Night Terror

"The Night Terror"
and no, not the nightmares. My kid. My 2 year old kid, specifically.

How many of you have heard, or even said, "no two children are the same". Well, if you've said it, you're wrong. If you've heard it, you've been lied to.

When it comes to sleep, neither of my kids enjoy it, let alone appreciate it's restorative benefits. Sarah didn't sleep through the night until she was 9 months old. Now though, I bribe her with 5 pennies every night just to get her to stay in bed. It works and as a result, this post is not primarily about her, for which she should feel honored and lucky.

Initially I thought Emily would be my sleeper (at 2 weeks she was sleeping an unheard of 10 hours a night), but as she grew, she proved me wrong. She is awful. Bedtime is one battle after another, night after night. As her mom, it's stressful, mentally exhausting, and I flat out dread the evening hours. The long and short of it is, it takes a lot to wear her out. She is simply not tired at bedtime.

Well, last night she was awake until midnight, a new record. She was not tired awake which involves yawning, fussing, and rubbing of the eyes while she insists, "I no sleepy." No, this was wide awake and happy Emily. She wanted to play, converse (I wish she wasn't so darn funny), and read. . .and did so until midnight. That's right. My 2 year old was up until midnight. . .

. . .and back up again at 8:30am. Fine for me. Not so fine for her. Whether or not she wants to believe it, she needs 10 hours of sleep a night. I know this. Of course I know this. I'm her mom.

When her little face in front of mine woke me up at 8:30am, I decided that I was going to push her to the point of toddler exhaustion. In my game of "Mommy versus 2yo", failure was not an option.

I had some errands to run this morning and ran we did, over to Chatham in Squirrel Hill, then to Shaler Library, and back home for snack. I let them have some quiet time, but I insisted, no napping! At 2pm Emily mentioned something about being tired. Ha. I decided it was the perfect time to head to the grocery store. We piled into the car, did a little shopping, and headed home. Now almost 3pm, in typical Emily fashion (go, go, go and then take a crazy long nap late in the afternoon), she started begging for a nap. I told her absolutely no way. It was too late for that. We played (ie the girls started picking on each other and tripping over non-existant obstacles - my plan was working, they were getting sleepy) and then I made dinner.

Soon after I noticed Emily eyes starting to droop so I suggested we head to the playground for a bit. I intended to stay 30 minutes which would have gotten us home at 6:30, but they were having so much fun we stayed until 7 when Emily started dancing in circles and saying she needed to go potty. When we got home, I threw them both in the tub and then suggested we give ourselves pedicures since they head back to school tomorrow. Naturally they liked this idea. So with popcorn and polish we had ourselves a mini-spa.

By this the time we finished our "pedis", Sarah was telling me she wanted to go to bed. I reminded both that we had some new library books to read and encouraged them to choose two. In the middle of the first book Emily laid down on the bed and said, "Mommy, I am soooo tired."

I promise you, sweeter words have never been uttered.

I tucked the girls into bed and both of them were out in 5 seconds flat. 

Mommy - 1
Kiddos - 0

just the way I like it.

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