Steph McGovern needed therapy after terrible night terrors about losing her baby

Steph McGovern has spoken out about the vivid night terrors she has suffered, which focused on her losing a baby.

The 38-year-old BBC Breakfast presenter has revealed that she needed therapy to overcome the nightmares, which she had suffered for years before becoming a mother.

Steph gave birth to a daughter last November but has since been fearing she has lost her, after nightly dreams that have terrorised her.

As she prepares to launch her new daytime live show, Steph’s Packed Lunch, she has spoken out in the hope it might help others that have befallen a similar fate.

Speaking to The Sun, Steph said: “I don’t ever actually feel stressed but the way it manifests in me is at night.

“I have crazy dreams and awful night terrors.

“When I was younger, it would be worrying about school stuff. I once went out of the door and actually went to school — in my sleep, in my uniform — at two in the morning.”

Steph said that in her adult years, the nightmares have seemingly become more real.

She continued: “As I’ve got older, they have become more vivid. And since having a baby, I will regularly wake up and think I’ve lost her.”

Steph said the nightmares consist of thinking that she had “dropped” or “lost” her baby.

It had got so bad that Steph’s partner had found her “on the floor scrabbling around under things or in cupboards, looking for the baby.”

She said that it is “really quite scary” what her “brain is tricking” her into doing while asleep.

Steph confessed that “lately the night terrors are of not being able to do my job.”

Detailing a recent incident at her home, Steph said that she dreamt she was “live on the studio floor and saw a man exposing himself to me, pressing himself up naked against the glass. It was awful.”

She said that her partner had to calm her down after finding her “screaming away” as Steph had “leapt out of bed and ran over to the wall and was shouting, ‘That’s indecent exposure! I could have you arrested for that!’”

Steph sought counselling after this episode and while she said that she is not “cured”, it has given her coping mechanisms to deal with the disturbing dreams.

She said that there is a new bedtime routine to help and Steph revealed: “Everything now revolves around the baby.

“The thoughts aren’t rational — it’s totally irrational. But it’s something I have had help for.”

She said that that therapist has helped her find that it is “all to do with how you go to bed at night, about your peace of mind when you go to sleep.”

Now there is no “looking at your phone, not reading terrible stories or watching the news,” before heading to bed.

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