A Just Add Water Nightmare

A couple days ago, my sweet mom sent O a Halloween care package.  She often sends "Nana" care packages and O opens each of them with much anticipation.  The Halloween box always contains a card, some candy, a pumpkin from her garden and a Halloween decoration.  This year she added something really cool – a “grow your own dinosaur."  

O couldn't wait to put it in water, and we did so immediately.  It started as a dinosaur egg and within 24 hours the dinosaur began to break out of its shell.  Yesterday evening, O was touching the dinosaur and it's shell.  It was only partially encased at this point.  I asked her, "What do you believe made the dinosaur come out of the egg?"  O responded, "I don't know."  I gave her some wait time … just a few seconds to ponder the question.  And then she said, "The dinosaur probably came out because she wanted to be a big girl."  O named the dinosaur Olivia Olana.  

Before she went to bed I asked her again “what else might have made the dinosaur come out of its shell?” She said water and then added, "It's just like baby frogs who live in their mommy's tummy.  They grow and grow and grow so they can't fit in their mommy's tummy anymore so they come out."  (I let the issue of tadpoles go for the time being.)

Her usual bedtime routine went as planned, beginning with bath time and ending with books and prayers.  In the middle of the night she awoke screaming in terror.  I held her while she cried and told her to take deep breaths.  She said she had been dreaming about dinosaurs and that Olivia Olana had grown so big it overtook our house and cut off her imaginary big sister's nose and feet.  She woke up two times … all because of the same dream.  

The second time I told her, "O, before you go back to sleep think about how you would want the nightmare to end happily.  That way when it comes time for you to get scared again, you won't need to because you can make it a happy ending.  It can be a challenge, however you can always try and change your nightmares into dreams with happy endings." 

Once I got her back to sleep, I looked at the clock … 5:30 am.  The bus will be here in three hours to pick her up.  Kindergarten SUCKS!