The Difference Between Nightmares & Night Terrors
As a parent, it is quite a heartbreaking moment when you hear your young child’s cry of fear coming from their bedroom. You rush to their side and they cling to you, or perhaps continue crying and appear agitated or confused. If your child is a baby or young toddler, they may not be able to verbally tell you what the problem is or describe their bad dream to you.
So how do you know if your child is having a night terror or a nightmare?
First let’s talk about what a nightmare is.
What is a Nightmare?
A nightmare is, simply put, a bad dream. Your child may dream about something as simple as being chased by a dog or a bear, or an older child may have a very complex dream involving some sort of trauma or social calamity. Nightmares tend to be a reflection of what the child has gone through during the day. Perhaps they watched a too-scary movie. Perhaps their parents argued or they witnessed an accident.
Nightmares are a normal part of growing up. They are very common in children up to the age of 7, as the child learns how to process the emotions and experiences they go through. Then again as the child enters adolescence, more complex issues arise in their lives which they must now learn to navigate and nightmares can become frequent again.
Nightmares take place during REM sleep. “Rapid eye movement sleep” is the lightest stage of sleep, which takes place toward the end of the night.
What is a Night Terror (or also called a “Sleep Terror”)?
A night terror or “sleep terror” is a partial arousal from Stage 4 sleep, the deepest phase of sleep which occurs between 1 and 4 hours after the initial bedtime. The child is not fully awake, yet exhibits startling behaviors such as crying or screaming, thrashing around, or acting confused or agitated. Children and babies as young as 6 months can have these partial Stage 4 arousals resulting in night-terror-behaviors.
Parents can easily misattribute these behaviors to reactions to a nightmare, and rush in to comfort their child. However, during a night terror, the child doesn’t fully awaken and recognize their parents. They continue crying or moving about, and get agitated when held or hugged.
A night terror can be very alarming for a parent, because they wish to comfort their child but the child cannot be comforted until fully waking.
However, the child will have no recollection of the terror upon fully waking. There was no bad dream or pain occurring during the terror which the child could later remember or verbalize.
The child will quickly fall back asleep after the sleep terror has passed.
Ensuring that your child has an adequate amount of daytime sleep through a solid routine, avoiding overtiredness, will help reduce the occurrences of night terrors. This is where I can help you!
How to Help Your Child After a Nightmare
Physically being there to comfort your child after a nightmare is the best thing to do. Your child will wake up after being frightened by the dream and likely cry or call out to you. You may need to reassure them, give more hugs and kisses, and possibly sit by their bedside a while. Some children are so frightened by the nightmare that they are reluctant to go back to sleep.
We do want to avoid making such a big deal out of the nightmare that the child grows to depend on having you sit at the bedside for extended periods of time or is reluctant to go to bed each night. Reassure your child that you will protect them and keep them safe. A toddler doesn’t understand the concept of “it was just a dream”, but they do pick up on your firm, kind, and solid presence. Likewise, if you are anxious or alarmed they will sense that as well and continue to have their own anxiety.
Avoid activities such as making a big show of shining lights under beds and into closets, or spraying “monster spray”. These activities reinforce the child’s fear that monsters exist - and that you, too, believe they could be lurking within your home.
The only “strategies” or “techniques” which you should use to help a child with nightmares take place during the day: talking with their teachers, spending one on one time with your child, monitoring the shows they are watching, and setting firm yet kind boundaries.
How to Help Your Child After a Night Terror
Since your child is not fully awake or cognizant during a night terror, physically and verbally comforting them will do nothing to stop the terror. In fact, intervening can make the behaviors worse.
Attend your child’s room during the night terror, to ensure that they are safe, especially if they are thrashing about. If they recognize you and indicate a desire for your help, go ahead and do your best to comfort them. Otherwise, wait, and you will see that the terror resolves and the child falls back asleep.
Fully waking your child can result in a longer amount of time elapsing before they go back to sleep, which can cause your child to be overstimulated and overtired. Your child will get much better sleep if they are allowed to wait out the sleep terror and quickly go back to sleep.
If your child does wake, or when you talk to them in the morning, do not mention that they behaved strangely, or ask them if they had any dreams or pains. A toddler especially will take these “suggestions” and nod their head yes or make up a story to please you.
Your child is likely to soon grow out of having sleep terrors.
Is it a Nightmare or a Sleep Terror?
So to recap how to tell the difference between bad dreams and sleep terrors:
SLEEP TERROR: Affects children and babies as young as six months old
NIGHTMARE: Affects children 1-7 and adolescents
SLEEP TERROR: Child is not fully awake and does not recognize or respond to you
NIGHTMARE: Child wakes after a nightmare and cries out to you
SLEEP TERROR: Child screams or thrashes during the terror
NIGHTMARE: Child only cries after waking up from the nightmare
SLEEP TERROR: Occurs during the first few hours of the night
NIGHTMARE: Occurs toward the end of the night
SLEEP TERROR: Child easily goes back to sleep
NIGHTMARE: Child resists going back to sleep
