#94, "If I wake up early I can still feel a self"
Sleep stories
The sleep story that I mentioned I was working on in the last issue of the newsletter (back in, um, March) is out now in the Sept. 16 issue of New York magazine. Thank you to Genevieve Smith for believing I could do it and to Chris Cox for his diligent and patient editing. Reporter and fact-checker Amelia Schonbek made the piece not just more accurate but much better in infinite small but important ways, and it was a privilege to work with her.
The first story draft that I submitted was pretty much just 8,000 words of parents talking to me. Some of them included long-time subscribers to this newsletter. The women I spoke with were funny, smart, heartbreaking, and so thoughtful. Here are some bits that didn’t make it into the final version of the piece but that I loved. Thank you. (Oh, and here’s a picture of the blanket!)
“There is an entire industry built on targeting first-time moms in a really vulnerable state. I see it in my new moms group. They’re like, ‘Look at this mom in this one reel! She just put her baby in a sleep sack and her child just magically went to sleep.’ But you’re just seeing, like, the 15 seconds of the baby closing its eyes! You don’t know what happened in the 30 minutes before when she was, like, sobbing in the dark!” — mom of a 1-year-old
“I can’t remember her name. I didn’t check a reference. She came to our tiny apartment and, like, observed us doing a bedtime. I was almost manic. We had a pretty awkward Pretty Woman moment where she wouldn’t leave and it was because she needed me to pay her. It was all cash. She didn’t have a website. Who was this woman? We’ll never know! It was all just so weird.” — mom of a 5-year-old and a newborn, on hiring a sleep consultant
“My husband has a really low tolerance for our son crying, or being uncomfortable, or anything. So I take him to get his shots. I take him to get his glasses. I get him to take his little eyedrops. Um, so I have a higher tolerance with him crying. So because it was just me at night, because my husband worked late, I was the one that was able to sleep train him…
My husband had a rough childhood. He doesn’t have that many wonderful memories with his parents. But one of the main ones he really enjoyed was cuddling with his dad in bed. When he was scared, or in the early morning, he would go to his dad’s bed, and his dad would just open the covers and he’d crawl in and they would cuddle. He felt that he wasn’t able to create that memory with our son, because I wouldn’t let it happen.” — mom of a 4-year-old
“I have not had the bone-depleting exhaustion I had with my first child when I was breastfeeding, because my husband has been able to do half the middle-of-the-night feedings from birth.” — mom of a 5-year-old and a 1-year-old, who had a double mastectomy between her first and second children
“One of the things I still am trying to figure out is, like, you can’t call in tired.” — mom of an 8-year-old and a 5-year-old
“If I wake up early, I can still feel a self. But even then, you know, it gets nibbled away at. My daughter came in yesterday before her [OK to Wake] clock went off. And I was like, I’m writing, I’m not available. And then at bedtime yesterday, I said, ‘Remember, don’t come out until your wake-up clock turns on.’ And she said, ‘Well, I feel like you love writing more than you love me.’ And it’s just like, ah, you know, it just feels impossible.” — mom of a 6-year-old
“Sometimes I’m lying there for an hour, just waiting [for them to fall asleep]. I work, so I sometimes I have other things to do, or I’ve got to make their lunch, or do laundry — just, like, life admin activity — and it cuts into that time. And that sometimes is frustrating. I sometimes feel like I’d be okay with them sleeping with me if I could somehow get them to fall asleep without needing me. Just to have time for myself. In the daytime, even if they’re at school or daycare, I’m working. Nighttime, I’m with them. And there’s nothing for me.” — mom of a 6-year-old and a 3-year-old
“If you think relentless exhaustion is part of the job, then you stop seeking options — because you’re like, ‘Well, this is it. This is what I signed up for. If we wanted to sleep, we shouldn’t have had kids.’ Someone will say, ‘I’m so tired. My two-year-old is still nursing three times a night.’ I would look at that with my lens and go, your child has a sleep association. They don’t know how to sleep without you. And so periodically, throughout the night, they need your assistance to navigate a light sleep cycle. And this is locking you and your toddler into a cycle of sleeplessness.
Their lens is, well, this is totally normal, and toddlers are going through regressions and growth spurts, and they need that closeness, and it’s part of how we help them develop emotionally. And if you were to not provide that service to them, they’d have an attachment disorder.
I’m claiming that as misinformation. I had to back out of those spaces online. The tired parent who says, ‘I’m really struggling’ instead of being given options and information to shine a light on the root issue, what they would be told are things like ‘Oh, hugs, Mama. It’s so hard. Try to get a manicure. A little self-care will help. Have you taken a long bath?’ And I’m like, no. A long bath is not the answer to this.” — Alexis Dubief, founder of Precious Little Sleep and author of the book Precious Little Sleep: The Complete Baby Sleep Guide for Modern Parents
“The sun always comes up. It’s much easier to deal with parenting when the sun is up.” — mom of a 4-year-old, a 2-year-old, and a newborn.
Laura this was SO GOOD 🙌💤