You are Getting Sleepy…

O sleep! O gentle sleep!
Nature’s soft nurse, how have I frighted thee,
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down

If you’re the father of a young one, you’ll know the feeling that Shakespeare so eloquently describes. I remember wondering if I’d ever get a good night’s shut eye again. (In fact, I think I’m averaging one good night’s sleep a year now, so that’s an improvement).

The reason I bring this up is because of some great info

• newborn sleep
• baby sleep
• toddler sleep
• preschooler sleep
• school-age sleep.

Also on the site is great article on Toward Independent Sleep.

Here’s hopin’ you get some tonight. Sleep.

Waking Up Sleepyhead

Often enough, it can be hard to get kids into bed (can I hear an AMEN?). Then at other end of the day sometimes hard to get them out of it. Especially for school.

With Eldest Son, the rare occasions where he is reticient to get up and at ’em for a school day, the tactic is logic. Logic and empathy:

“I know you’re tired mate. You’ve had a busy week. But you’ve got forty minutes to get ready and we have to go.”

… well, it’s not logic really; more like this is your reality, live in it.

Youngest Son? - sheesh!! The above approach doesn’t work. Neither does true logic which would be something like “It’s a school day, you go to school on a school day, you have to get up and get ready to go to school, so you’ll be getting up now.” Neither do consequences: “Get up now or I’m cutting back your allowance!” ["Go for it," he'll think. "It's worth the extra sleep"]

The key with him is to get him talking. This requires more effort and creativity than Eldest Son (by a mile) but it works.

If I can ask him about a funny thing that might have happened yesterday, or ask him if Freddy will be at school today, or ask him who he hopes will win the football match this coming Saturday, or mention that I had a wierd dream and tell him about it … eventually, I’ll get boo out of him. The cognitive cogs begin turning and I can almost see those cogs raising the shutters, powering up the lights, engaging the gears that make his limbs move him out of the bed.

What works for you? And what doesn’t?

Night Terrors

From age 2 to about 6, Youngest Son often suffered terrible nightmares as well as what’s become known as Night Terrors. Night Terrors are basically, according to my understanding, episodes of extreme fear and anxiety with no apparent cause and they happen, strangely enough , in the middle of the night.

If your little one is suffering this (and you’re suffering too, by default!), I came across this terrific and practical post about it, which I recommend to you:

How To Handle The Midnight Terrors