Every morning I wake up to the voice of a child calling for me. Never do I wake up to my own accord, look at the clock, and wonder why I am the first one up. Oh, no. My morning always begins because some small human that lives under my roof has decided to start their day.
We've gone through a lot of ups and downs regarding our sleep schedules since becoming parents. Chica was always a generally good sleeper (despite her first 8 weeks). She has been the kind of kid that goes down when she is supposed to and wakes up at a reasonable hour. Sure, she's had her seasons of earlier wake ups, night terrors and trouble falling asleep. But overall, she is my solid sleeper.
Bug, however, has thrown me for a loop since birth. Coming home from the hospital, she immediately slept for long stretches at night, which gave me the false assurance that we had another good sleeper on our hands.
HA.
Her sleep eventually became erratic, as most sleeping babes do. And unlike her sister, she woke up at least once per night until she turned one year old. That's right. An entire year of disrupted sleep for her, an entire year of disrupted sleep for me (coupled with a jaunt of middle-of-the-night nightmares for Chica).
Yes. Fun times.
Bug's sleep improved, but her wake up situation became dire. Our mornings for the better part of months 18-27 started between 5am and 5:30am. You can imagine how awful Daylight Savings times were!
Those months I was a force to be reckoned with: grumpy, tired and always in need of coffee. A wise friend told me that instead of working to change her sleep habits, I needed to change my expectations.
So I did.
And somehow, after that, she started sleeping in better.
It was like magic.
We still hit rough patches from time to time, but our days generally fall into what I call The Acceptable Zone.
What? You've never of Parent Wake Up Zones?
That's because I just made them up.
Now, every family's Wake Up Zones are relative. For some, 5am is a blessing, whereas to others 8am is a curse. There is a range between DANGER and DESIRABLE , with the ACCEPTABLE Zone falling somewhere in between.
This is a picture of what our Parent Wake Up Zone currently looks like:
One day, if I wish upon enough pennies thrown into mall fountains, our Acceptable Zone may just move into the Desirable zone.
We also may win the lottery.
What do YOUR Parent Wake Up Zones look like?
