Simon is 26 months old. This is important for many reasons: he’s hit that communication explosion where he can say pretty much whatever’s on his mind, his physical capabilities are growing by leaps and bounds, he’s finally keeping up with some of his older siblings and is therefore much happier, he’s suddenly an easier tag-a-long on those bigger, more involved errands that are perfect Daddy/Son dates.
It’s also significant because in all of those 26 months, I can count on one hand the number of nights I have had an uninterrupted night’s sleep.
The truth about Simon? He doesn’t sleep.
Not well, at least. Definitely not willingly. And more often than not, not at all.
I assumed that I was the only one walking through sleepless nights long after my baby was no longer, well … a baby. But here and there, I would hear of other Mommas lamenting their sleep-free toddlers. If you look carefully, you can spot us: we’re the Mommas and Daddies who look just a little frazzled around the edges, who stare off into the middle distance without meaning, who don’t just want that mid-afternoon cuppa, but need it. When we visited with my grandmother just before departing for Nepal, she couldn’t help but pick up on the fact that Simon didn’t even seem to need sleep. Maybe it was the fact that we didn’t even bother to try and work in a nap? Or the fact that she heard him cheerfully asking, “Sun is up now?” from her living room sofa bed at 3 a.m.?
“Your Papaw and your Daddy were the exact same way,” she confided. “Almost killed me.” I asked my dad, and sure enough, to this day, he sleeps four or five hours a night and never feels the need for more. “Just don’t need it. I’m not tired,” he confirmed.
Sigh.
So here we are– weeks away from welcoming our ninth child, who will undoubtably fill a niche in our family that we didn’t realize was vacant. It’s happened every single time; it will happen again. But hey, baby? In case you were wondering, the space marked “The One Who Doesn’t Sleep” is already occupied. Guess you’ll just have to be “The One Who Sleeps Really, Really Well.”