stage. Good luck, J.