When Connor was a toddler, he had a couple of episodes of night terrors. Although it totally freaked us out the first time, we read up on it and handled it okay the second. And that was that.
Then a few weeks ago, he got out of bed about an hour after he had gone to sleep. Chip went up to check on him (our kids NEVER get out of bed before morning) and found him running around the upstairs, giggling and talking jibberish, while holding his crotch in that special "I'm a boy and I need to pee" way. We tried to talk to him but he didn't respond- he was NOT awake, although his eyes were open. We finally guided him into the bathroom, and upon releasing his bladder his giggles became total guffaws- peeing was the funniest thing that had ever happened! We tried really hard not to laugh, got him back in bed safely, and closed the child gate at the top of the stairs just in case.
At the time we talked a bit about his night terrors, and how that was related to sleepwalking, and maybe it's just something he's prone to do. We didn't feel weird about then, but we did this past week when he had an episode that seemingly combined the two. We heard him get out of bed, and Chip and Roy went to check on him. Again, he had his eyes open but he was not awake. Only this time, he was HYSTERICAL. Screaming and speaking a mix of jibberish and phrases like"turn it off." When I ran up to see what was happening, he pointed and shrieked and acted scared to death. We got him to go to the bathroom and settle back in the bed, where he cried to himself until he was able to come out of it and go back to normal sleep. Chip watched him to make sure he was safe, then came back downstairs so we could compare stories.
Thinking back there were two other times when something like this had happened, but we didn't really realize what was going on. One was on a car trip, when he talked jibberish and couldn't explain to me what was wrong until finally he peed on himself and went back to sleep. The other was one time at his grandparents' house when he was wandering around upset until Roy held him to calm him down, at which point Connor peed all over Roy. As you can guess, our crack diagnostic team quickly realized that a need to pee seems to be the common thread to Connor's sleepwalking incidents. (The night terrors occurred when he was still in diapers, so I can't speak to those.)
This post has no point, other than to share with you what I've been Googling constantly this weekend and to tell you that you should probably make sure Connor pees before going to bed if he's spending the night at your house. So far he's only hitting the toilet in 50% of cases, so you might be in trouble if you don't. The good news is, this usually goes away by the time a kid is 15-17, so I've only got ten more years or so to be freaked out by it.
A Story about Pens
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