JJ has a thing at the moment about being kidnapped. He brings up the subject pretty regularly and talks about ways of coping with it if someone tried to kidnap him, ie physically trying to get away from them.
I keep telling him it’s really unlikely that he ever will be kidnapped but he obviously thinks about it a great deal.
Last night he woke me up by telling me he’d just had a nightmare. He was pretty distressed and even though my sleeping has been abominable over the last few nights due to the heat I asked him what he’d dreamt about. He told me that he’d been kidnapped and that Nana and Pop had been killed. I don’t think the two events were related but he was pretty upset.
He hopped onto my bed (not into because it was too hot to worry about bedclothes last night) and we had a hug while I tried to reassure him. After some reassurance I was able to send him back to his own bed and he was fine for the rest of the night.
Because he’s worried about kidnapping I wondered if other kids fear the same thing, and sure enough, they do.
I found a couple of articles that talk about children’s fears and strategies for dealing with them.
Just as well we’re not Haitians – child kidnapping is rife there at present.
Luckily he’s not too afraid that it’s completely debilitating, but his fear is there just the same. What are your kids afraid of?
