My children's sleep has been interrupted more than usual lately. Mischief, who was sleeping through the night, is awake once or twice each night and Trouble, normally up once or twice, stands at the baby gate at his bedroom door and calls out for me two, three, four times each night.
I know that climbing into Trouble's bed with him reinforces the problem, but frequently I am too tired to do anything but collapse gratefully onto his mattress and pull the duvet up under my chin. Lately, I am asleep before he's even settled himself against me.
My house, usually mostly tidy, has devolved into an unmitigated disaster, and rather than work on cleaning it up while Mischief is in school and Trouble sleeps, I catnap on the couch, trying to claw as much rest as I can from the too-bright, too-short afternoons.
If I am not careful - if I do not plan some self-care into my weeks and months - it begins to seem hopeless, and my temper becomes as brittle as my ability to keep my eyes from leaking against my will. My cardinal rules of parenting (never say "because I said so", remember their perspective, consider how my words affect them) slip sneakily out the window and I don't even realise that they're gone until Mischief says something incredibly hurtful to me. As my eyes well up, I recognise that she's just parroting something back that I've said in a moment of frustration, and my cheeks flush with shame as I apologise.
If I have something to hold on to, though, a plan or a dream or a hope, it's easier to smile gently instead of groaning with impatience. It's easier to take the time to let Trouble put on his own shoes, even though it will make us late, and to do it with encouragement and praise instead of chiding and harsh words.
Right now, I am clutching tightly at a plan for a weekend very soon that I will spend all by myself. I might watch tv. I will certainly read in utter silence. I will nap when the thought occurs to me, and will sleep the night through. I might knit or have a bath or take my time over a crossword puzzle at a coffee shop. When I wake, it will be to smile sleepily as I realise that I have nowhere to be and am responsible for no one, and I will gleefully pull the blankets back up to my nose and roll over for another hour.
This may seem a rather pedestrian dream for most of you, but at the moment it's my idea of heaven. It's the only thing making it okay that it's 1:17 am and I've spent the last 45 minutes trying to get my children back to sleep, painfully aware that morning for me will come in just over 4 hours. I will have no opportunity to nap tomorrow and it will be a very long day, but I'm borrowing comfort, calm and patience from my getaway weekend, so it will all be okay.
On this weekend when North America celebrates mothers, I hope you're taking the time to celebrate yourselves. I hope that you find something to hold on to, and that it's big enough for you to borrow all of the patience, calm and comfort you need so you can be the amazing moms that each of you are.
Good night!
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