For years and years we’ve had to get up at night with one or more of our boys. Autism is not conducive to sleep, and so it would go — one would wake up, I would help him, another would wake and my husband would help, just to have the third wake as I was finishing with the first. Adding all this up, I can’t believe we functioned most days.
I know for sure, that while the past 7 years haven’t flown by, they’ve also been somewhat of a blur. I have to wonder, is this because it’s been so hard, or because I wasn’t really awake for most of it?
Now as the boys progress thankfully seems to inch forward each day, we are in this place now where all three boys are in their own beds, and (mostly) sleeping through the night. They still wake from a nightmare on occasion, or because of accidents or just to sleep walk. But for the most part, we know that once they’re in bed, it’s for the night. We never thought we’d be able to say that!
So now comes the revelation that I just *now* started sleeping through the night myself, when I hadn’t since I was 24 YEARS OLD. I was an entirely different person then. A babe in the woods, with the world at her feet. Now I’m me, all twisty and complicated. And happy. What a step! What a leap.
I think I’ll go take a nap to celebrate.
***
Arianne also blogs about life and everything else at To Think Is To Create .