Sleep

As I’m sure you can tell by my name, sleep has always been an issue in my house. It
started when I was eight months’ pregnant and basically, except for the odd couple of
weeks here and there, has remained the same.

J-man is a night owl. I recall in those last few months of pregnancy trying to sleep while
he did gymnastics or kick-boxing, or played basketball with my internal organs. It would
generally start at 8 p.m. and carry on well into the two and three a.m. range.

The first night in hospital he didn’t stop crying, and that continued well into his sixth month.
At a year he was waking only a couple of times a night.

I tried everything. From rum on the soother to every sleep book, doula, and training method
known to mother. I spoke to every other mom I could find, even those who had long stopped
raising babies.

There was always a problem. He was hungry most of the time, the neighbour turned on the
light that shines in his room, I dared to go to the washroom (completely in the dark without
closing the door or flushing the toilet), it was a tooth, his ears, he was hot, he was cold, or
maybe he just wanted his mommy.

The thing about being in crisis (okay, maybe a strong word, but there were days for sure)
is that you ask for help and people try to give it to you. Try this method or that. Let him
cry it out, it will only take a couple of nights, develop a routine, give him as much support
as he needs, try rocking him, don’t rock him, teach him to fall asleep on his own, he’s
just a baby don’t expect him to fall asleep on his own, give him a bottle, don’t give him a
bottle you’ll ruin his teeth. And inevitably someone will say or insinuate, or you will feel and
internalize what they are saying is that you are responsible because you’re doing or not
doing something.

I would like to say there is a happy ending to this post, but at two and a half “we” still don’t
sleep through the night, though we do a little more often than we did six months or a year
ago. Maybe it’s still teeth, but every night starts with a one-hour tantrum. Some nights
there’s another at two or three a.m. Thankfully those are mostly short, except Sunday night,
which lasted an hour and a half! And in the morning, long after Mom’s at her desk, J-man
doesn’t want to wake up.

And who could blame him? I don’t want to wake up either. Oh right, I have my day job too!

-Sleepwalking Mama


[image: moon]

Does This Pig Look Like She’s Sleeping?

To sleep or not to sleep. Is that a question? Really? It feels like it’s not an option. To
sleep, perchance to dream — as if. When was the last time I actually slept enough to
have a dream? Why does that pig look like she's sleeping? She's not. I am inside her
head. I can hear her brain. It is humming: “Stop sucking and maybe I can get some
sleep…errr…Oh, just want to sleep…whirr…I’d like to sleep…I could shake them all
off…but then they’d scream and I’d have to get up with them and oh what a bother, I
should have listened when they said ‘Don’t let them in the bed with you because you’ll
never get them out!’"

She’s not sleeping. I know she’s not.

This is what I was going to write about. The main topics the Mamas and I have
discussed over our time together include sleep, feeding, sex, and personal sacrifice. And
love. Half of it, the Sweet. The other half, the Sour. Sometimes, on my own, I focus on
the sour and I forget all about the sweet.

Yesterday I met with a friend who informed me and another friend that she had had her
fifth miscarriage. This came crashing in. It was not meant to be the focus of the meeting.
We had no idea. She had listened to me go on and on about my sleep troubles with
the Guppins, and our other girlfriend had talked about her relationship, home, work, the
usual, when this beautiful, busy, in-demand artist friend of ours, this gorgeously patient,
loving being, the woman who I have chosen to look after my daughter should my partner
and I End, just sort of tells us.

a heartbeat
we hold out arms
we hold back what tears we can
we grieve instantly
she tells us she thinks they were twins
we bow our heads
she tries to smile
we hold on
we hold on.

I forget about the pig. I forget about everything I hardly deserve the right to have. With
my blundering and accidental happiness. It’s not fair.

-Drama Mama