Pre-school issues, anger, nightmares

June 2010

Dear Joane,

I received the book and CD about a week ago. I have read the book, all except the last 2 chapters, and I have been using it for 6 nights now. I didn’t realise that I should have listened to the CD before beginning, will do that tomorrow (I thought the CD was just the book being read aloud). Anyway, it is still early but it seems to be working! My 5 year old son has been having a few problems at preschool and has been a bit angry and over emotional lately, nightmares etc, so we decided to just work on his confidence and try to increase his sense of security as a first port of call. Today he came up to me and asked me if I was happy (the song “if you’re happy and you know it, clap your hands” was on in the background). I told him I was and asked him if he was happy, to which he replied “Yes! I’m happy! I’m clapping!”. Both he and my 6 year old daughter have told me they have also been having happy dreams, which is a big change from a few weeks ago when they were both waking up scared every night.

My daughter also just seems somehow a bit more settled. She has been telling me she loves me over the last few days, which I realised she normally doesn’t do unless I say it first. Today I thought to myself that it seems like she now “feels it in her bones” that I do love her. I also think that doing the process is good for me, I feel like I am on the path to giving them the most important, valuable thing I could ever give them, which is a deep feeling of being alright within themselves. So in that way, I feel like I am on the way to fulfilling the goal I have set myself as a parent, instead of constantly feeling like I’m getting it wrong, and letting the children down. As I say, it is still early days, but so far so good!

I was very interested to read in your book that nightmares are a sign of things not sitting quite right in the child’s subconscious, so my husband and I have been trying to also go over the day with the children before bed and apologise if we have blurted out anything that might have caused them any confusion. It makes so much sense to send them off to sleep having cleared up any misunderstandings, but having it spelled out as it is in your book, has really helped us to focus on that.

I found out about your book from a psychologist and hypnotherapist who saw you speaking at a conference a few years ago, as I mentioned that I was trying to help my children with night terrors. He wrote down your name for me and I followed it up through your website.

Thanks again for writing Joane, I will keep in touch and email your if I have any questions along the way.

Kind regards, SC