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What is your child scared of? And what do you do to calm them? Tell Legal & General: voucher to win

Hello.

Little children are packed full of joy – but it’s also quite common for them suddenly to become scared by things, too. And it’s our job, as parents, to calm their fears.

Legal & General would like to know what sort of things your child (under 5) is afraid of – and what you do to help them cope with their fears.

And you could win a £100 voucher for telling us!

Don't worry if your child is now older than 5 – or too young to tell you their fears: you can still join in by sharing what used to scare or frighten you as a child, and how your parents helped you through it.

Everyone who posts on this thread to tell us about their child’s fears and what they do about them (or their own childhood fears and what their parents did about them) will be entered into a prize draw to win a £100 shopping voucher.

We’ll keep this thread open until Tuesday February 28th, and we’ll announce the winner’s name on this thread on Wednesday March 1st.

This discussion is sponsored by Legal & General, the financial services company. You can read more about their advice on anxiety in children herePlease note that any comments you post here may be used by Legal & General in future marketing material.

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  • So Meredith is only tiny really but I'm 100% sure she's scared of Louis Armstrong (Satchmo).. when we put what a wonderful world on she cries and even more so when me and the hubby sing it in that voice 🤣

  • I was always scared of the sea myself.. my dad never helped as he pretended to be a shark and grabbed my legs and pulled me under water!!

    Nice one pops 👍👍

  • My children were frightened of the dark so we started having lovely family outings in the dark evenings and this helped a lot.

  • When my daughter, who is 5 now, was younger she was terrified of Father Christmas. After all, what sensible 2 year old wouldn't be afraid of a big fat man with a huge white beard all dressed in red? Soon cleared up though when she realised where all the presents came from

  • I was always scared of what was under the bed. I would not tread on the rug beside the bed at bedtime as I thought a monster would come out and get me. My parents did nothing except assure me there was nothing there and eventually I accepted it. 

  • My youngest daughter was always terrified of loud noises; particularly the hoover, and cried whenever I put it on! I had a Hetty hoover, so when she was about 2 I bought her the child-sized version so that she could pretend to join in with me when I was doing my jobs. It worked a treat - she absolutely loved it and only associated the hoover with playing and positive experiences from then on :) 

  • My daughter was afraid of the dark so i got a night light for her 

  • My son was terrified about his SATS as he wasn't one of the smart kids. I started him at a wrestling school and it did wonders for his confidence and was fearless about starting secondary.  We also had a magic spray that would chase away monsters away whe he was small 

  • I read somewhere that babies are not born with any fears so children only become afraid of something if we give them reason to think there is something to be afraid of. So, for example a child that is afraid of the dark often feels like this because we make a point of leaving night lights on etc. So I always made a point of turning lights out, picking up spiders- all of the common fears I could think of.

    Generally I think it worked but as children get older, other influences come into their lives such as other friends, TV etc and fears come from those sources too which you can't always stay on top of.

  • I was and still am terrified of baby butterflies, (I cannot even type the word) 2 boys when I was 2 put loads down my back, I have never got over it, My parents did everything they could to tell me they would not hurt me, it didn't work,

    In the end they never took me anywhere that they would be. I am still the same now, cannot even read the written word, or see the brand name of the shoes. or even a cartoon of them, Makes watching Alice In Wonderland really hard

  • My Son is Terrified of halloween costumes it difficult not to do this in my house as I have 4 other kids who love dressing up and going trick or treating and we used to have a Halloween party every year but since my son was 6 months old he is now 3 we can't have one so my mum has to let the other 4 have a fancy dress party at her house whilst we stay in and turn off the lights with a polite notice asking not to be disturbed we have tried everything to assure him it's just a fancy dress costume like his Spider-Man costume but he won't have it so now we have decided to let him grow out of this fear so hopefully he will enjoy Halloween when he is ready.

  • I have had a huge fear of Pigeons most of my life.  Apparently one landed on my pram when I was a baby in the garden.  The thought now writing this makes me feel sick.  I made the huge taboo mistake once of letting a scream out in front of my daughter when a pigeon landed next to us.  She was horrified that I was horrified so I quickly made a huge joke of it and actually fed the pigeon one of my chips before leaving.....

  • my daughter is afraid of hand dryers so we always wait until public toilets are empty before we enter then leave as quickly as we can!

  • My LO was scared of the sound of cellotape being pulled and was scream at the sight of it. She is still vary but after we sat down and wrapped lots of presents shes ok.

  • the dark, so we use a night light

  • it was the usual for my daughter, afraid of the dark and we just continually told her not to be afraid and it seemed to work

  • I was always afraid of the dark so my parents bought a tiny night light that plugged into the socket by my bed. It really was tiny, like a fairy light really and that was enough to reassure me.

  • My son has got a fear of being left - so losing us whilst out shopping or one of us leaving the house and not saying goodbye to him.  We talked to him about it and reminded him that when we are out we always hold his hand so he knows that he can't lose us, but have also told him what to do if he ever can't find us.  We also make sure that he knows that we will always say goodbye and give him a kiss before we leave - even if he is still asleep.  This seems to have reassured him somewhat.

  • After awaking one night after a bad dream and being too scared to go back to sleep my mother took me into the garden where we picked some magical herbs to ward off bad spirits. Looking back now it was probably just some old grass and weeds but it did the trick :)  I also had an crochet owl hanging above my bed whose job it was to watch over me while I slept. I had a pretty cool mum I must admit.

  • I was always scared of the dark - so my parents got me a night light and always moved certain toys out of the room if I thought they were scary at nighttime.  

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