NIghtmare or hallucinations in a 4 year old?

[April2]

So much for me trying to break my addiction from here, lol. I know I said I'm going to try and spend less time on here but something happened last night that was pretty freaky to me. I was wondering if you all could tell me if this is normal?
Last night around 1:30am I heard my 4 year old jabbering and crying in his room. I went in there and he was standing across the room acting afraid. I kept talking to him soothingly trying to get him back in bed. He wouldn't go. I led him to the bathroom to go potty and then brought him back to his room. He still refused to get back in bed and kept saying something that I finally understood he was saying "bugs". I asked him if he thought there were bugs in his bed and he said "Yes, bugs". I kept reassuring him there were no bugs and I sat on his bed and smoothed it out and showed him there were no bugs and kept trying to reassure him. He wouldn't come to me so I picked him up and sat down in the bed with him in my lap and he was freaking out, arching his back and trying not to touch the bed. I finally got him laid down. He wouldn't put his head on his pillow, he laid his head on his stuffed dog. I went back to bed and heard him a few minutes later crying and saying "bugs" again. I went in and he was standing across the room, trembling and pointing to his bed. He kept whispering "bugs in bed". Finally, I gathered him up with his pillow and stuffed dog and brought him to our bed. As we were leaving his room he stopped and looked down and said "rocks" and walked very gingerly across his doorway as if he were walking across rocks.

He laid down in our bed but was clinging to me and curled all up into me. I couldn't gently move him over. He wouldn't do it. A couple of times he sat up like he was startled and stared at his pillow and said "bugs". Again I kept telling him there were no bugs. He laid down on his stuffed dog again. Then when I moved or shifted he sat up again startled and I went to move his dog and he stared at it like he was afraid and started crying and acting like he was trying to get away. I couldn't calm him down. Every time I touched him trying to reassure him he would jump as if I were the bugs. Finally he freaked out again and jumped out of our bed and kept crying bugs over and over.
This time my husband got up with him and carried him back to our bed and had him lay directly on his chest and he fell asleep that way, finally. I think he was finally exhausted.

This morning he got up and said "bugs" again but didn't act as afraid. Then he said something like "Bugs bite you". And I reassured him no bugs were going to bite you. He said "Bugs outside" and I said "Yes, bugs are outside". Then I made his breakfast and went to sit him down and he stared at his chair and said "bugs". I told him there were no bugs in his chair.
So it's still on his mind, apparently.

The thing that concerns me is I've never seen him act like this. I'm assuming he had some sort of bad dream but I am very careful about what he watches on TV. He only sees Disney or PBS shows like Seseme Street, etc.
If you all could have seen the way he was acting I think you would have been concerned too. If it was a bad dream why was he still acting like there were bugs everywhere when he was wide awake? Why was he freaking out so bad? Did my son have a bad nightmare or did he have some sort of hallucination and was seeing bugs everywhere? This was pretty freaky for both me and my husband. I'm just not sure what to think. Is this normal for a child of this age?
Thank you. Sorry so long. I tried to post in the Ask A Doctor Forum but it was full.
Can anyone tell me what happened?
April

[Natta1980]

try to give him a back rub with lotion before bed - I feel "bugs" sometimes too - when it is getting colder and skin is getting dryer

Good luck

[RockRose]

April,  as scary as that all sounds,  I've heard of stuff like this before. I think it was somewhere between a dream and a hallucination.  

I've come to believe this kind of thing can be caused by a viral infection.

Hope all goes well for him.