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The first few months
of a baby’s life are basic training for parents. It prepares them
for the upcoming stages of (1) getting the child to go to bed, (2)
getting the child to stay in bed, and (3) aren’t you ever going to
get out of bed? These stages can cover a span of 18 to 23 years or
until he finally moves out of the house, whichever comes later. I
have one friend who is still suffering sleep deprivation almost
thirty years after giving birth to her youngest child. She has now
gone full circle and is back at stage one.
Medical researchers
spend large amounts of grant money studying sleep deprivation.
These scientists are usually from a university with a mediocre
football team and, therefore, have time to think of ways to spend
grant money. Their study subjects include swing shift workers and
others with odd work schedules such as medical researchers. They
even pay college students to participate in experiments, although
the only incentive most college students need to stay up all night
is a keg party or the due date for a term paper.
Grant money would be
better spent studying important things like why a child who rode the
Millennium Force at Cedar Point eight times in a row can’t get to
Grandma’s house without throwing up in the back seat of the car.
You can learn everything you need to know about sleep deprivation by
spending a week observing the parents of an infant. Better yet they
could pay the college students to spend the week with the baby and
let the bleary-eyed parents get some sleep.
Parents of infants
deal with twice-a-night feedings, dragging themselves out of bed at
hours they have not seen since they were dating. While they’re up
they get a snack for themselves, accounting for an postpartum weight
gain by both mother and father which, no doubt, is being studied by
medical researchers somewhere. Then they change the baby’s diaper
and it’s time to get the young one back to sleep.
That’s the point at
which the system breaks down.
Many parents try
rocking the baby. Accustomed to the rocking motion, these children
grow up to buy waterbeds and, later, boats which they use to spend
$1,523 to catch a two-pound trout.
One exhausted mommy
reported that her three-month old slept seven hours straight – from
4 a.m. to 11 a.m. No matter how she changed naptimes or bedtime,
the baby would wake up by midnight and refuse to go back to sleep
until four. So mommy stayed up and watched TV until baby was ready
to go back to sleep. The child’s first words were “home shopping
network.”
A well-known trick
to get a fussy baby to sleep is to put her in the car seat and take
her for a short drive. One daddy used this system so often that he
claimed that he earned his daughter’s college money by delivering
pizzas while baby snoozed.
At the toddler
stage, the program changes. The child learns to say “No”, and
continues to do so for the next 16 years. This also is the age at
which their bedroom is invaded by monsters who take up residence
under the bed. I used to grab the nearest aerosol can and spray
around and under my daughter’s bed, guaranteeing that
“Monster-be-gone” would keep away all things scary. To this day she
thinks that any house that smells of Lysol Country Fresh is due for
an exorcism.
When the preschooler moves from the crib to the
toddler bed he realizes he can escape. He wanders off in search of
adventure with no particular destination in mind but often ends up
in his parents’ bedroom where he wants to stay. One friend of mine
put a sleeping bag beside the bed for the child to sleep in so he
could feel close to mom but not crowd the bed. The first time the
family went on a camping trip and her son saw the sleeping bags
being unpacked he thought they had become homeless.
Another friend tried
the reward system when her daughter reached elementary school. If
her daughter went to bed without a fuss for two entire weeks, she
would get a toy she wanted. Her teenage brother lobbied to get the
same deal, except he wanted a Camaro.
Which brings us to
the teen years and the third stage of bedtime warfare.
Teens go through
many changes, most of them embraced with the singular goal of
annoying their parents as much as possible. Recent studies
conducted by those tireless medical researchers reveal that teens
are physically programmed to stay up later and sleep later. Teens
fully support these findings.
Teens can find a
multitude of excuses to delay bedtime. One obvious problem is that
they need a GPS device to find their bed in the mess they call their
room. Another is the failure of parents to be specific. When I
told mine that bedtime was ten o’clock I neglected to make it clear
that I meant that night.
One advantage that
parents of toddlers have is that they are able to pick up their
children and physically deposit them in their beds. When the child
reaches six feet in height and is the freshman quarterback for the
Central High School Flaming Idiots this is no longer an option.
This is when the threat-and-reward system comes into play. For
every ten minutes past bedtime they stay up, they lose an hour of
some privilege such as TV time, computer time, video game time. The
ultimate threat, of course, is the revocation of telephone
privileges which teens think are a right conferred on them by
Congress in 1876. Conversely, if they hit the sack every night on
time for a month, they get a reward, such as being allowed to live
at home for another month. The Camaro would be excessive.
The problem of
getting the teen to go to bed pales in comparison to getting the
teen out of bed. At first parents try to keep the house quiet,
figuring the child needs sleep. Then they realize they can rev up
the weed whacker outside the bedroom window and it will have no
effect. Alarm clocks, clock radios, the UCLA Bruins Marching Band
and incoming missiles have failed to wake the sleeping teen.
Washington Irving must have had a teenager in the house when he got
the idea for Rip VanWinkle. When they finally do arise they get on
the phone and compare notes on who slept later. If that spirit of
competition could be transferred to schoolwork they would all score
1500+ on their SATs.
Adequate threats
usually can be formulated to finally get the child out of bed on
school mornings. “The plumber will be in your bathroom in ten
minutes to replace the sink” was one of my most effective. You
would have to see our plumber to fully appreciate that one.
Weekends are another
matter. Many teens consider noon to be the break of day on
weekends. Holidays are even worse. The flowers on the Rose Bowl
floats have wilted before most teens rise on New Year’s Day. The
advantage to this development is that the parents finally can sleep
as late on weekends as they wish without fear of being disturbed.
However there are
times when you really need the teen to haul herself out of the sack,
such as a member of family is being inaugurated as governor or
you’re moving to Krygyzstan. Setting aside summer camp tactics,
like a cold water surprise, parents must be devious and ruthless.
One sure way to get your teenage son out of bed is to stand outside
the bedroom door and scream, in an incredulous voice, “Pregnant?!” A
clever father rigged his daughter’s TV to turn on at 9:30 a.m. ,
turned up the volume, and disabled the channel changer so it would
receive only C-SPAN.
Having a teenager
who drives, of course, immediately returns the parent to the ranks
of the sleep deprived. Any attempt to go to sleep is thwarted by
listening for the sound of the car pulling into the driveway,
accompanied by the crushing of garbage cans and the abrupt
relocation of the mailbox. But at least he’s home and you know
where he’ll be for the next twelve hours. In bed.
©2001 M. Barron Stofik |