Sleep deprivation and other sleep related unpleasantries

After over a month of sleeping through the night, Kenson has been waking up in the middle of the night. He usually comes into our bedroom. No tears, no noise except the sound of little footprints. I just picked him up and put him in bed next to us when this first started. But then it started happening every night. And it would get earlier every night with Kenson spending less and less time in his own bed and more and more time in our bed. (And Mama and Papa got less and less sleep as they tried to share their bed with a toddler.)

Situations like that bring to the forefront what I think is one of the biggest issues adoptive parents deal with: why is my child doing this? Is it related to emotions related to adoption? Or is just a kid being a kid? It's important to know the difference because it may make a difference in how you parent at that moment in time.

I tried a couple of different things once it got noticeably worse. I tried rocking him back to sleep. I tried laying on the air mattress in his room with him in his crib. I tried just putting him back in his crib and walking away. None of it worked. He would wake up as soon as I put him down and then refuse to go back to sleep. He would sleep but then crawl onto the air mattress with me if I fell asleep. He would cry for a few minutes and then lie awake for an hour of more once I was back in my room.

So onto plan h. My friend, Heather, has always had a wake up spot in her room for any one of her kids who happen to wake up during the night. So that's my new plan. I took our two oversized floor cushions and put our crib mattress pad and a sheet over them and laid them on the floor, at the foot of our bed. So when he came in last night, I put him on the floor and all three of us were back to sleep in no time. I'm hoping this solves the problem. I can live with him needing to be near us if he wakes up. I can't live with him needing to be on me if he wakes up!

The other unpleasantries? Stupid, stupid time change! Okay, I love that it's not dark by suppertime but trying to convince your two year old to fall asleep an hour earlier is just plain stinky. (Not to mention that it makes me have to get up a whole hour earlier.) Kenson laid in bed for almost an hour tonight before he fell asleep. He wasn't being naughty; he just couldn't fall asleep because his body still thinks it's too early. Poor little guy!