My 3 year old is terrified of "monsters". He is always saying he's afraid to go back our hallway into his room or even to the bathroom by himself (even if the lights are on) because he says he's afraid of the monsters. I don't know where he got the idea of monsters being in our house. Being a Catholic family, I've even taken Holy Water to the walls and carpeting in all the rooms...
How can I help him understand that there aren't any monsters and he's not going to get hurt, he's safe?
Hi, Becky:
There is a book by M. White, 1984: "Fear Busting & Monster Taming: An Approach to the Fears of Young Children."
Dulwich Centre Review
Hope this helps. Good luck. D.
My hubby always told all our kids to call him when the monsters come...because he was hungry and he had heard that they were very delicious when you bake them in the oven and eat them with ketchup! This always made them giggle...
My daughter (also 3) has started saying things of this nature (but also afraid of the tigers in our room, etc). Anytime she tells me she's afraid of something, I pretend to catch it, eat it and burp afterwards. I will also try the monster spray as I've heard that works well with kids too. I do also tell my daughter that monsters are not real - but realize that this makes no sense to a 3 year old because to her, they ARE real!!!
It is definately a phase. My son is four and is starting to realize monsters are just pretend. At 3-years old he was convinced they were going to get him. We are Christian and had our house dedicated and everything. We even tried "monster spray," watching "Monster's Inc." which seemed to help somewhat then I took a different approah. So, with my son, we pretended the monsters had mommies and dadies that wanted the baby monsters to be nice. I would even pretend that the monsters were Christian and the mommy monsters would call their baby monsters home to go to bed, so that they could say their prayers. This seemed to help the most.
I read in a book somewhere, I would have to locate where I read it, anyhow, I read that children sometimes make up monsters to compensate for things they just don't understand or scared of. For instance, when reading any book, watching a show, cartoon or any other source of material that has a conflict in it, children can't seem to think abstractly so they make up a monster to give concreteness to what they are scared about.
Another way to help a child to say "bye" to monsters is to talk with the child about all the abstract things they are scared about. For instance abstract reasons can include, even simple things like: mom leaving child with babysitter, which has to happen sometimes, we need breaks too; mom yelling or disciplining for various reasons, children are scared when we discipline them, but they do need to be taught to help around the house, eat, and various other things; also as simple as mom or dad wanting a child to eat a certain type of food that the child doesn't like. Children can have all types of reasons for having their monsters, they do grow out of them around 5 to 8 years old, when they start understanding a few of the things that are abstract.
My daughter who is 6 and like my son at 3 believed that monsters would get her, no longer believes monsters are real. I hope this helps. Good luck
This really is a phase most kids go through. Saying there aren't any doesn't satisfy him. You could give him a little flashlight or a can of room spray and tell him that it will make the monsters run away, or something like that. He needs to feel he can chase them away, not you, because they come when you're not always there.
Well I am also Catholic and all my kids went thru being scared in their rooms. With my oldest it was just vague..he kept saying mommy I am scared. So I got a clear spray bottle at the dollar store and filled it with water. I put a label on it and it said monster spray. We sprayed his room twice a day and by the 6th day or so he forgot all about it.
My middle one saw a scary movie and for a month or so had to sleep with his older brother.
The situation that kind of freaked me out a bit. My daughter last winter say told me there was an old lady coming into her room at night. Its only my three kids my husband and I that live in the house. She was too detailed to make this up ...in my opinion.
I have had some unusual experience along that line.
Anyhow I didnt make a big deal about it. She stopped talking about it.
The monster "spray" worked for my niece. My son recently started saying that there were bugs on him. He isn't afraid of them, just make believe right now. i told him that if he doesn't want them there, tell them to go away. Did they go away? He will say yes, they flew away. I plan to use this technique when he starts with the monsters. It is actually a developmental milestone.
Has he seen the movie 'Monsters Inc.?' That may give him a different view of monsters. It's such a cute movie... Also- you could give him a flash light and say it's to ward off monsters... (or something like that)
Good luck!
There are a bunch if ideas about how to calm your child in the book The Happiest Toddler on the Block by Harvey Karp. It is a normal phase that all children go through. Think about the friendly monsters on Sesame Street. This too will pass. Best of luck.
Could it be that during the day either in books or TV they see monsters or scary figures? Just this week in VBS we've had a dressed up gorilla (VERY real looking and acting!) and my 2 yr. old has had to sleep with me every night. My husband suggests that it is because she sees the gorilla and for that reason she is afraid to sleep in her own room. I would monitor what he sees during the day.
While this may not be a popular idea, when my sons went through this (I think all kids do at some point), we talked a lot about how they were going to fight back. The monsters turned in to dragons and they were the knights in shinning armor that were going to slay the dragons. Once they felt empowered to fight back, the terror stopped.
I used the same technique with bad dreams. I'd tell them to go back to sleep and dream a different ending, one in which they were victorious. My 16 year old told me once, not long ago, that he still uses that technique and that it was very effective.
Good luck!
Ditto on the "monster spray". It worked for my son at that age. I would spray it under his bed, around his door frame etc...and it calmed him...eventually, he grew out of it.
One addition to the moster spray idea - I added lavender to the water and let them spray and keep the bottle with them. My son also does better when he has a flashlight.
There might be some books from the library that you can read to him that might help (friendly monsters, etc.).
