Our author gave birth to two children. And unfortunately that nightly sleep deprivation equal to. That makes you tired, that makes you crumbling – but a thought has to come out now.
Dear child sleep experts,
Small apology in advance: I'm slightly tense, maybe overreacting. That's because I slept badly. The last 1800 nights. It took my first daughter years to sleep without interruptions, about as long as the second was born – and she barely managed an hour at a time for almost a year and a half. That was bad. What gave me the rest during this time, however, was the question: "And, will you sleep through the night?", Which I was asked with a reliable penetrance that was unbearable.
I know why sleep deprivation is a torture method. And envy everyone who hasn't experienced it themselves. Or can you imagine what it is like when the bedroom is transformed into a place of horror, where after a stressful day there is no rest, but sheer horror? Roar that sounds at least five times as loud in the quiet of the night. Permanent startling. Angry and drowsy combing through the apartment in search of the last saving pacifier in the household.
Jam as a solution?
My children were just awake all the time. Both. So often that I was even advised to cook excessive jam after being put to bed so that I would have to stand by the stove (great image of women, by the way!) And not slip into this counterproductive behavior, again and again to mine running crying child. As if the decision could instinctively only turn out right: for the jam, against the child, of course! In retrospect, I am surprised that this crazy suggestion did not trigger a "falling down" moment in me …
If someone never gets into a deep sleep phase for months, they turn into someone you don't want to be friends with: irritable, hostile, humorless. Sleep deprivation brings out the worst in people. After months in which I carried my child around the apartment at night, humming, served well-tempered milk and mumbled "Everything is good", at some point nothing was good anymore. Sentences happened to me like “Shut up, I'm sleeping!”, I fired full milk bottles against the walls, looked for protection from the screaming under the duvet – only to crawl out again with my guilty conscience and play consolation command. I berated my husband, even though he was just as tired and couldn't help it. I longed for my life without children and wondered who I could possibly please with the two of them.
My battery? Completely empty.
During the day I was so exhausted that I was often latently sick. The ground seemed to be moving under my feet. I failed to fill out forms because I couldn't understand the simplest things. When someone offered me help with anything, I cried with emotion. There was just no more energy – for friendships, for sex, for fun. And no, osteopathy, lavender oil foot massage and Bach flowers couldn't help, unfortunately.
If then someone wanted to know whether the child was sleeping through the night, I had the feeling that I had failed, that it was my own fault for my horror nights. Because the question is linked to expectations, to ideas of how things should go with a child if, as a mother, you do everything right. It is actually a charge. From the esoterically oriented salt crystal lamp camp it reads: The bond is not strong enough, so the little ones cannot let go! From the sleep-educating hardliner group: You don't have your child under control!
Anyone who has annoyed me with something like this in recent years is only thanks to my high degree of self-control that I haven't freaked out. Dear questioner, you will not have suspected it, but some of you were damn close to being beaten down and insulted by me on the street. The very worst thing I could have threatened you with would be an overnight visit to me. But I don't wish that to anyone, really: to anyone!
Sincerely yours Lena Schindler.