I’m not a parent, but going by pop culture, it seems like literally every child has the same fears.
In pre-modern times, I imagine that they’d be sleeping in the same room as the parents, but if modern notions of privacy don’t permit that, seems we could at least design an enclosed capsule or something.
Not a psychologist or anything but isnt it healthy for a child to overcome a fear and not just avoid it
Also not a psychologist, but I would say that’s only true if the fear keeps them from enjoying life
As adults, we design our living spaces to be comfortable to us. We don’t intentionally make them scary so we can overcome.
Speak for yourself. My home is entirely sharp angles and unsecured towers of broken glass and rubbing alcohol suspended in petroleum jelly that also slicks the floor. I will brook no weakness in my home.
Dealing with ones fear should be learned at an early age. I didn’t start dealing with my fears until I was 17.
What stopped you from doing so prior to that?
My parents build a room where I didn’t have to face my fears
And you never left there until you were 17?
(I know you’re not OP, but still.)
Whoosh
Fears are a tough thing to face.
Who intended for the closet to be a scary void?
Same dude who put a bucket of truth outside the master bathroom
The people who think not having it be one means children are avoiding rather than overcoming their fears
It may not have been intended as such originally, but if you defend the design on that basis, it becomes intentional.
If your kid can’t overcome a closet you’ve got bigger issues. I’m sorry but this entire thought process is too much.
Comfort ya. But we do not succumb to irrational fears either. Our more to the point, it may not be healthy to say place ten locks on our doors because we think someone is trying to break in always.
We did for my daughter. She then got scared of door knobs because they “had eyes”. They find something else lol
Haha this is pretty cute not gonna lie.
I read OP’s question and was like 🤔 waaait a minute this is brilliant! The I read your comment and was like ahh… shit… 🤣
But do we really need door knobs though 😋
I think fear is an important part of our development, and sanitizing children’s upbringings is rarely the best approach. I love when my child communicates that they’re afraid of something because that gives me an opportunity to guide them through how to encounter and process that fear, and how to continue functioning in life when fear is present (which is always for a lot of people).
Also, for kids who are scared of their closet or under their bed at night, if you remove those triggers I would be surprised if other triggers did not arise. It could easily turn into a never ending game of whack a mole.
“Bran thought about it. ‘Can a man still be brave if he’s afraid?’ ‘That is the only time a man can be brave,’ his father told him.”
I recognise this. Where’s it from?
It’s from game of thrones, but I don’t know if the quote originated there. I’ve seen it in different wordings all over the place.
This is from page 26 of A Game of Thrones by George R. R. Martin.
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Similar goes for picky eating. Few things are tasty by default, but most tastes are acquired by repeated exposure to new cuisine.
I’m still getting used to clams, snails, slugs, and calamari. Went from gag reflex and unable to swallow to capable of eating but not savouring in a few months time.
And again with fears, it’s not that dark voids have become less dangerous or fearful, it’s just that I have checked enough voids to not be immediately alarmed.
Maybe we don’t need to round every sharp corner we can find. I doubt anyone is traumatized for life because there was a closet in the room as a child.
Much more are traumatized by being forced into the closet. Let’s fix that instead.
Kids are afraid of being alone in the dark. The monster under the bed or in the closet is just how they communicate their fear.
I had a room similar to what you suggested. No big closets and an elevated bed. But I still got scared sometimes. And the only things that helped were being in a well lit room and or not being alone.
That makes sense.
Same with me. Even when the room was brightly lit I would get anxious and would ask a parent to sleep with me just because I was alone, not being able to sleep.
My 1st thought is that we may need these minor fears to learn how to deal with fear itself and as part of developmemt they’ll likely just be a fraid of something different instead.
Did you forget about your teenage years? Teenagers want their own space to hide their uhhh stuff.
There are beds with drawers underneath.
Classic monster hiding spot! Won’t work!
It slows it down though, it’s futile but it’s reassuring.
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It is an opportunity to bind with your child. Make them face their fears playfully. Probably will strenghten its braverity.
Also, any matress needs air circulation beneath below it. Otherwise it will get warm, stinky and very dirty.
There are a lot of bed frames that are solid, though, including the one I use at home. If it causes any ill effects on the mattress I haven’t observed it personally.
Nonnative tounge - I meant below grabsthetoolbox
i dont know a single child who has the same fears kids in movies do
I did actually the opposite, unintentionally. But worked. My daughter never had a problem with a dark void somewhere. She loved to hide there.
maybe she IS the monster?
*M Night Shyamalan taking notes
I used to love the dark, felt safer there.
I found my monster
I always told my kids the monsters were in the closet not under the bed. I also introduced them to hand puppets named chewy and Bytee. They were monster ostrich that lived in the closet, there favorite food is my kids which they nip at and the kids all have found it hilarious over the years. Also there was a monkey that slept in the closet when the zoo was closed. I told the kids I was renting out the closet space. Have three kids 13, 11, 4 none of them were ever afraid of the closet or under the bed. Any hint that they thought something was in the closet and I would go full conspiratorial and confirm there is “something” in the closet. That always seemed to work well apposed to denying their fears.
Eliminate closets?
Anyway no, not every child has these fears. Mine don’t. They sleep in pitch darkness and have never complained.
But you deal with a lot of weird fears and hang ups with kids. Not by accommodating them but by helping the kid grow out of them.
One of the ways one can grow out of a fear is by accommodating it enough in a passive way that it’s forgotten about. Lighting up the back of a closet or under a bed for even a couple of months with a battery-powered nightlight (if there is no outlet available) could easily be enough for a kid to overcome it. Not in every situation, of course, but I think in enough that it could be worth a try.
I do agree that changing the entire space like that is too much though.
I was afraid that I’d die in my sleep. Not like from health issues. Monsters or something unknown that only existed when I was alone in the dark. To a later age than I’d prefer to share.
Fuck, all right, I got over it last week. /s but the rest was true.
I wasn’t afraid of my closet, I was afraid of stretching my legs out towards the end of the bed, because claw monsters might get them.
When you buy a house, closets are just there. You could take the doors off, I suppose, but closets are just a thing. As for the void under the bed, that is a feature and not a bug. Yes, it may allow for a fear of what’s under the bed. It’s also an inherent defense against the actual bugs on the floor that would otherwise crawl up the child’s bed.
Basically, the answer isn’t to change the standard child’s bedroom but to instead work around it. Take the doors off the closet if it scares them. Check under the bed every night and maybe put their “bravest” stuffed animals under there for protection. But rooms are rooms. Blocking off a closet and putting the kid’s mattress on the floor is not the answer lol.
