Where My Daughter Gets Her Sleeping Habits
Every once in awhile, you run into one of those incredible toddlers who you can just lay down for a nap and they actually fall asleep without too much of a fuss. They’re tired, and laying down for a little snooze just makes sense to them.
Julie is not one of those kids. While she is a good sleeper at night, she is a complete monster during the day at naptime.
So you might say, “Well, then, don’t lay her down for a nap“.
And my answer is no freaking way. She needs it. Desperately. And even more than her needing some zzzz’s, I need a little bit of time without her climbing on me like a monkey.
Well, I guess I should have figured this out sooner… but do you know who she gets this annoying habit from?
Her dad.
James is one of those adults who never outgrew the whole, “I don’t wanna go to bed!” phase.
In college, I’d meet up with him in between classes and he’d be absolutely wiped… I’d ask how late he was up, and he’d mumble sheepishly, “Um, I dunno. Pretty late. Maybe 2 in the morning”. What he would always later admit was that he’d be up until almost sunrise.
Now, one would think that he’d be up watching porn and masturbating, or playing video games, or maybe drinking beer with his buddies and laughing like a moron. But no, not James. You wanna know what that boy was up doing until sunrise?
Computer programming. Programming his “Linux Box”. Yup. You saw that right. My darling husband is *that kind* of engineer. The one who wears a T-shirt that says, “No, I Will Not Fix Your Computer”. For Christmas one year (long enough ago that he actually had short hair), he even got me a shirt that says, “I Love My Geek” on it.
And he was proud.
As a side note, I am very happy to say that I can still fit in those clothes, even after two kids. Except my boobs are like two sizes bigger right now.
But anyhoo, that Geek is still obnoxious about “bedtime”. It’s so stupid. If I’m not the one to initiate the whole hey, we’re both so tired our eyes are rolling around in our heads, what do you say we go to bed… thing, he will sit there, staring at his computer, until the sun comes up.
Whining about how exhausted he is and how he needs sleep the whole time, of course.
I’m constantly thinking… You know, I’m not his freaking mother. I shouldn’t have to tell him it’s bedtime. But I do. Otherwise, he never goes to bed.
I have no idea why this is. We’ve discussed it time and useless time again. Even our therapist gently told him that maybe he should consider going to bed a little earlier so that we’re not so wiped out. We did that for about two weeks, and it was great. Then it was back to the same old routine.
Now, he’ll say he has no problem with going to bed at a decent time, and that’s true. It’s the whole getting-off-his-ass-and-getting-into-bed-on-his-own-accord part that we have trouble with.
If I weren’t such a light, restless sleeper, this wouldn’t be nearly as much of a problem. But unfortunately, my doctor didn’t give me a bottle of knock-me-out-on-my-ass-unconscious when she wrote my prescription for Prozac. If I try to go to bed before him, he always wakes me up when he finally does get to bed with his ball-scratching. Put simply, I can’t sleep until he has fallen asleep and is done doing his annoying snort-awakes, scratching, and teeth-clicking.
Consequently, I feel like I’m sleep training three kids at once. No wonder Julie is such a pain in the ass to lay down for a nap.
*Argggg*
I need my own bedroom.
Current Mood:
Mischievous