Moral Support.

I needed it today. So, I called my husband.

Rewind to the beginning of summer.
Brooke decided to make up for all of the early morning wake-ups that I caused in order to get her to my Mom's each morning before school. It seemed as if a switch had gone off in her head and she knew that NOW she could do what kids do best during the summer months....SLEEP IN! (Wait, isn't that only supposed to be middle school kids?)
At any rate, Brooke was going to bed around 9pm, sleeping until 11:30 am. Unbelievable. Then, she'd take 2-3 hour naps in the afternoon. Every. Single. Day. Pure. Heaven.
Truthfully, I took a lot of grief for allowing her to sleep that late and some people even told me that I'd 'pay for that' when it came time to get Brooke back into our September-June schedule.

I wasn't about to wake her up super early each morning just to shut people up, but I'm beginning to wonder if maybe I've created an almost-2-year-old Monster.

Fast forward to the beginning of the week.
I have NO EARTHLY CLUE what is going on with my child, but she won't sleep! EVER!
Well, that's not completely true...I tend to exaggerate when I'm emotional.
It's close to impossible to get Brooke to bed before 10:15 pm. When she's asleep for the night, she stays asleep. That is, until about 7:45 am. Not enough sleep for this child.
You'd think that less night-time sleep would cause better (and maybe even LONGER) afternoon naps, but nope. Not so much.
Now, instead of a solid 2-3 hour nap, Brooke wakes up after about 30 minutes SCREAMING as if she's on FIRE! I can assure you that she's in fact, NOT on fire, and that I have absolutely no idea what is going on with her.

Catching up to right now. 2:33 pm.
Brooke has been up since 7:45 (when she started SCREAMING from her crib this morning!).
She could barely stay awake to eat her lunch and fell fast asleep in my lap around 1:15pm. I layed her down. She screamed. Then fell asleep. Back up. Screaming. At 1:45. She slept for 30 minutes. Not enough sleep.
So, I went upstairs and checked her diaper to be sure that she hadn't gone #2. No #2. So I kissed her, told her I loved her and that she needed more rest. Out the door I went. And she JUST stopped screaming. This is not a joke people.

Please understand that I LOVE MY DAUGHTER. And I'm not just worried about her not sleeping because I enjoy being away from her. But any mother out there would understand that sometimes, nap time is the only break a Mom gets during the day. Nap time is when I fold laundry, wash dishes, get supper ready, eat lunch, check email, blog, watch Y&R, do school work, write out bills, or anything else that really needs to get done around here. I'm entitled to a few minutes to myself right?

Let me say that I am NOT against the 'cry it out method.' I do realize, though, that it's not for everyone. When Brooke was around 9 months old, she started fighting us rocking her to sleep. Zig and I made the decision that we didn't want to fight with her in the evenings, and instead just enjoy our routine...so we began laying her down wide awake. Sometimes, she'd cry for a few minutes, but then would nestle right into her bed and fall asleep. And she slept so well once she realized that she could just rest and sleep on her own.

There have been dozens of times where Brooke has woken up during the night or from a nap when I KNOW that she's not ready to be awake yet, and I've just let her yell. She almost always puts herself right back down. And she's fine. No harm done.
Like I said, not for everyone, but it works for us.

But today, I'm thinking that I've never had to let her scream as long as I just did. I feel TERRIBLE and I just got done crying about it from when I called Zig for moral support. God love him, he offered to leave work early and come home to be with her - and let me leave. Destress. Unwind. Not necessary...but very nice of him to offer.

It's quiet upstairs now.
I have to admit that I'm not sure what I'll do the next time she awakes.
I'm just going to pray that she wakes up much more pleasant than she's been.

Who knows why I've composed this post.
Maybe it is to remind myself that I'm human and NOT Super-Mom.
Maybe it is just to document the fact that motherhood is hardwork. And that I should be proud of it.
Maybe I just needed to vent...
Maybe I just wanted to write down my thoughts so that I could remember these days...
These perfect, lazy, summer days. The good. The bad. And the ugly.