I haven't written about sleep in ages, which is remarkable considering that getting the Tsunamis to appreciate it in the same quantities that I do has been a preoccupation of mine for about seven years now. One day I'll do a BIG POST telling you all about the trials and tribulations of why-we-don't-get-a-lot-of-sleep-around-here and how-that-makes-us-feel... actually, writing that post will bore me so much that I might actually fall asleep, so I'll get right onto that. But, in the meantime, this is a little post about a little bit of my sleep tribulations and it's only a little bit boring.
I want to talk about the 'half sleep' - the 'Twilight Sleep'. Mothers of newborns will know exactly what I'm talking about here. It's the sleep your body is having when your brain is actually wide awake listening for your baby to make an imperceptible noise that only you can hear at around 3.37am so you can leap instantly out of bed and be at their side in a jiffy. It's the sleep you might also start having if a loud crash awakes you in the middle of the night and your brain thinks 'oh my god, one of the darling children has fallen out of bed' but your body says 'yeah, whatever' and tries to go back to sleep. Alas, after a crash like that it's only Twilight Sleep that you'll achieve.
Recently my friend the Twilight Sleep has been visiting me when Maxi-Taxi makes his 3am stealthy entrance onto the mattress we've got set up in our room for just that purpose. Yes, he has his own temporary bed at the foot of our bed and we'll just ignore the fact that recently it's been sporting it's own feather doona with a cover that marries well with our bedroom's general colour scheme...
Judge not, it's been a very lengthy, sleepless battle to get him to this semi-independent point. The idea is that he sneaks on in and if he can get himself out of his bed, up the stairs and onto the mattress without waking us, the mattress stays. If he wakes us up, the mattress goes. It's been quite a few months now and the little mattress is working it's magic. Except of course every night the sweet little boy who comes creeping as quietly as he can wakes me up anyway because I've been in Twilight Sleep mode just waiting for him to come up every night.
That's what Twilight Sleep does to a mother. It's the expectation that our children are going to need us and they probably really don't, but we can't be sure because we're only half asleep so we hear every little sound so it sounds like they sorta do. It's a vicious circle that I'm not sure how to break. Whenever I bemoaned the fact that my babies were yet again playing up during sleep time, my wise Mum always said to me "you can't make them sleep" and she was absolutely right. Unfortunately it's true that we can't make ourselves sleep, either.
If you have any suggestions whatsoever to help a Twilight Sleeper like me just go the f$#k to sleep*, please let me know. In the meantime, if you need me, just breathe extra heavily and I'll come racing.
* My absolute favourite children's book of all time.
[Image from here]