Last night, I woke up at 4am and found Aislin asleep on our bedroom floor with her pillow, no blanket. Not sure what to do (move her, etc), I woke Brian and he just said to leave her and toss a blanket on her. I did. She slept there until she woke up this morning at 7am. She had already been up once and been put back to bed. Here is what is going on.. she is afraid of monsters in her room. This has been going on for months now- she is afraid of the monsters in her closet, under her bed, in the toy box, etc... at first, i was thinking... come ON, this is totally another distraction technique and she just wants a reason to climb into bed with us. Then i researched it a little and found out that this is real to her- she is prime age for this to happen. We have tried peeking in closets and under beds. We have tried a flashlight under her pillow at night in case she gets scared. She sleeps with her door wide open and the bathroom light on. We have tried drawing pictures of her monsters and naming them. We have tried "telling" her monsters to leave her room and to go to their own beds and go nite-nite. We have tried the star chart, where she gets a star for every night she stays in her bed and then gets a surprise after so many stars. I feel like I am running out of options. Today, we are going to make a sign for her room "no monsters allowed". I have read some research where it says to just put a pallet on the floor in the parents bedroom and if they come in during the night, to let them sleep there...not sure I want to do that! I know this will eventually go away on it's own. But until then, this is a struggle! Brian and I are getting up several times a night, or being woken up, or being shoved over when she climbs into bed and we are too tired to fight it.
If anyone has ANY ideas at all about how to manage this a little bit, please share! I would totally appreciate it!!
(oh, and she named all the monsters. the last one is Ted.)