I’ve got five kids, three of whom are under five. I haven’t slept through the night in four years. It’s ok. Really. I’m used to it. I’ve just convinced myself that sleep is for wimps – like those people who ride the motorized carts through Walmart just cause they’re pregnant. Wait. I did that once.
Anyway, it’s not a sleep training issue, really, it’s not. I sleep train like a champ. Like it’s my J.O.B. because, well, it is. It’s more a law of averages. With five children, there is always going to be someone who has a bad dream, or falls out of bed, or loses a lovey, or doesn’t make it to the potty, or DOES make it to the potty and then proceeds to drop the toilet lid so loudly that we all start up with hearts racing wondering when the war started. Then, of course, occasionally, there’s the puking. Like last night. Poor little Juliette who made it down from the top bunk and all the way to the bathroom. Well, the first time. Not so much on round 2 and 3. That’s another law for you: the law of diminishing returns. I know I don’t have those right. Shut up. That’s not my job.
These are all interruptions to be expected. This is what people are talking about when they say to new parents, “You’ll never sleep again.”
You know what they don’t mention? They don’t mention waking in the night to a half-naked zombie boy standing by your bed, scratching his neck, rolling his head around, and asking about curtains. Nope. See, told ya. But I’m your friend, so I’m going to let you in on a little secret…
Sleepwalking is real, y’all, and it’s super trendy around town. Or, at least, around here. That’s as much of the town as I see, anyway.
When Grey was a baby he had horrible nosebleeds. Like massacre quality, “Oh my God! Is he still alive?” nosebleeds. Then when he was a toddler he had night-terrors. EVERY.NIGHT. He’d “wake up” screaming and nothing we could do could calm him down. His whole body shook. After a few months, my whole body shook. Night terrors are not run of the mill bad dreams. They happen during a different cycle of sleep, a cycle it is very, very difficult to wake from. You basically have to sit there with your terrified, possessed child until they enter a different sleep pattern and then you can wake them up and calm them down.
Finally, after about a year of Googling (it would’ve gone faster if I wasn’t so dang tired) I discovered a link between excessive night terrors and sleep apnea. To my credit, I got from sleep apnea to allergies in one click. So, we took Grey to an allergist and yep. He’s basically allergic to air.
He’s been on medication for a few years (slightly scary, I know, but not nearly as scary as that, up there) and the night terrors have ceased. In fact, he doesn’t seem scared at all as he wanders our house in the middle of the night. Me, on the other hand, I’m terrified. Ok, sometimes I’m amused. Sometimes I even haul out my phone to capture the crazy, as insurance against a crappy girlfriend so that I can share it as a Public Service Announcement.
Y’all. He’s ASLEEP. Creepy.
But seriously, our house is just chock full of things to kill yourself on if you aren’t paying attention. I think asleep definitely qualifies as distracted. There’s this, for example.
I know it doesn’t look like much now, but in the middle of the night, that thing turns into the stairway to hell. There’s even a few floor length windows at the bottom so you can slit your throat on broken glass in case you don’t just break your neck on the way down.
But that’s not the scariest thing. Oh no. This is the scariest thing:
See that balcony up there? That one WAY up there? It’s a good thirty feet off the ground. And it’s in my bedroom. The same bedroom where zombie sleeping boy shows up in the middle of the night. And you’d think, “Hey, no big deal. If he walks through your bedroom to your balcony doors, you’ll know it. You’ll wake up.” But you’d be wrong. Because, might I remind you that I haven’t slept through the night in FOUR YEARS. So I’m tired. Like really, really tired. I might not wake up. Ever.
But I think I’ve come up with a solution. Yes, indeedy. I’m going to trick out Grey’s door this weekend. I’ve found the perfect thing.
This should keep him busy for a while.
Anne Prickett
Great idea, but remember I taught Grey last year and I’m pretty sure he’ll figure it out…even in his sleep.
Big Daddy
awe com on mom,, I can work that maze in my sleep..(he got it from somewhere).
Gale
Jen, my twins TOOK TURNS with night terrors. No joke. I now sleep in a (legally) drug induced state for my sanity and my children’s safety. That being said, I once was so exhausted when, in a middle of the night, once in three years dead sleep, I told my child with a stomach ache to go clean his stomach with bleach. Yep. That’ll cure your stomach ache. Thank God he had enough sense to roll his eyes and climb back in bed. This too shall pass. Thank you for your truth with humor!
Ruby Julian
My husband, brother-in-law, son, father and brother were all sleep-walkers, but it’s something they all did briefly as pre-teens and grew out of. Coming into your bedroom is not as bad as what my husband did in his sleep as a 9-year-old: he would use the crisper drawer in the fridge for a urinal! His brother, who was eight years older, would go to the fridge and eat in his sleep, which makes it a very good thing that they weren’t both sleep-walking at the same time. 😀
Mitzi
Poor Grey. Will have to hear the follow up!!! My uncle did this. He would go to the barn to milk the cows. My poor grandmother would follow him so he didn’t hurt himself.
Jen
Well at least he was doing something productive in the middle of the night!
Meredith
As I sit up waiting for my six year old to finish his nightly terror, I laugh with tears. Thank you for capturing the exhaustion and humor of the situation as only someone who has gone years without sleep can. Tonight, and next time I am up waiting, I will say a little prayer for your family. Hope things get brighter soon.
Kathy
I never knew how interesting late nights could be until after having kids. Night terrors are otherworldly. Our oldest tended to have them on the first night of any trip away from home, which made visiting grandparents a real treat–those dead-of-night hours of delirious crying, thrashing, babble, etc., geez… Gawd, your stairs. We have stairs stories. Our old house had two steep staircases (rise=run, with crazy shallow stair treads) and I wondered what childless brainiac must’ve designed such deathtraps, back in the 50s, when feet were smaller, or everyone had better balance, or perhaps every stair climb was just met with greater acceptance of the seriousness of the endeavor… I believe everyone in our family had at least one spill, adults included, and no, intoxication was never a factor. At one point I fell, holding an infant babe, and I sort of slid down the stairs on my back, holding baby up in the air, like I’m carrying some kind of drink tray, and we remarkably slid to the bottom safely, shaken but not stirred, as it were. I applied adhesive traction treads at one point, and they helped a bit. It was tedious. We had baby gates. They were tedious. We ultimately moved away. Thank goodness. I never thought I’d appreciate aspects of the stately old split-level, but alas… Good luck with the nocturnal monitoring–and, of course, the sleep.