Flash forward a a few years. Boy child is now 7, baby girl is now a little girl at 4 and a new baby girl, almost 1, has entered the arena.
My children sleep in stages it seems. Boy child likes to wake up early, which is why there are dark out curtains on his window. Little girl likes to stay up late and sleep in. New baby girl takes up everything in between. Between the three I feel at times in a perpetual state of sleep deprivation and I am honestly starting to suspect myself of suffering from insomnia. I find myself exhausted before the bedtime ritual even starts in the evenings. Drudging through dinner and bath time in methodical state of repetition.
The boy usually falls asleep fairly quickly in the evening. I think he has started to learn to accept the fact that it is okay to admit that you are tired every now and then. I have to sigh on the nights he begs to stay up to read his books. After winning the battle over learning to read or not with him he has now developed my love for it, which is wonderful but I don't want him to suffer for my bad habit of , " I will sleep after this page." "Ok, after this chapter." only to finally put it down after the book has been ravenously devoured. So I tend to limit his time but most of the time he falls asleep with the light still on.
Little girl has taken over his role as the hall wander and creator of "I'm not tired." excuses. She starts school next year so the role of night shift little mother hen need to start coming to a close. She debates with me some nights on why she should not be going to be just yet. I finally get her into bed and sit down only to hear the creak of an opening door and the loud pattering of someone's tiny feet down the hall. I turn to see a small head peering around the corner and as she sees that I see her one of two things happen. She lets out a little shriek and runs back or proudly thrust herself into the room to make a request. Pick one: "I'm thirsty" "I had a bad dream." "There's a monster." "I need another story." "I have to go to the bathroom.". Her newest is "My stomach hurts." this line was pulled for almost two weeks and even though I could find no true evidence of such an ailment I took her to the doctor. Who reminder her it was important to not lie about such things and try to poop. We are still have slight issues of her not wanting to do that...
By the time I get her finally convinced that perhaps she should fall asleep the baby girl either wakes up or decides this would be grand time to fuss all her woes to the world. I play, rock, feed, cuddle, sing, read or just plan entertain the final child left awake. Until she finally falls asleep or I swaddle her and place her in her bed. Then it's my turn to convince myself to sleep.
You see I have passed the the exhaustion that early threatened to have my curl up on the couch for a snooze. I have now gotten my second wind so I try to do somethings to go to sleep. Some nights I turn on the tv to have a little noise drone on so I can finish cleaning up messes. Some nights I crawl in the bathtub to soak away the day, most of the time I have an audience in baby girl. Some nights I pick up the book that I failed to even read a full page from during the day and try to find my way back into the story. Some nights I lay in the dark willing myself to sleep.
Go to sleep mommy. Just go the F to sleep, quickly before the sun starts to rise and boy child awakes.
