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If you’ve ever rushed into your child’s room in the middle of the night to find them screaming, sitting up, and completely inconsolable… and only to have them settle back to sleep like nothing happened… night terrors may be the reason.

Night terrors can be incredibly frightening to witness, but they’re often misunderstood. In this episode, Allison explains what night terrors really are, why they happen, and what parents can do both in the moment and behind the scenes to prevent them.

You’ll also learn one of the most important clues for telling the difference between night terrors and nightmares, and why timing matters more than most parents realize.

Most importantly, we’ll talk about the root cause behind the majority of night terrors and the simple sleep changes that often stop them within days.

Listen to hear:
— What night terrors actually are (and why they’re not dreams)
— The key difference between night terrors and nightmares
— Why night terrors usually happen in the first half of the night
— The most common triggers, including one many parents overlook
— What to do during a night terror (and what NOT to do)
— Why waking your child can sometimes make things worse
— The role overtiredness plays in night terrors
— The sleep schedule changes that often stop them quickly

Next week, we’re continuing the conversation with an episode all about nightmares and why the approach to handling them is different.

Looking for expert guidance on your child’s sleep? Allison offers two free age-specific guides to help you discover how much sleep kids need to thrive—at any age. Get your free copy now: 0-2 Years Old or 3 to 10 years old

From baby sleep to toddler sleep, daycare naps to sleep training—How Long ’Til Bedtime? is the podcast for parents who want practical, guilt-free sleep tips they can actually use.

Hosted by pediatric sleep coach Allison Egidi, each episode delivers real solutions for every stage—from navigating newborn sleep struggles and weaning night feedings to helping your 3-year-old fall asleep independently (and stay asleep!). Whether you’re trying to make sense of daycare sleep patterns, craving your evenings back, or simply need a working mom podcast to keep you grounded, you’re in the right place.

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Scroll down for a full transcript of this episode.

233. Night Terrors in Kids: What They Are, Why They Happen, and How to Stop Them
Before we dive in today, I have to share an example of how well intentioned adults in a child’s life can unintentionally plant a seed of an idea into a child’s brain that can have major negative consequences. I was recently told about a preschooler who is participating in a school play. So cute, right? And this particular kiddo is still happily in his crib. Well, the play was written by the teacher and it’s about a baby who wants to climb out of their crib. I’m sorry, what? Why would we tell a bunch of preschool age children a story about a baby wanting to climb out of their crib? I can only imagine how many families will have a child suddenly climbing out of their crib by the time this play is performed.

I feel like we should be there handing out business cards. I have to be honest, if my child was at this preschool, I would have to be having a conversation with the teacher, the administrator about how this is a risky choice to make with a bunch of young kids. But that is not my school, so I will leave it be. But I hear about things like this a lot from parents where someone has a seemingly lovely idea and it can get kids into a little bit of trouble.

Okay, on to today’s episode. Today I’m covering all things night terrors. If your child has been struggling with night terrors or you’re just trying to figure out if they’re actually having night terrors, this episode is for you.

Hey there, Allison here. Welcome back to How Long ‘Til Bedtime. Okay, imagine this. It’s the middle of the night, you hear your child, they’re screaming, you rush in, and your child is sitting up in their crib or their bed, eyes open, and completely inconsolable. You try to talk to them, you say their name, you try to hold them, but it’s like they can’t hear you. They’re not really making sense. It’s like they’re looking right through you and they’re not calming down. And then just as suddenly as it started, it stops. They lie back down, they go back to sleep. And in the morning, they likely have absolutely no memory of it.

If this sounds familiar, there’s a good chance your child had a night terror. Today, I want to help you understand exactly what night terrors are, why they happen and what to do in the moment. And most importantly, how to get them to stop. And next week we’re going to talk about nightmares, which are a different thing, even though parents often get the two confused.

Let’s start with what a night terror actually is. A night terror is not a dream. Your child is not awake or they’re partially awake. They’re in a state between deep sleep and waking and their brain kind of gets stuck in that transition. The result can look absolutely terrifying to a parent. If you’ve ever looked up YouTube videos on night terrors, there are some very disturbing videos. Your child may be screaming or crying loudly, sitting up or standing in their bed, their eyes might be wide open, but it’s like they’re not really seeing what’s in front of them. They could be thrashing or moving around saying things that don’t really make sense. And it’s really challenging to actually comfort them. And here’s what makes it so confusing and alarming. They look like they are awake. Their eyes are most often open and sometimes they are getting up and actually standing or walking, but they are not fully awake. They can’t really process what you’re saying. They are not registering your presence the way that they would if they had actually woken up and were scared from a nightmare.

Most night terrors last anywhere from a minute to up to 15 or 20 minutes, maybe even a little bit longer. And when it’s over, your child will typically just go back to sleep like nothing happened. Night terrors most commonly occur in children between one and 12 years of age. And research suggests that it may affect one to 6 % of children at some point in their childhood. I see it most often with children between two and four years old. The good news is that most kids outgrow them completely by the time they reach their teenage years.

And here’s something really important for parents to understand. And it’s one of the key ways that you can tell the difference between a night tear and a nightmare. Night terrors happen during deep sleep. Specifically, they occur during what’s called non-REM sleep, the deepest stage of the sleep cycle. And because deep sleep is most concentrated in the first half of the night, night terrors almost always happen in the earlier part of the night. So if your child wakes up screaming at 10 or 11 p.m. and you feel like they’re not fully there, they’re not registering that you’re there, maybe is a better way to put it, then it’s much more likely that it is a night terror.

If they wake up scared and crying at 4 a.m. or 5 a.m. and they’re kind of telling you what happened in that dream, then it’s more likely that they had a nightmare. We’ll talk more about nightmares next week, but just tuck that timing detail away because it’s a really useful clue.

Now let’s talk about why night terrors happen in the first place because this is where things can get actionable for parents. There is a hereditary component to night terrors. If either parent experienced night terrors as a child or if either was a sleepwalker, your child is more likely to be prone to them. Night terrors and sleepwalking actually share a similar mechanism and often run in the same families. But and this is a really important but, even if your child has a predisposition to night terrors, night terrors have triggers. And when you remove the trigger, you can often eliminate the night terrors entirely.

The most common triggers are being overtired. This is by far the most common trigger I see in the work I do with families. When a child is sleep deprived, whether from skipped naps, late bedtimes, or an inconsistent schedule, their brain has a harder time moving smoothly through the sleep cycle. And that’s when they’re most vulnerable to getting stuck in that in-between state and experiencing a night terror.

Another common trigger is being out of alignment with their natural sleep rhythm. This is related to overtiredness, slightly different. So even if your child is getting a decent amount of sleep or it feels like they’re getting quote enough sleep, if bedtime is happening at the wrong time, most often too late for their biological sleep rhythm, it can affect the quality and the architecture of their sleep during the night.

Another trigger is stress or big changes. A new sibling, starting a new school, travel, a disrupted routine. Anything that raises a child’s overall stress level can trigger a night terror. Fever or just general illness. When the body is in that kind of fight mode, sleep quality often suffers and that can bring on a night terror. Certain medications, specifically, I want to mention melatonin. And I want to mention melatonin because I don’t think parents hear this often enough. Melatonin can trigger night terrors in some children. I’ve worked with many families who had no idea that melatonin was the culprit for their child’s night terrors. And once they stopped giving it, the night terrors completely stopped. So if your child is having night terrors and they’re also taking melatonin, this is absolutely worth looking into.

Now I want to share something I see all the time in the work I do with families because I think it might feel familiar to some of you. One of the most common situations where I get a call to help with night terrors involves toddlers. And the story is often similar. The child is overtired, either they’ve dropped their nap too early or the nap has become inconsistent and short or bedtime has drifted later and later potentially because of the nap. And the accumulated sleep debt, the chronic state of just being a little bit overtired is exactly what’s fueling the night terrors.

The parents are typically exhausted and very stressed by these intense nighttime events. And they’re often asking me if there could be something neurologically wrong with their child. And while I always encourage parents to call their pediatrician and loop them in when something worries them or seems new or unusual, the fix in the vast majority of cases does not require medical attention. It just requires more sleep. Not only more of it, sometimes it’s better timed or reallocated differently between the day sleep and the night sleep, and it needs to be more consistent. And when we address the sleep and we get it more consistent and we focus on the balance between day sleep and night sleep, the night terrors stop and often they stop within days. So this is something to consider. If you have a toddler and that sounds familiar, you may need to really take a new look at their sleep schedule and how it’s allocated between day and night sleep.

Okay, let’s talk about what to do when your child is having a night terror. I know this is hard because every instinct you have as a parent is going to tell you to like wake them up, shake them out of it, make it stop. But here’s the thing, intervening can actually make it worse because remember your child is not fully awake. They can’t process your presence the way that they normally would. And if you wake them or try to wake them, can sometimes extend the episode or make them more agitated, meaning now they are fully awake and they’re very hard to settle. And I have found that a lot of parents tell me that their child becomes more likely to have another night terror after they wake them up. So I’ve seen that time and again over the years when parents fully wake their child out of a night terror. It’s almost like they go back into it once they go back to sleep.

So here’s what I do recommend. Try to stay calm. I know that’s easier said than done when your child is screaming, but your calm presence is important even if they aren’t registering fully that you’re there and you can absolutely whisper reassuring words to them, but very calmly and not trying to shake them out of it. Keep them safe. Make sure that they can’t fall out of the bed and hurt themselves. If they’re standing or moving around, can gently guide them away from anything dangerous. But if they’re just sitting up in bed and flailing around a little bit, but they’re not in danger, don’t restrain them. And again, try not to wake them up. This is kind of important. If you fully wake your child during the night terror, like I said, they might have a very intense reaction. And so it’s actually better to just be nearby, be calm, keep them safe and let the episode run its course.

And then don’t ask them about it the next day. Since they typically have no memory of it, bringing it up can actually create anxiety around sleep that didn’t even exist before because now they’re wondering about these things that are happening during the night that seem to stress you out and at a minimum they don’t remember and that can make people anxious. And most importantly, know that the night terror will end. Your child will settle back down. They will go back to sleep and they’re likely going to have no idea that anything happened. So you can stay focused on how can we prevent them going forward.

So let’s talk about what actually can make night terrors stop because I’m guessing if you’re listening to this episode and you’ve made it this far, that’s what you really want to know. The most effective treatment for night terrors in the vast majority of cases is more sleep that is aligned with your child’s natural rhythm. And here’s what that looks like practically. Typically that means moving bedtime earlier. I know that might sound counterintuitive and you might think if my child is waking up in the night, wouldn’t I maybe keep them up later so that they have more sleep pressure and they’re more tired and they’ll kind of fall into a harder sleep? And the answer to that is no, that typically is going to make things worse.

An overtired brain struggles to move smoothly through sleep cycles. Moving bedtime earlier, and sometimes that just means 15, 20, 30 minutes can make a significant positive difference. So without having all the details on your situation, I would say start there. Move bedtime a little bit earlier and see what happens over the next week. And while every child is unique, generally speaking, in these situations, I usually advise people to protect the nap if a child is having night terrors. For those children who would still benefit from a nap, a skipped or shortened nap creates that exact kind of overtiredness that can be the trigger. So if your child’s been fighting the nap, it’s worth asking whether they truly no longer need it or whether the nap timing is off or it’s just kind of a behavioral thing that needs to be addressed and adjusted. That can often look like bringing back a rest time every single day. So there’s consistency to the rest time so that on those days that your child needs the nap, they are put into a situation where they can take it.

And be consistent. Night terrors love inconsistency. Irregular sleep schedules, late nights on the weekends, travel, although I want you guys to travel, but keep an eye on it. There are sleep schedules when you travel because all of these things can create conditions for night terrors to spring to life and stay alive. The more consistent you can be with your child’s sleep schedule, the more stable their sleep architecture becomes. And if you’ve been giving melatonin, get curious about that. Talk to your pediatrician about whether it’s time to take a break and to see if those changes may help.

And this is easier said than done, but trying to reduce overall stress where you can. If there is something big going on in your child’s life, a transition, a change in home, something that they seem worried about, try to address that during the day and remember that getting more sleep and being well rested makes it feel a little more manageable to move through stress. So focus on more connection, more reassurance, more consistency during waking hours to reduce stress that might be feeding these nighttime disruptions.

So to wrap things up, night terrors can be very stressful and very scary to witness. I want to acknowledge that. But they are typically not dangerous to your child and they almost always have a root cause that you can address. If your child is having night terrors, the first place I suggest you look is at their sleep. Are they getting enough of it? Is bedtime happening at the right time for their body? Is their sleep schedule consistent? Because in most cases, especially when we’re talking about the toddler and preschool years, the answer to why my child is having night terrors is fairly simple. It’s typically that they need more sleep and when they get it, the night terrors very often disappear.

So next week we’re going to talk about nightmares, which are kind of completely different experience and they happen at a different time in the night and there is a different approach to stopping them. So come back and tune in for that.

If today’s episode helped you make sense of what’s been going on in the middle of the night at your house, I’m thrilled. If you’re listening and thinking you have a friend or a relative who might be dealing with this at their house, please take a second and share this episode with them. And as always, thanks so much for listening. I’ll see you back here next week. Bye for now.