Can I Please Get Some Sleep!

sleep (Photo credit: Sean MacEntee)

I feel like I am preaching to the choir when I start a post on a blog aimed primarily at parents which has the title; “Can I Please Get Some Sleep!” As mommies and daddies you know that when you decide to have children one of the most important things you have to come to grips with is the fact that sleeping in, and 8-9 hours of solid sleep are a thing of the past. It’s just no longer a part of your life, much in the same way combing my hair became a thing of the past when it all started to fall out. You have to accept it, give it up and then move on, otherwise you will find yourself a constant ball of angst and stress.

Even though we have long since accepted the fact that sleeping a full-night’s is no longer an option for you, the past couple of weeks at The Urban Daddy household have been like no other…

Let me explain what is happening here.

First off, our kids have always had a very structured day, so their evening begins with dinner, followed by kitchen clean up, bath/shower time, a snack, book (us or them reading) and then lights out by their set bedtime.  Boo, at just over 3-years-old is the first off to bed. Her bed time is 7pm. Ever since our summer vacation she has decided that bed-time routine begins with her falling to sleep in our bed, laying on mummy, in “Mummies bed” as she likes to call it.  She also needs to have pee’d, brushed her teeth, and have at least her favourite stuffed animal of the day snuggled against her before she dozes off.

Once Boo is asleep, I carry her to her room and hope that she stays asleep during the walk.  It’s a temporary move, however.

Boo is now at that age where we need to teach her to tell time so she will not get out of her bed before 7am (like her brothers), so right now she  meanders over to our room at all hours of the night, blankies tucked under he arms and she climbs into our bed and snuggles up on top of my wife / her mummy.

Problem is, one awaken, my wife cannot get back to sleep.  I’m not so unlucky, and all I need is 10 seconds and I am back out cold.  So of course, Boo comes in, wakes up my wife, who 1 minute to see if I wake up too (which I do not), then kicks me to take our daughter back to her room, which I’m happy to do.

But parents, you know that once a child arrives in your room, they do not want to go back to sleep in their bed, so Boo then goes through her routine of stall tactics; “I have to pee”, “I want you to sleep with me”, I’m thirsty”, “I’m hungry”… Once all that is taken care of, I convince her that I am going to lay with her until she’s asleep, and once she’s back asleep I slide back to my bed, or sometimes I just fall back to sleep there beside her and hope that she hasn’t jumped back out of bed and into our room.

The problem continues because I’m trying to not fall asleep in her room – I want to break her of the habit of coming it and waking us up because she knows she either sleeps in our bed or she gets me to stay with her.  It’s tiring.

So it figures then that once we start to break the pattern we get a night like the one I’m about to describe, which happened last week.

Early last week, Boo arrived in our room – an hour and a half after her bedtime – and hoped into bed.  We were watching TV together so I got up to tidy up the house and let Boo and her mummy lay down to sleep.  Before I left, however, Boo asked me for water.  “I’m thirsty”, she said.

I gave her water and she guzzled some back, then she started to cough / choke, so we both turned to look at her.

“I almost threw up!” she said.

Third child, I’m thinking in my head, “No, you were just choking on the water.  You’re okay now, go to sleep, I reassured her.”

“No, I’m going to vomit!” she follows with, now opening her mouth to show me that she threw up in her mouth and did not appreciate the acidic taste.

“It’s okay, just got to sleep, please” I replied.

“No, I’m going to vomit” she repeated to me.  “I’m going to the toilet.”

Up she popped out of the bed, and then she tore off into our bathroom.

“Turn on the light!” she blurted as she zoomed into the bathroom.  I looked at my wife and we nodded in agreement that I should at least go turn on the lights for her.

So of course, upon turning on the lights, she proceeds to vomit into the toilet… Twice.

Oops, I thought.

“I vomited in the toilet”, she pointed out to her previously unconvinced father.

“Yes you did.  How do you feel now?” I asked her.

And this episode was just the beginning, which saw us change our bed twice, including the duvet and it’s cover off to the laundry room with her blankies, her bed sheet, her under-pad and about 10 towels.

Yawn.

Now, Six-year-old Stewie is a completely different story…  This kid looks like he is going to pass out exhausted by 7pm, and he gets right into bed and reads or draws, but he sleeps SO soundly.  He gets up at the creak of the floor or the sound of thunder and races into our room and snuggles in to bed with us.  He’s getting so big that he can’t sneak in any more, we have to make room for him.

We now tell him when it may rain at night and he always asks if he can come sleep with us if there is thunder.  We always say yes.

Then there is Linus.

He’s a great sleeper.  We had Stewie at home and Linus slept through the birth.

Nuff said.

So what would be the perfect gift for my wife???  A night at a hotel.  Imagine… Food, WiFi, TV and a soft, comfy bed without distraction… I’m shuddering just thinking about it…  For me.  🙂

How do your kids sleep?