Oh Beautiful Sleep

Without enough sleep, we all become tall two-year-olds.

~JoJo Jensen, Dirt Farmer Wisdom, 2002

If people were meant to pop out of bed, we'd all sleep in toasters.

~Author unknown, attributed to Jim Davis

The amount of sleep required by the average person is five minutes more.

~Wilson Mizener

The feeling of sleepiness when you are not in bed, and can't get there, is the meanest feeling in the world.

~Edgar Watson Howe

Daylight savings time with children is not an extra hour of sleep. No, it is an extra hour of morning.

~Me

I have not slept well for some time now. My belly, back and bladder wake me many times at night. Couple that with my almost two-year-old who often thinks 1:14 AM and then again 4:35 AM is morning and you can imagine how frustrated and hopeless I can let myself feel on any given morning.

Being awoken at 4:30 AM has too often lead to the complete end of my night's sleep as my body is just too sore to lay down any longer. And so I have prayed many times that the Lord would give me uninterrupted sleep. I tell you the truth: I cannot function without beautiful sleep: "Lord, just let Weston start sleeping every night through the night. Please! Before the baby comes at least! And, Lord, give me a couple nights in a row just to catch up so I can be the mom you want me to be." But on one of those prayerful, sleepless mornings the Lord allowed me to see something new: Sleep had become my idol. I had begun to believe that no amount of God would help me become the mom during the day that I knew I needed to be - only beautiful sleep could do that. God wanted me to trust in HIM and what HE can do more than I trusted in SLEEP.

Upon being shown this, my prayer quickly changed, asking instead that regardless of how much sleep the night brought me, that I would depend wholly and solely upon the only One who could get me through my day to His glory.

I wish I could say that after this epiphany - this lesson that God was trying to teach me - that He then gave me night after night of sleep (since, after all, I had finally learned what God was trying to reveal to me). No. He has not. I now am being asked to live in this new understanding, testing my faith and providing me many opportunities to trust in Him for what I need in a day.

While I do still love sleep, that is not a bad place to be.

My Picks: Best Books for Parenting, Compiled

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Marc Weissbluth, M.D. If sleep is a struggle, or if you are afraid that sleep might become a struggle, read up on this book for sound research and (hopefully) great results. Great for a mom with an infant, or a mom with a child of any age that does not sleep through the night, has trouble going to sleep, or is not adjusting to their own bed, or any number of sleep-related issues going all the way up to the teen years.
Raising Godly Tomatoes by Elizabeth Krueger. The best book out there for godly instruction on the yearly years of child training. It is an excellent book for a mom with an 18-24 month old and beyond. One caveat that must be mentioned: She advocates keeping your children isolated from the world. The decision to do or not do this while your children are young is one that must be left up to how God leads your family. Regardless of what your family chooses, the help in this book is unmatched for its parenting advice.
Parenting the Heart of Your Child by Diane Moore. Great book for getting a big picture of the various stages your kids will need you to coach them through, as well as some tips for where you are now. Good for mom’s with 3-4 year olds and beyond.
“Don’t Make Me Count to Three!” by Ginger Plowman. An excellent resource for learning how to biblically teach, train and discipline our kids. Great for Mom’s with kids around 4-5 years old and beyond.

What are YOUR top picks?!?

A small Sleep Tip addition

I was re-reading my sleep tips and realized that I have one more:

If your baby is uncomfortable (perhaps with gas pains?) when it is time to sleep, lay her on her LEFT SIDE. Did you know you can burp laying on your left side but you can't burp (without urping) on your right or on your back? It's true! Imagine what a relief it would be to a baby to JUST BE ABLE TO BURP!!

Now go ahead, drink some pop and lay down. You know you want to try it!

Sleeping Tips for the New Mom

I just went to a baby shower, where I gave the same thing I give EVERY first time mom: the book Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. But this time, I included in the card a short list of my best sleep advice. I thought it would be fun to include it here.

1. Do not leave the hospital until you are taught and are very good at "burrito wrapping" your baby. Find a couple of different nurses to show you how they do it, and then PRACTICE A TON at the hospital. You will need this skill.



2. Remember (And this is related to #1) that your little sweetie just came from a cramped little place, where she felt incredibly secure. When you put baby into the crib, your baby will feel most secure (and therefore sleep better) when you can mimick the security of the womb. Burrito wrap her, then use a receiving blanket, folded up to look like a long, flat snake, and tuck that around her head tightly, and then put a firm, rolled up blanket on either side of her. (This image shows the "flat snake" and buritto wrap.)



3. Begin super early (like in the first 2 weeks of life outside the womb) to allow baby to cry in her crib, both to go down to sleep and when awaking. A decent rule of thumb is allow her to cry for one minute for every week she has been home from the hospital. She needs to learn to self-soothe and she needs to be taught how to sleep. If you are too quick to go in, you might actually interrupt a sleep cycle...she might be "crying out" but not actually awakening.



4. (Related to #3) I always used a timer because I really hated letting my babies cry. That timer gave me a mental break because I knew when it was time to go get by baby. I would hear that cry and immediately go set the timer. You would be amazed how often baby falls back asleep...hint hint...baby was apparently not ready to be awake!



5. Especially in those first couple of weeks, put baby to sleep in her crib before she is tired. This gives her the chance to enjoy (because she is not too tired to enjoy it) being all bundled in her crib, looking around a bit and quietly drift to sleep all by herself.



6. If baby is not comfortable sleeping on her back, try her on her side.



7. Start each morning at the same time, which will usually mean waking baby up. It feels impossible, but it pays huge dividends.



8. Sleep begets sleep... the better your baby sleeps at naps, the better the night sleep she will get. It is completely counter-intuitive, but starving your baby of sleep will not a better night-sleeper she make. Trust me.



9. If you think that getting your baby to sleep through the night is all about YOU wanting YOUR night's sleep, think again. Your baby needs that solid uninterrupted sleep way more than you do. So don't play yourself the martyr, thinking that you are doing what's best for the baby if you get up at night whenever she "needs you." By 10-12 weeks, what she really needs is sleep. So do the right thing and begin to teach her to sleep through the night as soon as Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child says to.



10. The best baby book out there to teach you how to teach your baby how to sleep (did you follow that?) is Marc Weissbluth's Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child. Read it and reread it. And then read it again. It is an incredible reference, and it does not make judgments upon families for the choices they make: co-sleeping, family bed, cry-it-out, no-cry method. No judgments (how refreshing). You just get his research findings in an easy-to-swallow writing style.



11. Did I mention Heathy Sleep Habits Happy Child?

What would you add to the list?