I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t tired. Sometimes I’m merely tired, and not exhausted, which is always welcome. Sometimes I think that if I could just close my eyes right now, I could sleep for the next 12 hours. Maybe longer. Throughout the week, I’m certain I could sleep hours past my alarm. And yet, Saturday morning, I’m wide awake at 6am. It’s unfair. Now that I have children who sleep past dawn, I myself am unable to do so? What kind of sick joke is that?
At work today, I thought about a nap, out loud. It was met with equally enthusiastic response from nearly every adult in proximity. I’m actually not a nap-taker. I think people are born into one camp or the other on that front. But they always sound like the best idea ever, and I think maybe I could be a nap taker if I just applied myself.
My ears are tired, because at any one time, there are at least two people talking to me.
My legs are tired, because last night I thought I could change seamlessly from jogging to biking. Turns out those are very different muscles. Respect to every tri-athlete out there.
My eyes are tired, because they’ve been staring all day at black text marching across a white screen and I never think to take my contacts out until they’ve been in for 15 hours and are stabbing me in the eyes.
My college roommate and I were huge Barenaked Ladies fans in college. They have one song called Who Needs Sleep. If you haven’t heard it, I recommend listening. It’s fun, and it’s been dead on accurate for me across decades. (Decades. Because I somehow keep getting older). Who needs sleep? (well you’re never gonna get it) Who needs sleep? (tell me what’s that for) I think as a human race we’ve done amazing things. But how tired are we? We’ve been to the moon, and good for us. But we may have explored galaxies by now if we were all just a little more rested. We may have already been visited by alien races who said, right before they moved on, “It’s a cute planet, but there seems to be some sort of sleeping sickness here.” They may be right.
Our war with sleep starts early. I can remember as a child, I was supposed to be in my room napping, but I’d be up. And our postman, Mr. Mahoney, would come by, and I’d call out to him from my second floor window, which my mother would never be able to hear, because I was so very sneaky, and he’d say with mock sternness, It’s naptime! Go to sleep! It actually may not have been mock sternness. If he was a father himself, he probably felt pretty strongly about it. Just another kid on his route who had no respect for the amazing schedule that somehow gifted them with an hour’s nap every afternoon.
Now, with kids of my own, I realize that there are volumes, tomes, dedicated to child sleep habits. And there is a booming industry of sleep aids for exhausted adults. I think the reason Sleeping Beauty is such a timeless fairy tale is that we’re all secretly jealous. Really? And then she just slept? FOR ONE HUNDRED YEARS? That’s amazing. But back to children… I understand now that the number one rule of early parenting is that you do everything in your power to tire them out so that they’ll “sleep well.” This really has very little to do with their sleep cycle. I mean, if they get a good night’s sleep, so much the better. It’s better for everyone that way. But really, this is about the tired adults. If we can just get these little balls of energy into their beds (before we miss the window and they cycle into manic crazy), we have it made! And yet, it’s a ridiculously difficult task. Just this week, way past bedtime, my youngest came downstairs (again), wanting to read in her bed. No, I said. You need your sleep. It’s a school night (and mommy needs to watch John Oliver on DVR with his HBO-sanctioned language). I turned off her light. “Fine! I can’t read in the dark! I won’t learn to read! I’ll never learn anything!” she yelled down the stairs after me. At that moment, her illiteracy was the least of my concerns. We can tell when our children don’t get enough sleep. It affects them just like it does us. And yet, what I really mean when I say, “Why don’t you take a deep breath and think about what you just said… I don’t think you got enough sleep”, is, Mommy didn’t get enough sleep to deal with this tantrum and so help me, if you keep pushing, I’m going to dive into that bag of M&Ms like there’s no tomorrow and pair it with a side of rosé and do you really want that on your conscience?
As school starts again for the year, we’re balancing a new rush of activities with a new year of a little more homework, and a little more independence, a little more testing of waters and boundaries and limits. A new year of growing up, for all of us. The sensible thing to do would be to go to bed earlier, count sheep and get a white noise machine. But those hours when the house is finally quiet and my time is my own are too precious to give up to sleep. We’ve all heard Plato’s famous quote, Be kind. For everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Perhaps, adapted, we just need to remember, Be kind. Everyone you meet is at least a little tired, and quite probably exhausted.
Let them sleep, for when they wake, they will move mountains.