Question

I'm putting a call into my ped, but I'm asking here too. 

Jack has developed a new habit.   Every night at about 3 or 3:30 am he crawls into the corner of his crib, rocks back and forth, and bangs his head.   He is dead asleep when he does it.  It's freaking me out!  

I've noticed that he will do it while in his pack n play (awake), but it doesn't appear that he's trying to bang his head.  It looks like he's rocking back and forth to either crawl (and he crawls normally so it's strange) or to propel himself forward so that he can grab the side of the pack n play to stand up. 

Any thoughts? 

Edit to add:  Peds office said I should wait until the 1 year well visit to bring him in and discuss.  BOO!   Since that's a few weeks away, I went with option B.  Seek a second opinion.  My friend is a fantastic Dr. out in Cali so I e-mailed him.  I'm sure it's nothing and that it's his way of soothing himself, but still.  

How old is Jack? Ephram had these TERRIBLE and scary "night frights" when he was about a year old. He would be dead asleep, but screaming and flailing his arms and hitting himself and others. His Pedi told is that he would outgrow it...and he did. Good luck, let us know what it is.

--Leah

He's 11 months old. 

I have one of the strange kids who like to bang their head on things.  Andrew started doing it when he was like 9 months old, he doesn't do it hard enough to hurt himself, but he would like back up against the wall and bang the back of his head.  They say it is normal and some kids do it and some kids don't.  Not sure if yours is doing the same thing?  I think he was preparing himself for banging heads together with his brother, which always happens somehow around here!!

Two of my nephews suffered from night terrors really bad... one starting at about 8 months old. 

He would scream and thrash around and be sititng up in his crib looking wide awake but be totally asleep.  It was freaky. 

He is 16 months old now and it still happens occasionally.

The other nephew didn't start the night terrors until about one year and he outgrew them by 18 months. 

Hope that's all that is going on with Jack!

Cindy

I just did sleep training with Anna and I read a few books, I think it was the Ferber book that talked about "head banging", I was interested in it because I remember my brother doing that when he was a kid.  The book said that behavior is totaly normal and goes away on its own.  I got the Ferber book from the library and have since returned it so I can't look it up for you.  I didn't end up using the Ferber method, but I read some interesting things in the book.

I just googled "ferber and head banging":
http://books.google.com/books?id=r-vv_rUd-lQC&pg=PA101&lpg=P A101&dq=ferber+and+head+banging&source=bl&ots=Ql1aq45EvU&sig =mnkR9cHLdGmc-K3Udd_K4fAH9g0&hl=en&ei=1w-ESt77OJSutgebrOyuCg &sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false

How did the sleep training work? I am in desperate need of getting Nylah to sleep in her bed. Thanks

Really, really well!  I am so happy with the results.  I ended up using The Sleepeasy Solution by Jennifer Waldberger and Jill Spivack.  It was recommended to me by another mother.  It does involve some crying it out, but it wasn't too bad.  I started it when she was 6 months old and by night 3 she didn't cry at all when I put her down at night.  Before I would nurse her to sleep in my bed and then transfer her to her crib when she was passed out cold. 
Naps were really bad before, they were too short and always in my bed.  Naps are going pretty well now, but she does fuss/cry a little more, like 5 minutes.  She use to be kind of fussy during the day and we were blaming it on teething, but I really think she was overtired.  I was really against crying it out, but it was so worth it.

its funny you mention this... ive found jayson a few times in the corner of his crib screaming as if the boogie man was in there... really nothing would fix it... just lots of holding and talking to him quietly... its truly scary

Let me know if you call the pedi and what the say.  Libby does the same thing every once in a while.  I think she has nightmares, poor thing.  I would like to know what their nightmares are about since they really haven't experienced a whole lot in life!  Know what I mean?