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My 14 month old has been affraid when at the doctor's office from when he was about 8-9 months old. He was having a normal checkup and didn't even get any shots but started crying when the doctor checked him. Next time he cried as soon as the nurse tried measuring his head circumference. The time after that he cried as soon as we were in the nurses office and now he cries as soon as he sees either the nurse or the doctor.

This, however, also happens wheneer we're in an office like environment. We recently went to enroll him in daycare and he started screaming in fear both times we entered their offices and just this week we went to and old neighbor's apartment (he's never been there) and he started screaming and stiffened up in fear as I was holding him, and stopped as soon as we were out the door. Same thing happened when we tried taking his photo for his ID.

Is there anything I can do to help him with this fear or do I just need to wait it out?

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    Welcome to Parenting.SE! This is a tough one — my oldest was scared for years of medical situations where anyone wore blue gloves, because that was what the nurse who gave her shots had worn.
    – Acire
    Commented Jun 19, 2015 at 11:35
  • My 8 year old still cries at the doctor if he thinks there's even a slight possibility of a shot.
    – Karl Bielefeldt
    Commented Jun 19, 2015 at 18:18

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My suggestion would be to make those experiences more pleasant for him. He has probably had a bad experience (shots will do that to a kid). You can try taking him to those places and do nothing but happy things. He will start to associate those places better than he did before. It also depends on the doctor. If you have a pediatrician that is great with kids then everybody wins. Sometimes you get doctors who aren't "fun" for the kids. Its a bummer but it works that way sometimes.

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    One way we convinced our youngest that the dentist was OK and could look in his mouth was the hilarious slurrrrrrp noise of the suction tool -- he started giggling like crazy at the funny noise, and after that broke the ice he was much calmer about having his teeth examined. Looking for fun, even if you have to invent some sort of game, can be a huge help.
    – Acire
    Commented Jun 20, 2015 at 2:37
  • Yeah, our paediatrician is relatively cold towards kids, though we found that the approach of the person rarely has anything to do with our kid's reaction.
    – eagerMoose
    Commented Jun 23, 2015 at 14:57

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