Sleep Deprived

It doesn’t really take much to understand that having children will definitely get in the way of a good night’s sleep. Obviously with a newborn, parents find themselves getting up a lot of times at night to respond to crying or hunger. To some, sleep might get easier when the baby gets a little older. To others, like me, who are ‘blessed’ with high need babies who ‘hate’ sleeping, it might take a while longer for uninterrupted sleep to come.

By the age of 2 and a half, both my older girls would be sleeping well already through the night. They would occasionally get up with night time dreams or may ask for milk but more or less would go back to sleep with no fuss. Oh, I can’t wait for Alyssa to get into that stage!

Alyssa has never been a sleeper. My mom thinks she has super bionic ears that wake her with even the slightest noise. You might think that living in a house with 2 older sisters, who can be quite talkative if given the chance, would make her used to noise. But no, Alyssa turned out to be a light sleeper since Day 1.

She has a certain music type that helps her lull to sleep. Nope, she doesn’t go for those lullaby songs for babies but would prefer loud and pop songs. Here is a girl who used to sleep with the music of Michael Jackson blaring in the speakers!

Today, she turns 18 months and still her sleep patterns are as erratic as ever. She literally hates to sleep no matter how tired she may be. In her mind, she feels that sleeping will hinder her from precious time of being with others and experiencing stuff.

Actually, she is more like Nadine in that aspect as Nadine too was not much of a sleeper when she was younger. And up to now at age 7, Nadine would try to put off going to sleep whenever she can. One time, she told me that she doesn’t like sleeping because it is so boring, “You do nothing but lie down and close your eyes.” Hence when it is time to sleep her mind becomes active and she thinks of so many other things instead.

Raya is a lot easier to deal with in the sleep department. When she’s sleepy she would just let us know then lie down in bed and within seconds, she’d be snoring away. Oh, if only all my children would sleep like her. I guess that would be wishful thinking on my part.

Lately Alyssa would really refuse sleeping at night. No matter how much talking and explaining I do, she would fight me and whine and cry. And when I have finally put her to sleep and think that I would have a little time in my hands, she would be awake again. She still insists on breastfeeding even if I know and feel that my milk has decreased considerably already since she is more into solid foods now. I do give her Lactum milk once in a while but on most nights, she would refuse it.

I checked in the Internet and found out that a lot of mothers have experienced a break in sleep patterns usually at this age and that it would get better by age 20 months. I do hope that Alyssa gets to sleep better soon for my sanity’s sake. And maybe, just maybe I’d be able to sleep a little more at night until the girls become teenagers --- by then, I’m sure I’d be having interrupted sleep again.