Bah, I didn’t need all that sleep anyway

Okay, fellow parental units. Parental guidance is required.

Little E has just gotten out of bed. Again. This started a few weeks ago with the big storm, but even if there’s not a cloud (or a single bolt of lightning) in the sky, it’s become an every-night phenomenon. At some point, he wakes up, gets spooked, and hightails it into my room, where he promptly hops into my bed and pretty much takes it over. The first couple of times I tried to stick it out, thinking, “Aw, poor little guy needs his dad.” Then he pretty much evicted me and I thought “Okay… um… NO.” Getting him back into bed is a major ordeal. We’ve gotten him a “Twilight Turtle,” which is a plush turtle with a hard shell that has stars and constellations die-cut into it; you push a button and turn the turtle on, and a light projects the stars and constellations onto the walls and ceilings. It turns itself off in 45 minutes.

He loves that turtle. It’s a great idea. And he brings it with him when he tries to invade my bed.

He needs to be sleeping in his own bed, and I’ve had to be fairly harsh in enforcing that. Eventually he goes to sleep again. And eventually he wakes up and next thing I know, I’m being whacked in the face with Turbo Turtle and blankie horse. Hell of a way to wake up.

I’m not sure what else to do here. I know his kind – he’s my kid. If I go putting an honest-to-God nightlight in his bedroom, he’s going to stay up and read by it.

Oh yes, I said “read.” We’ve turned that corner. He sounds words out based on the letters, and he’s starting to form associations with meanings. He’s 32 months old and he’s genuinely starting to read. He read the word “flap” to me the other night while we were reading bedtime stories. He then flapped his arms vigorously like a bird whose engine was stalling out.

It will probably surprise no one that another favorite word of his is “turtle.” Go figure.

Anyway, when he gets to waking up every hour to every hour-and-a-half, and comes running into my room, this is costing me some serious sleep. I’ve tried everything: soothing music, letting Obi and Puck (and sometimes Olivia) stay in his room, going in there and hugging him until he’s ready to lay back down in his bed (God willing)… there seems to be no universal fix for this problem. The sleep interruptions are killing my energy level on any given day.

How has everyone else had to deal with this?