Dream On

Let me tell you about our night time routine. We read a book, reflect on the day, say a prayer, and put The Boy down in his bed. We turn off the light, shut the door, and walk out of the room. And then he cries. Every night. For over a year. Sometimes it's whining, sometimes it's big ole crocodile tears. We don't go to him, we don't say anything else to him, we just walk away and let him do his thing. We've tried rocking him to sleep. He cries when we put him down. We've tried laying down on the floor beside the crib. He cries. We've tried checking on him every 5 minutes. He screams. We argue about whether or not we should go to him while he's crying, we've talked to our pediatrician about it, we debate and generally agonize about it, but nothing we've tried has worked. He cries himself to sleep every single night.

You know how newborns can't have anything in their cribs? No blankets, no stuffed animals, no deadly plastic grocery bags? My involvement with our local Child Fatality Review Board had made me sensitive about any suffocation hazards. About three months ago it occurred to me that even though he's old enough we'd never given The Boy anything to sleep with. No blanket. No pillow. No stuffed animal. Hmmm. Oops?

I mentioned it to the Husband. "Get him a pillow!" He said with great urgency. We pulled a pillow off the guest bed and put it in the crib. "Piwwow" The Boy said. He was proud. So he cried himself to sleep on it, but his little tears had a softer place to land that night. Then it occurred to us to get him a blanket and a stuffed animal too. By the way, he had both of these things in his room, it had just never occurred to us to actually put them in his crib.

So we wrapped him up in his blanket, gave him his little lovie blankie that's a puppy, and laid him in the bed. And he was silent. We said goodnight and walked out, waiting for the crying to start. It didn't. We were amazed. The next night we wrapped him up, gave him his puppy, laid him on his pillow, and again: no tears! Again and again he went to bed with no tears when he had his stuff. Ninety percent of the time we were having great nights.  Poor kid was crying for a blanket and pillow for over a year!! We felt terrible. We've since added a bunny, monkey, owl, and sometimes a book as his sleeping partners in an attempt at restitution. My friend Jill said The Husband and I should have to sleep with no covers and no blanket just to see how bad it would feel. At least could we have some footie pajamas??

So one night I've got him cuddled up with his blanket and puppy, doing our night time routine. We finished our book, and I was reminding him about the things we'd done that day. When it was time for his prayer, I said what I always say: "Today was a good day. Thank you God for today, and thank you God for The Boy."

He grinned at me sweetly, wrestled his arm from deep within his blanket, pulled out his puppy and said "Puppy. Amen."

My kid said his first prayer! And it was thanking the good Lord above that his parents finally got it together enough to allow him to sleep with a square of fabric with a dog on it. Next step: a scrap of bread for dinner!