I’m a mother of two amazing girls, aged 15 and 12. When my younger daughter was about 5 years old, she was scared of monsters. Every night, we would do a thorough check of her room and use a homemade monster spray (ask me for the recipe) to rid her bedroom of monsters. She would only fall asleep after we completed this process every single day, until she was sure that there was nothing to be afraid of. Eventually, she grew out of her fear, we retired the spray, and all was well for a bit. Fast forward two years to 2020, to the peak of the pandemic during lockdown. I woke up one night to my daughter screaming in her sleep. I rushed to her room to find her terrified and barely coherent, but mumbling something about being burned by red lasers. I had no idea what she was referring to, and the best I could do was soothe her back to bed. The next night, it happened again, and it continued each night for the remainder of the week. During the day, we talked, and nothing seemed amiss… she was doing fine in online school, getting lots of […]