2 yo Suddenly Afraid of The Dark?

DD is 2 Yo and ever since she was 3 months old she has been pretty easy to put to bed and learnt how to self settle at an early age, only ever got upset or woke if hungry or sick / teething and in the last 12 months I could count on 1 hand how many times I have got up to her in the night.

As of 3 days ago she is fighting going to bed and if we put her in her cot awake she stands and basically screams and works her self up to a right state, even If I am right there beside her. She is now saying that she is scared of the dark. So I have been putting her to bed in her cot and sitting on a chair next to her with the door ajar so there is light in her room for her to see. She screams. If I put her in bed and leave the door open and stand out side the door so she cant see me for a few seconds she screams. The only way I can get her to go to bed is to sit with her on the couch in the dark with the hall light on and cuddle her till she falls asleep and then put her to bed.

Once she is asleep then she is ok - but if she fully wakes in the night in her room she will scream again and work herself up and the cycle starts again.

We have a night light in her room and her bedroom door is always open when we got to bed and the hall light is on every night so she can see if she wakes up - this makes no difference at the moment.

Is this just a phase?? It breaks me heart that she is scared of the dark! But nothing seems to be working to help allay her fears.

Has anyone else gone through this and how did you solve it??

We put her in bed with us if she wakesin the night but its so uncomfortable as she tosses and turns and kicks me and not to mention the lack of room with 2 adults a 2 year old and a 7 month pregnant tummy!

Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated!

Kate

Bump..

We went through something similar with DS1 when he was 23 months. All of a sudden terrified of being left alone in his room at night. He would scream to the point of gagging and started to climb out of his cot out of desperation. Because of this we turned his cot into a toddler bed, gave him a night light and stayed in the room with him until he would be calm and then tell him I would just be going to the lounge room to get a tissue and then go straight back in. Once he was comfortable with me going out for those few seconds I gradually made my 'errands' lasting longer and longer until he fell asleep waiting. This took about a week from memory, but he was happy to be in his room by himself again.

Thanks Esme!