Is my 2 1/2 yo sleep-walking?

[dee73]

My 2 1/2 yr old ds has been known to cry in the middle of his day or night sleeps on and off for a few months now, but we have had a new development - now when he cries in the night and you go to his room, he might be standing in the middle of the room, or sitting on a chair. We've also found him asleep on the chair or on the floor in the morning. When he cries his eyes are open but he doesn't respond to our talking to him, although he will cuddle us. So he is awake, but not fully, and he never remembers it in the morning.

Does this sound like he's sleep-walking (I've never known a sleepwalker personally so don't really know what it's like) and should we take him to a doctor?

[Lulu]

Sounds like it to me. I sleep walked (or is the slept walked?lol) as a kid. I did it on school camp once...
I also used to head to the front door, or go to the fridge when I got into my teens. I don't do it anymore, no treatment.

Mum used to walk me back to bed and I'd be fine.
My SDS used to walk too. He could even sit and and watch telly and have a conversation with me without being fully aware. He stopped too, we used to have a joke about it in the morning so he didnt feel embarrassed. He was about 8 then.

Now there is a train of thought about stress causing this type of thing, he might just have a lot going on in his liddle bwain right now. Just guide him back to bed and talk to him softly.

DS has night terrors and thats the extreme version. I've had him screaming and trying to pull open the back door "I want to do the gardening!!", but it seemed to be a life or death situation. Sometimes he yells in bed about thing, like "take it away" so I just soothe him and say "mummy took it away, its all gone" etc. It can work to bring him back to sleep again.

Im not sure if you need to take him to the docs though. I don't know if there is anything they can do?

[~Trish~]

Sounds like sleep walking to me too. I used to be a sleep walker as well, I could climb in and out of my top bunk bed with no problems! I could hold conversations and my sister even woke up once to my foot in her face, somehow I'd climbed into her bed up the other end. It was never a big problem, I never went to a Dr about it and I grew out of it by the time I was about 8 or 9.

If you are concerned that your DS is in danger then I would probably take him to a Dr to get checked out.

[dee73]

Thanks Lulu and Trish - we have had lots of changes in our lives lately (new baby brother, daddy going away on training, and staying with grandparents interstate) so it could just all be a bit much for him. He's such a trooper through the day and hardly ever gets upset about anything, so maybe this is his outlet for his stresses.