Kid having visual hallucinations at night?

October 16, 2013 1:43 PM

So, our five year old climbed into bed last night because she was seeing things: butterflies, then puff balls, then crickets everywhere. She said that she knew they weren't real, but she was sufficiently freaked out that she was afraid to put her feet on the bed, and got very upset. Turning on the light helped them go away, and so she eventually fell asleep with the light on. She seemed awake the whole time this was happening. Is this something to be concerned about? Should I take her to a doctor?
posted by anonymous to Human Relations (24 answers total)

I would only worry about this if it happens over and over again, more than just once or twice, to the extent where it's disrupting her life.

Eyes play tricks on us in the dark. I was certain that I could see vampires in the front hall every time I turned out the downstairs light. CERTAIN. (Sometimes when I'm back at home I can still see them. Something with the shadows in that particular corner of the house in the moonlight.) Like, I knew they weren't real, but it still didn't stop them from "being there," you know? I would occasionally psyche myself out about them to the point of bolting up the stairs in a panic until I was like 13 or something similarly embarrassing. She's only five.

Something that might help is to give her a small flashlight to carry with her. If she's into pretending, tell her it's the magic cricket zapper or something and she just has to point it at whatever she sees and it'll go away.
posted by phunniemee at 1:50 PM on October 16, 2013

The very first, lightest stage of sleep (both falling and coming out of sleep) can involve something called hypnogogic sensations, where you can have mild hallucinations. It's possible that what she was experiencing felt like being awake, but it was really that first stage of almost being asleep.

Other than that, like phunniemee, I remember seeing strange things in the dark as a child, like a bouncing ball coming around a corner, or spiders on the ceiling. Big imaginations + darkness can produce a lot of things to see.
posted by bizzyb at 1:56 PM on October 16, 2013 [14 favorites]

This totally happened to me. As it turns out, I am extremely near-sighted. It still happens, but at least I know what it is now. I also have hypnogogic issues, but the dark with glasses/contacts and without are two completely different things for me. Has her eyesight been checked lately?
posted by kellyblah at 2:02 PM on October 16, 2013 [2 favorites]

Yes, this also used to happen to me when I was that exact age and it turned out to be a combination of poor eyesight and (alas) impeding very terrible migraines. But unless she has also been complaining of severe headaches (which i assume you would have mentioned) then I don't think that should be your first assumption. Do get her vision checked, though. I didn't really mention to anyone that I was having trouble seeing distant objects because I just didn't realize it wasn't automatically like that for everyone.
posted by elizardbits at 2:08 PM on October 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

It's also possible she was having a false awakening dream. If you've never had them, they can be very disorienting, even for adults.

For example, I have had false awakening dreams where I wake up and look around my room, which looks entirely normal, except it's slowly filling up with smoke. I've had some that were so realistic that I wouldn't be sure if they really happened or were just dreams, and would have to ask my roommates.
posted by inertia at 2:08 PM on October 16, 2013 [8 favorites]

I have sleep paralysis etc and this happens to me a lot. I regularly wake up and see figures and objects in my room and can get up and walk through them or pass my hand through them for a minute or two before they fade. I am totally awake and discussing what im seeing with others quite ofren. Its kinda trippy but once it was explained to me I lost all fear of it. So if you can find a kid friendly science based explanation I would try that. Just hearing "its not real, its a dream" wasn't enough for me.
posted by fshgrl at 2:13 PM on October 16, 2013 [4 favorites]

One of my kids, who is now 40, vividly remembers similar hallucinations he had once when he was sick at around 5. Did you check her temperature? If it happens again and she's definitely not coming down with anything call the doctor.
posted by mareli at 2:21 PM on October 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

This used to happen to me! I have great eyesight, no migraines. I would see silverfish flying around near the ceiling, snakes rising up out of my bedposts, stuff like that. It was a very short phase, right around age 5.
posted by peep at 2:22 PM on October 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

According to Oliver Sacks in an article he published in The New Yorker maybe a year ago -- if you're looking for a citation let me know -- it isn't unusual for children to have the occasional visual hallucination for no particular reason.
posted by mr. digits at 2:25 PM on October 16, 2013

Never mind -- I can't talk about providing a citation and then fail to do so in good conscience -- the article is "Altered States: Self-Experiments in Chemistry", Oliver Sacks, 8.27.2012.
posted by mr. digits at 2:29 PM on October 16, 2013 [7 favorites]

When I was a kid, amorphous shapes in the dark scared me, even if I knew they were just the silhouettes of my toys. I couldn't explain it; they just looked scary, you know? I also vividly remember being mystified at the "snowy" quality my vision often had in the dark, like transparent TV static or thousands of tiny spinning propellers. I can easily imagine that being interpreted as bugs or puffballs. (And I remember a couple very specific, vivid nighttime hallucinations that still feel insanely real to me.)

A reasonably strong nightlight can help a lot. Get a plainish one; I had a glittery butterfly nightlight that looked good during the day but turned into a scary monster face at night.
posted by Metroid Baby at 2:30 PM on October 16, 2013 [2 favorites]

This happened to myself and my youngest sister. My sister was around three or four when she experienced her "visions" and mine didn't happen until I was in my late teens. Neither of us had bad vision or migranes, it was just a thing we went through.
posted by WalkerWestridge at 2:30 PM on October 16, 2013

Yep, me too, aged maybe three or four. Grew out of it very quickly and spent my time worrying about whether wolves and bears might come in the window instead.
posted by emilyw at 2:37 PM on October 16, 2013

As a little kid (ok, fine, I still do this) I was creative, sensitive and enjoyed have FEELINGS and experiencing MAGIC. I also LOVED sleeping in my parents' bed which was ordinarily not allowed unless the kid in question was sick or crying for some reason.

If at that age I'd thought of something like that I would have absolutely done it, first for my own entertainment (mind, as a kid I once spent an hour staring at the floor whispering "tree" over and over to myself just because it made my brain feel wobbly and gave me the feeling that the universe wasn't real) and second because hey, I could sleep in my parents' bed!

I'm not saying your kid's experience wasn't real in any way - but I would support not freaking out until/unless this happens a lot rather than just once or twice. And if you have a creative, sensitive, magical-thinker kid, maybe there is a chance they are initiating this themselves. Doesn't impact how upset they can feel, or how real that upsetness is though.
posted by arnicae at 2:57 PM on October 16, 2013 [3 favorites]

This sounds exactly like what happened to my son last year. He was up all night long, seeing bugs all over the floor and on his skin. Very scary. The pediatrician said it is caused by fever. It started happening the second night and I gave him ibuprofen to break the fever, and it went away. If you have health insurance, call the nurse line.
posted by ravioli at 3:46 PM on October 16, 2013

Oliver Sacks also talks about this extensively in his recent book Hallucinations, which might be a comfort for you to read. The general gist of the book is that hallucinations of various types are actually a lot more common than is widely known, and are in many (most?) cases benign. A study in the 50s found that half of the subjects experienced hypnogogic hallucinations.

You'll want to check with your doctor of course, but just by itself hallucinations without other symptoms or negative effects isn't something to be worried about.


* The chapter in question is 11: On the Threshold of Sleep.
posted by danny the boy at 3:52 PM on October 16, 2013 [3 favorites]

They are often called "night terrors"and they are very common. I used to get them too.
posted by lollusc at 3:56 PM on October 16, 2013

My boy went through that phase. Putting my arms around him and sleeping in the same bed did the trick.

I know it still happens. My door flies open and he's just standing there staring at things I can't see. This is much better than the screaming bit he used to do.

Snuggle while you can. They get too big really fast.
posted by Mr. Yuck at 4:46 PM on October 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

I've always had sleep paralysis, and still do late into my fifties. But it only happens to me when I sleep alone, for some reason. Do you have a family pet that can sleep at the foot of her bed?
posted by raisingsand at 5:22 PM on October 16, 2013

I get sleep paralysis/hynogogic hallucinations sometimes, though they are usually auditory as I'm falling asleep, and very very very rare visual ones when I wake up. In one especially notable event, around your daughter's age, I had a nightmare, and woke up unable to move or talk. A scary witch's face hovered to my right. I tried to call for my parents and couldn't do anything but pant. I focused on trying to make sound. By the time I had recovered enough to call for my parents (in other words, by the time I was fully awake), the face was gone.
posted by cairdeas at 5:41 PM on October 16, 2013

Are you absolutely certain she was awake?

My oldest used to sleepwalk. He would get out of bed in the middle of the night. Wander around the house. If you saw him he would have a random conversation with you. He would often be very upset about something during his wandering and he would act very agitated. He would "see" things. His eyes were wide open the whole time but he was asleep. It was the weirdest and creepiest thing. We would gently guide him back to bed and he would instantaneously fall back asleep.
posted by LittleMy at 6:11 PM on October 16, 2013 [1 favorite]

When I was 5 I had a whole tribe of creatures called 'mickeys', which I've since realised were what manifested in my eyes when I pushed on them while my eyelids were closed. In the extreme dark they stayed there when my eyes were open. Luckily for me they became my friends but I can imagine having made them scary swarming creatures if I was feeling a bit dark.

Poor little duckling, she just needed to go to sleep feeling safe; turning the light on and doing what you did was the right thing to do. Don't be too freaked out on her behalf.
posted by h00py at 3:55 AM on October 17, 2013 [1 favorite]

This used to happen to me when I was a youth. As long as the kid knows that it is imaginary, it is fine. I think that's just one of the parts of teaching your kid about life.
posted by gjc at 5:48 AM on October 17, 2013

I used to get these as a kid whenever I had a fever of any sort, even a slight one could trigger one, as could something as simple as getting too hot at night. Walls would move, the floor would fall away and things would be moving around the room.

My mother used tepid showers to cool me down and ibuprofen or tylenol, being sleepy or waking from sleep with the symptoms made them much more vivid.

I still have nightmares and hallucinations at night now I'm grown up if I get too hot while sleeping so summer is a bitch even though I know what they are.
posted by wwax at 6:33 AM on October 17, 2013