Lately my two children have been making me go through a ritual each night. I have taken on the role of Monster Slayer! Daddy runs upstairs to the children's bedroom standing in the center of the room and shouting at the monsters under the bed and yelling at those trolls in the closet, banging the drawers and exorcising the demons that might reach out and harm the children. The Boogeyman and all run for the hills as Daddy thumps his chest and makes like a superhero.
My son looks up and says, "Thanks Daddy." He truly believes that somehow I have rid the room of his fears.
My daughter looks up at me with a sheepish grin, "So if there were really monsters up there, where did they go? I didn't hear them leave."
I think perhaps it was her that made the monsters appear for the little guy in the first place. Ah, it was always nice to be the oldest and wisest sibling.
Paybacks are a bitch, and he is going to get her one day soon, and if not Daddy will help. I was the oldest after all.
My daughter was afraid of the monster in her closet for a long time until I told her there was no monster in her closet and that there couldn't be. She wanted to know how I could be so sure and I told her because all the monters know I'm one tough mother and they're afraid of me. Then she wanted to know how they knew I was tough and I told her that I knocked the beans out of them the first time they came along and they knew from then on not to mess with my house. It seemed to do the trick for her. She mocks the monsters and their sissy ways now.
Protecting their children from the dreaded monsters under the bed and the Boogy man in the closet is what Daddy's are for. (Oh yes, and for catching the spiders.)
What a good daddy you are!
Of course there are monsters under the bed and in the back of the closet. How else do you think all those toys, dirty laundry, and half-eaten sandwiches end up there?
Genuine Girl scaring GB??!! NOOOOO! *lol*....but it will be interesting to see how GB will get her back. Watch it be something when she's a teen. That's how it always happens.
I employed a trick that worked wonders, at least til Dani wised about the monsters. Did you know that monsters hate hiding in clean rooms???? lol Too bad she wised up about the monsters...the room has never been the same since.
Can't wait to see how GB gets back at his sister...its going to be good, I just know it!
The Little Tyke has one of those animal flashlights (ironically, made by Little Tikes), so our ritual includes shining the flashlight at all possible points of entry (door, closet, window, fishbowl - I know, just don't ask). When the trigger is pulled, the light shines and the bear roars, thus scaring off the monsters.
LOL! We have a snake like the one JG mentioned. You push the button, it opens it's mouth and hssss......
Kind of brutal when the kid rolls over on it in the middle of the night, thus litterally scaring the piss out of herself.
I get off easy on this topic. I am a martial artist, and run a costume company. I have lots of scarey masks, that the boy has played with since an infant. Also, I have photos of myself in his room dressed as a wizard, and Batman. I tell him that the monsters are eaither scared of daddy, or under my control. I am , after all, Darth Daddy.
Shannon
ps. I also have a huge wooden sheild and a dragon head on his wall. I tell him the dragon scares away any bad monsters that arent afraid of daddy (like daddy's motherinlaw..hehehe)
Man, this is the best post I've read all week. I ran into this EXACT problem a couple of days ago. One of the neighbor kids told my son that there are zombies in his room that will eat his brains. Like an idiot I simply tried to tell him that zombies aren't real. "Who are yah gonna believe, me or the neighbor kid?" (Don't ask questions you don't want the answers to.)
This will definitely be the approach I take tonight.