It starts with the “oh my god the baby/babies have slept 4 hours in a row, cue two babies who refuse to nap, sleep the following day ,causing copious vats of coffee being drank as you struggle to keep your eyes open. But sure its ok you are on maternity leave after-all and have nothing to do but sit around and watch telly ,right….
OK it’s a once off, phew you sigh as normality returns the following night and then an eery kind of calm comes over the house. You and your partner give each other “the look “as you close the nursery door , one of you goes to open your mouth but before you can utter a word the other nearly tackles you to the ground for daring to say out loud what you are both thinking and praying.
And then you get cocky, we got this you high five each other! The twins are sleeping longer each night and you dare to verbally communicate this to others as they hit the 4 month mark.
BANG 4 MONTH SLEEP REGRESSION
Normality resumes 6 weeks later, thank Jesus just in time before we have no hair left but unfortunately the marks are left behind, those dark pools under our eyes unfortunately are there forever.
Everyone is a little brighter, early mornings are still hard no matter how much sleep has been had ,such is the busy life as a parent ,but you can cope ,solid blocks of sleep are happening.
8 MONTH SLEEP REGRESSION
Why ,Why ,Why , you nudge each other that its their turn to go to the crying baby, and the joys of multiple parenting usually means very soon you nudge yourself from the bed as the other makes their presence known. You shuffle past each other, dancing the zombie scene from Thriller in the kitchen most mornings as you go about the morning ritual.
And then one day you realise the alarm actually got the chance to finally do what it is meant to do and it wakes you! Ye stare at each other in disbelief, check the calendar and look at the Wonder Weeks app and see those feckin clouds have been replaced with sunshine and lots of lovely blank weeks ahead. And months follow and all is right with the world.
Cue returning to work at the twins first birthday, thank God they are sleeping I say to my friends and husband it’ll make going back to work that bit easier, night before I go back they wake at 4am…
13 to 18 months was rocky and one we have not yet recovered from and maybe at their 21st we can reminisce fondly but lets just say the app forecasted clouds and it was right!
So now we are nearly 3 years old and it’s been great, lots of good nights sleep, enough sleep to take back up finishing my novel, writing short stories, going to the gym twice a week in the evenings, himself a very talented artist being able to paint again, all is good and then you dare to say this out loud.
There is no longer an app to show me clouds so I go by the app that is the verbal confirming out loud to other people that your child is sleeping. There is nothing more to guarantee your child waking for the entire night than to dare to say it to another person- even to write it in a conversation is like you are predicting the future and all that you can see ahead through your blurry sleep deprived vision is your empty space in the bed!
Take the fact that not only a few days ago in another post I dared to mention the kids weren’t sick. A mere two days later illness struck and we have been pulling all-nighters alternating nights to keep some form of sanity. Two trips on a Saturday to the doctor confirmed antibiotics were needed and things are looking up for us all.
The irony of this post has not escaped me but since we are in the middle of a no sleep situation all rules of never saying out loud that our kids sleep are gone out the window!
( little man will be ok thankfully in a few days )
DodeestoDaquiris 