11 yr old too scared to play in her bedroom.

[goosegirl]

My sisters 11yr old girl is too scared to be left upstairs to play. She wont go to the toilet unless you follow her up there. It makes no differance whether she is with her mum at home or at our place with us.

Does anyone else have this problem?

GG.

[Annabel]

:unsure:

hI GG, my daughter was (and sometimes still is) like this...but she is 8, so I can understand it...she feels a bit anxious on her own and wants me to accompany her...in case there is some kind of monster lurking under her bed or in her cupboard or summat...she is usually OK once she is in there...

I dont have a lot of patience with it Im afraid...my husband understands it better as he used to be like that when he was small, so he often gives in to her if she says she doesnt want to go upstairs on her own...I dont like to pander to it, in case she never grows out of it....am i being mean? :unsure: i just want her to grow up with an independent streak, rather than a needy one....

[TharSheBlows]

I was never scared in that way but when I was a similar age I was terrified of my Wurzel Gummidge doll that sat in the corner of my bedroom.

I think watching Poltergeist (the clown scene) probably had something to do with it!!

[Bonkers Mad!!!]

i was scared of "upstairs" as a child. even now i still don't like "upstairs" at my nans, yet i live alone with my children and am never scared in my own home. i was always ok once i was up there and could be left, it was the actual going up bit that i was scared of. :rolleyes:

[Eeyore]

I used to be terrified of going up and down the stairs because we had a frame on the wall with a skull and crossbones military badge in it, it scared me so so badly, but I just grew out of it eventually. :(

[Ribbit]

I was terrified of going upstairs in my grandparents' house, and in my home until I left it. Then I took over my grandparents' house, so I stayed frightened of being upstairs until I was about 23. :blink: I have an overly furtive imagination, and that was the cause. All sorts of horrible things were going to happen to me up there, and I had (and have) a fear of dark places... and corridors of closed doors. Oh my, I sound like I'm scared of my own shadow don't I?! :blink:

My family were very patient and I don’t think they ever expected me to be any different. I’ve never actually grown out of it, I still have a furtive imagination, and if I lived in a house the upstairs rooms would always have open doors and lots of light. I’m normal in every other way though, so I don’t think it’s anything to worry about.

ribbit :)

[goosegirl]

Thankyou for all your replies everyone,

I know my sister tends to tell her not to be silly. We tend to say we follow her up, then we hang around down stairs untill she starts to come back down. We had one incident of her holding it in instead of going to the toilet.

I rember being scared of the dark, and the bogy man when very young. But at that age I liked being in my private den, my bedroom. No parents and plenty of sweets.

She still misses her dad, her parents separated a long time ago. My sister always reminds us to lock the front door when visiting to stop strangers wondering in. I think our niece thinks someone is going to wonder in.

GG.

[TharSheBlows]

What is it with Grandparent's houses that makes everybody feel this way? I feel uncomfortable in my nan's house (upstairs) and I am 24! Very spooky indeed! :o

[Bird Woman]

i used to feel very scared upstairs in my nans house also.

im sure my grandad (who died when my dad was little) died in the house and i used to catch my nan watching things i couldnt see and talking to someone i couldnt see. if i needed a wee id run up the stairs as quick as possible, have the quickets wee in the world and then rush back down to the living room, slam the door shut and lean against it so as to stop the bed feeling getting in.

[Mr Ribbit]

Sorry in advance if this is a daft idea :unsure: - we don't have children so you may be throwing virtual fruit and plates at me and my suggestion in a moment. :blush:

By the way, just in case this is a bad idea, and since ribbit isn't in the room with me right now, I'd better just make the following disclaimer - The following views are expressed by mr ribbit only and in in no way reflect the overall view of the ribbit household. Any fruit thrown in this direction should only be directed at mr ribbit as it his own resposibility to have said fruit aimed at him.

Once you know what really worries her I'm sure you'll find a solution of some kind. If you wanted some extra 'back-up', what about some giving her some form of talisman or tool, e.g. her own special pocket torch, a jade necklace (Chinese believe this is for good luck and fortune), a 'special' good luck bracelet, a silver cross, a Red Indian dreamcatcher hanging in the darker areas of the houses, that sort of thing. When I was a kid, I really believed in the power of these sort of things, not realising at the time it was the faith in the item that was the real strength. To a degree, I'm still the same and I don't think I've turned out too badly (was that ribbit laughing in the backround, I thought she was out). :D

My special thing was a silver coloured torch that had a button on it that I could use to 'flash' morse code/pirate/spy signals at people. :hihi: :hihi:

[Ribbit]

That's actually a good idea :o (you don't hear that very often :hihi: )

I used to have a crucifix covered in shells - big wooden thing - that I took upstairs with me when I was little. I thought it worked on just about everything... not just vampires... so it did help.

I used to make it to the bathroom, lock the door, and then couldn't pluck up the courage to leave the room and venture back out onto the landing (the trap door to the attic was up there too.... spooooky!). I sat in the bathroom for an hour sometimes. My nan thought I was very constipated. :blink:

ribbit :curly:

[Bonkers Mad!!!]

yep, i think that is an excellent idea :D as a child, crucifix's terrified me more than upstairs. as an adult pagan, a lucky gemstone bracelet sounds an excellent tool but any "good luck charm" could work with an 11 year old. definatly worth considering. :thumbs:

has anybody seen a frankie howard film called house in midnight park? he gets left a spooky old house, i saw it when i was too young to understand comedy and theres a scene where he goes to the toilet in the night and the place is deserted. the toilet chain comes off in his hand and when he leaves the bog thereae 2 servants waiting. for some reason this frightened me, my nans house had a proper chain like that, ours had a handle. i used to creep upstairs for a wee and then i'd go as near to the door (directly opposite the stairs) as the chain would let me, then ...pull and RUN like the clappers back down the stairs. :hihi: doesnt bother me now unless i'm alone in the house :blush:

[goosegirl]

Ribbit & Bonkers Mad,

Thats not a bad idea really. She is off anything Chinese at the moment, she fell out with a Chinese friend.

I would settle for Angellus to keep me warm though, and to bump off the NFH.

Maybe I could go a little Buffy, we both have Scoliosis. I could practise with my mister pointy on my NFH.

GG.

:angel: :angel:

[sally]

My daughter was scared to play in her room when she was little ...she used to say the big nose was going to get her...we thought it was her age...anyway one night I heard her screaming and found her absolutely terrified ...the big nose was going to get her...
I looked round at where she was pointing and realised the big nose was car headlights shining through the window and a gap in the curtain made it triangular in shape .hence the big nose...we still laugh about it now...

Dont worry GG i think its all part of growing up...

[Bonkers Mad!!!]

There'll come a day, all too soon, when there'll be times when she won't want to have anything to do with anybody else and her bedroom door will stay firmly closed to all comers.

how true is that :hihi:

[goosegirl]

Thats true,

I,m waiting for the day she rebels, and takes home a Marilyn Manson lookalike to meet her mum. :rolleyes:

GG.

[Bonkers Mad!!!]

i am so glad i have boys :D apart from the fact that they are automatically labeled "yoofs", i think my life would be so much more stressful if they were girls :blink:

[mazza]

Hi GG,

I think you are right to be taking it seriously, it is very real for your neice and it's great that she has someone who cares about her problem like you.

I know it's totally irrational, but every so often, I get really spooked going downstairs in the night to get a drink of water of whatever even though I know nobody is there! And I am not 11 yrs old any more either! :o

I think it is to do with being told stuff like 'keep the door locked in case someone gets in' and 'don't talk to strangers' etc, kids get very worried by stuff like that.

Eg a garden bench was stolen form round my way lately (yes, that's as bad as it gets round here :hihi: ) and I casually read it out to my eldest (9 yrs old) from the local paper.

I didn't think much of it until a few days later, he was very anxious about the door locks, keeping stuff in the garden chained up, locked away etc and also keeping his real valued possessions on him ( a bunch of rubbish trading cards :rolleyes: ) at all times...

It really bothered him, that there could be a burglar about, more than I had realised it would. he also started to say stuff like 'Let me come uptairs with you...' etc

So what I am saying is that perhaps the adults in her life should chat to her and see if it is anything particular that they have said or done that has made her feel so worried about going upstairs alone :) .

[sally]

Im not sure which is more stressful my two boys or my 18yr old daughter..

I do know its not the Marilyn Manson lookalikes that scare me ...but the latest beau is Mr.Smooth...a heartbreaker if ever I saw one ..ofcourse she is besotted as her looks like sean Paul...ask the youths..they'll know who he is.

GG you are very special and its good your niece talks to you ,I think Mazzas post was absolutely excellent we do forget how much we say or do in front of our kids and even in my 2 boys cases what has directly happened to them we really do not know what effect it has on them inside and what secret fears surface in the dark.I also think some of the playstation games and cartoons they watch are quite scary and must have some effect ,I remember my daughter being scared of ghosts because I let her watch scooby doo before bed!!

My 9 yr old feels as though with his dad not living here that he has to "fix"things and be strong ,he talks a lot about when he is older and how he would never let anything like this happen to his family.
My 11 yr old is very angry ,he is just starting puberty and the conflict in his mind scares him as much as me..

I think that sometimes we expect much more from our kids now than was expected of us when we were young and it is adding to the pressures they are already facing at school and from friends and TV advertising.
Give her a hug from me and take her to claires for some Hair pretties..XXX