Last night sucked. Well, I guess to be accurate I should say this morning sucked.
One of the twins woke up crying at 4:00 am. This happened the day before as well, so we were dreading two straight days of ruined sleep. We waited anxiously, hoping he would soothe himself back to sleep, which he often does. No dice. We then had a brief discussion about what to do. I suggested bringing him into our bed, but was reminded of how that never ever works, because he doesn’t sleep in our bed. He just tosses, and turns, and talks, and generally keeps us awake. We decided to send Mom into the lion’s den, and it was the right choice. She has rockabye-baby-foo that Dad can’t compete with. 30 minutes later, Mom came back to bed triumphantly, and all was well.
The glorious silence lasted about 10 minutes.
The second boy must have awoken from the earlier ruckus, and since he is able to climb out of his crib, he was at the bedroom door, crying and rattling the doorknob. Fortunately, this guy is usually able to get into bed with us and fall back asleep. Unfortunately when I tried to quietly extricate him from their bedroom, his brother re-awoke and resumed the water works.
At this point it was approaching 5:00 am, we had unhappy toddlers, and even though it was Saturday morning, Mom had an 8:00 am appointment to get to. Obviously it didn’t help that I had stayed up past midnight editing photos and playing games, and this was all on top of the aforementioned prior lousy night of sleep, a busy work week, and an illness that has been passed around amongst our family for about a week.
The next couple of hours were a blur of cries and sighs, as we tried to negotiate with the terrorists. The carrot approach, if you lie down and go to sleep, you can stay in Mom and Dad’s bed, had the same unsuccessful result as the stick if you don’t lie down and go to sleep, you’re going back to your crib. Both boys were up for the day, and wanted attention. They weren’t going to sleep in our bed, and they weren’t going to go quietly back to their cribs.
At some point the boys and I wound up back in their room, playing with blocks and reading Llama Llama Misses Mama. Some time later Mom came and relieved me for 30 minutes or so, before she had to leave the house. I actually did doze for a few minutes, but it was far from what I needed.
Mom took off for her appointment and I immediately turned on the TV. Despite studies warning against excessive TV watching for young kids, I am finding that television is a damn effective babysitter. I’m not thrilled with myself for resorting to it as often as I do, but I have come to terms with it. It’s the only way I can keep my sanity while doing things like making coffee and breakfast, feeding that cat, emptying the dishwasher, taking a shower, etc. If not for the idiot box the guys would be destroying the house and/or screaming like banshees which is never cool, but especially not when sleep-deprived at 8:00 am. Mom almost never turns on TV for them, and is more able to keep them under control. That, or she’s more willing to put up with the chaos. EIther way she’s a stronger person than I am.
FWIW the boys only watch shows with positive messages such as Daniel Tiger, Handy Manny, and occassionally the NFL.
Haha?
🙁
I will admit the boys have watched a bit of football this season, though not much to speak of, and discussing the NFL’s current woes is a whole other blog post, or three. It’s depressing as hell, and I have trouble reconciling my love for the game and fantasy football in particular with some of the recent off-field news. But I digress…
When all was said and done we survived the morning. I successfully fed the boys, and supervised them enough to prevent injury or death. They enjoyed their shows, and before long Mom came home to rescue me.
I joke about a lot of this, but I really do get bummed out. It doesn’t take much early-morning screaming to make me regret the whole parenthood thing. I mean what were we thinking? We had a good thing going pre-kids. We travelled. We went out to concerts, restaurants, parties and movies. Navigating our house didn’t involve an obstacle course of fences, baby-gates, and drawer-locks, nor toys with pointy plastic parts and pieces that practically pierce skin. We slept a normal amount at night. Our commute was easier, with no need to go out of our way to daycare. Money was less tight. Meals were more creative. There was time for projects, and for reading, TV, movies and games, and for just staring at the walls.
I know I’m not the first person to struggle with toddlers, and I probably have it better than many other fathers. Still, it’s damn hard. Getting back to the humor of it all is probably the only salvation. Difficult as they are, those boys sure do make me laugh. Even in the hardest times, there are often laugh-out-loud moments.
I am reminded of an aborted nap time several weeks ago that I was able to capture on video. It was the normal time for a nap, something the boys do everyday, but for whatever reason they weren’t having it. See the below video and imagine my conflicting interior monologue as I watch them completely ignore calls for nap time, and instead one boy dances and sings, while the other climbs out of his crib to approach me.
These boys may be slowly driving me insane, but at least I’m laughing along the way.
