Off Topic Sleep walking.

[Deanna]

Seriously going to have to get alarms on the doors. Either a full home alarm system (which wouldn't be a bad idea) or some kind of contact alarms for the doors.
Kadee and her sleep walking it driving me bananas. She has done it more since we moved into this house than she has her whole life.
Normally she will end up in the bathroom or her closet. But one night when Steve was here (not long after we moved in) she came out and kept trying to turn on a light on the living room wall (that wasn't there) then she kept sitting in the chair by the fire place. She would get back up..try to turn on the "light" again. This went on and on.
Then about 5 or 6 nights ago about 2-3 am I hear the gargage door rattling. Normally we just close the main garage door and leave the inside garage door unlocked. Since Steve has been gone this two weeks I have been locking the inside door too. Well, like I said I am in bed and I hear the door rattling. I go in there and there is Kadee in the laundry room just tugging and pulling on the door knob trying to get it open. I ask her what she is doing. (she will talk with you..and her eyes are always wide open). She says "They aren't supposed to be doing that. They will get hurt. I have to go tell them to stop" Who it was, or what they were doing I couldn't get from her. But she just kept saying she had to go tell them. I finally got her directed back in the right direction. Asked her if she needed to use the bathroom before going back to bed, she said yes. She goes in there and goes. Then she just kinda sits there. So I hand her some toilet paper and tell her to clean herself. She uses it to wipe her face..lol. (wrong cheeks babe..lol). Then last night she was trying to get out the back door where we let the dogs out. She was fumbling around with the lock on that one (we always lock this door so she is used to having to unlock it). Luckily it was 11 pm and I was still up.
It just scares the crud out of me that the last two times (twice in a week) she has been sleep walking she has tried to get outside.What in the world would have happened if I hadn't caught her those times? Where would she go? What could happen to her?
I can't stand the thought of that. We are going to have to get some kind of alarm that will sound when the exterior doors are opened at night.

This kid is going to be the death of me, one way or the other

(Steve is her dad/my hubby. Just thought I would add that..lol)

 

[MaryA]

Oh my goodness! That is very scary. Do you think maybe just some bells on her door or something might work? Of course, you may not sleep very well if you have one ear straining to hear the bells. Otherwise, maybe sliding bolts or those chain locks up on all exterior doors high enough where she can't reach them? Definitely better to do something, even if it seems drastic (like drilling holes in the doors of your new house to put on extra locks) than to do nothing and wish that you had. Hopefully it's just a phase that she will grow out of quickly. Couldn't hurt to take her to the pediatrician either. Not that I think there's anything "wrong" with her, but a doc could at least tell you if this is common, how long this phase is likely to last, and what sort of safety precautions you should be taking. Maybe he/she might even know of something that might help. Good luck, and let us know what you end up doing!

 

[Deanna]

Thank you.
It is scary. I worry about her.
She has done this he whole life but the past three times have been so much more involved than they ever have been before. Normally she would just get up, walk into the living room, bathroom, her closet..ect. You would ask her what she was doing, and that seemed to snap her out of it. She would say she didn't know (sometimes would rattle off something I didn't understand) and just go back to bed.
But the past three times she doesn't wake up when you talk to her and she keeps trying to do whatever she was doing.
I did mention it to our family doctor a couple years ago. He didn't seem too concerned and said that is is fairly common in young kids. And that she will probably grow out of it in her teens or early aulthood. He said as long as she isn't doing anything to hurt herself (which at the time she wasn't) not to worry too much about it. Just make sure there isn't anything she could get hurt on. (if she were to run into it or trip..ect)
We don't take the kids to a pedi. We have always just taken them to our family doctor. He is a GP but "specializes" in pediatrics. Guess I could take her back to see him again and see what he suggests. I really don't want to medicate her.
But I will surely have to do something with the doors somehow that will either alert us or keep her from opening it. I even worry about a high dead bolt or chain lock. If she knows it is there and knows that it is locked then she will just try to get it unlocked. (hopefully we would hear her dragging the chair or whatever over so she could reach it). But the garage door she didn't try to unlock because she isn't used to having to unlock it. But the backdoor she is, and she was in the process of unlocking that by time I heard her and got out of my chair to walk over there. I guess I just worry that if she knows in her sleep to unlock that lock that is normaly locked then she would know in her sleep to unlock the dead bolt or chain that is normally locked at night. But if there was an alarm, and she didn't know the code..she wouldn't be able to disarm it.
I'm probably over thinking this...but I worry

 

[bogwoppit]

It is not fun at all. My son, and my brother, was a sleepwalker. He did grown out of it very young, probably 10 or so.

We put extra locks on the house to keep him in, at the same time we put extra smoke detectors as well, because having the locks would make it harder for us all to get out in a fire. We also have a burglar alarm on the house that goes off if the doors are opened from inside or out.

 

[gymnastbeth]

This reminds me of myself, I used to wake up in the WEIRDEST places. I haven't done in since around sixth grade, but boy, is it odd. I would wake up in the basement, in the bathtub, and never know what I was doing there. My mom said that my eyes were wide open, but I would just walk around, sometimes mumbling something. Closing my door when I went to bed and then putting a sock over the door knob made it stop. When I reached to turn the knob while sleep walking, I didn't have enough strength in my hand to turn the knob because the sock just slipped around. (If that makes sense?)

 

[Deanna]

That makes sense. And worth trying, at least until we can get something more permanent in place. I hope it works for her. She was trying to get the lock undone on the back door though. She didn't get it undone..but she was sure trying. I got to her pretty fast (as I was still up at that time) and wonder if she ever would have gotten it undone given enough time. The sock is a good idea though. Will put socks on all the exterior doors tonight..lol.
Im sure it will make for interesting conversations when we have guest.
Plus, now I have a use for those missed matched socks..lol

 

[sleeplessinnewyork]

Hi! I read somewhere that putting a big sock over a doorknob would help because when a person is sleeping they don't have a lot of strength, and the sock would move around in circles, making it hard to turn the doorknob. Also, I know a girl on my old team had a bar at home, and she would sleepwalk to it at night and do pullovers on it until her parents found out and put the bar away before nighttime. So, put away gymnastics equipment if you have any, or gymnastics-developed instincts will take over.

 

[wallinbl]

My grandmother-in-law has Alzheimer's and often has no idea what year it is, what city she's in, etc. Sometimes, she wakes up at night believing it's 1941 and she's on vacation in such and such place and she's late for dinner or something. The family members that care for her have something that's hooked up to her bed that alerts them when she gets out of it. I believe that it's a pressure sensitive mat that covers the length of the bed where you'd step if you were getting out of it. I don't know how expensive it is or whether it's a reasonable cost for sleepwalking, but it seems like it would work for you as well. You could try putting one in some place that would go off if she left a certain part of the house, but wouldn't go off if she just went to the bathroom or something.

Related to the sock thing - there are plastic covers that go over doorknobs for child proofing your house. They're cheap. They're a bit of a pain to use as you have to squeeze somewhat hard to get them to have enough friction to turn the knob. DD managed to learn that if she would hang from the doorknob while twisting, she could get it open (and tear up the door while she was doing it).

 

[Deanna]

all great ideas. And I am putting them all away in my mind as possible uses for the future.
Funny that you say that about the child proof door knob covers. We had those both when Kadee was a baby and when her brother was a baby. Basically they stayed on our doors or about 3-4 yrs. (Kadee and Buddy are 18 months apart). By time it was all over, Kadee was the one that had to open the doors for her dad because he just couldnt get it to work..lol. Her brother never figured it out..but Kadee could do it better than we could.

 

[LiveLoveTumble]

My friend's house has an alarm system that tells you when a door or window has been opened, and it says which one. So, if you opened the front door, this funny monotone voice will go, "Front door open." You could set it to go off only at night too. I think they have it because they have a little 5 year old girl.

 

[sleeplessinnewyork]

Oops, I just realized that my post was really similar to gymnastbeth's. Sorry!

 

[CoachGoofy]

I used to sleepwalk. And sleep condition. And once, not to terrify you or anything, sleep drive. I ended up going to ridiculous lengths to not let that happen again (as in, throw my keys backwards over my shoulder into a laundry pile before I went to bed & then putting something heavy in front of my door, that could have been disasterous!) & I've got bells & strategically placed obstacles.

It's mostly a stress thing for me. I hope she outgrows it soon, or that you find workable solutions, that must be so scary for a mom.

 

[MaryA]

Sleep drive? Eek!

 

[coachmolly]

My brother had some sleep walking issues when he was younger, no going outside but he would get things out of the fridge and even tried to hit my dad once. My mom's brothers also had issues with sleep walking, so I imagine it has some kind of genetic component. You could see if any aunts, uncles, or cousins have/had similar difficulties.
Maybe you could try doing things to get her to "wind down" before bed? Quiet time for an hour before bed, Sleepytime Tea, whatever helps her relax. I know I have problems with my mind and body still going when I go to sleep and while I don't sleep walk, I wake up feeling exhausted and have been told it's like I'm running a marathon in my sleep. I recall reading something similar in Dominique Moceanu's autobiography years ago, she was so wound up and tuned in to gymnastics that she would just keep doing it in her sleep. Those kinds of things might have nothing to do with Kadee, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to throw it out there.

 

[LiveLoveTumble]

We put extra locks on the house to keep him in, at the same time we put extra smoke detectors as well, because having the locks would make it harder for us all to get out in a fire. We also have a burglar alarm on the house that goes off if the doors are opened from inside or out.

Why did you just copy bog's post?

 

[txgymfan]

It is a spam bot and has been banned.

 

[Aussie_coach]

That is very concerning, there was a problem with one of the sleeping medications (stilnox) where people were sleep walking and they would drive, cook, even commit crimes, people had severely hurt themselves too. I don't mean to scare you either, but I would return to the doctor and explain that the problem has gotten more severe, there must be something they can do.