Parenthood is a sleepless journey

IS it cruel to wish sleepless and restless babies on your loved ones?

My brother and his wife are about to welcome their second child into the world.

Their first slept like, well, a baby.

But mine hasn’t. She’s now seven months old, but I can’t remember a single night I slept without her interruptions.

The first few weeks, in particular, were utterly brutal.

All the rocking, humming and lullabies in the world just would not work on this wriggly little thing.

On some days, the sun would be making its way back up above the horizon before my wife and I managed a wink of sleep.

Often our eyes would lock, and although no words were said, it was obvious what we were both thinking.

We were told about the sleepless nights, but we didn’t take it seriously.

Could it really be this bad? When will it end?!

Fortunately the worst of it did pass, but getting my daughter to the dreamland state is still a struggle. She has no such thing as a regular sleeping pattern, and refuses to stay asleep unless we are with her. On the flip side, the worst my brother has had to endure is his daughter occasionally veering off her regular 7pm sleeptime schedule. Getting our kid to sleep anytime before 10pm is a huge success in our household. I can’t even imagine the sheer bedlam if we managed to get her to nod off by 7pm. And worst of all, we always have to listen to my brother complaining about his daughter’s sleeping. It’s the one certainty at our family catch-ups — his whingeing about not being able to park himself in front of the TV until slightly later in the evening. I roll my eyes every time I hear it.

If you ask me, he doesn’t know the first thing about struggling with a restless, sleepless child.

But it could be time to exact revenge. The second child is well on the way. And this time, it’s a boy.

Apparently there’s no evidence to suggest either boys or girls sleep better than the opposite sex.

But I’m hinging my hopes on the young lad bringing dread and terror — or at least some long nights — to his father.

Maybe that will make his complaining at the Christmas table more bearable.

And if that makes me cruel, then so be it.