To sleep, perchance to dream … nah, not likely

SUBURBAN CHRONICLES

I have not had a full night’s sleep in exactly 5,984 tries.

That’s the number of restless slumbers that have passed since the birth of my first child, who — with timely reinforcement from her younger sister — has turned me into a high-functioning, R.E.M-depraved zombie.

It started from Day One. My wife went into labour at 1 a.m., kicking off a 24-hour odyssey that included two hospitals, a one-hour drive through a snow storm, a healthy delivery, followed by a Big Mac and a not-very comfortable doze on some vinyl cushions for this new dad. I’ve basically never recovered. Especially from the Big Mac.

As all parents know, the first few weeks and months with a new kid are an exercise in exhaustion. And while much is made of mom getting a few winks — sleep when the kid sleeps — for dads, the situation is a little different. Go to work, come home and take over from a borderline insane wife, get what rest you can, repeat. It didn’t help that I was overwhelmed with the urge to check on my new spawn every five minutes to make sure she was still breathing.

My wife and I also made the decision to allow our kids to sleep in our bed when they wanted. For us it was simply another loss in a battle of attrition with our children (current score: kids 2,371, parents 12). Do I haul this dead weight back to its own bed or simply make the best of what little pillow real estate I have left? Allow a kid to enjoy unadulterated inbed snuggle one time — during a thunderstorm, a bout of flu, after a nightmare — and there’s no putting that genie back in its bunk bed.

The kids are older now — one teen and one tween — and so have stopped stealing the covers and my slumber. We still get woken up occasionally for illness or sleeplessness or a particularly loud weather event but instead of crawling in, they simply stand beside the bed until one of us of wakes up: it’s like being stalked by a family member.

The funny thing about not sleeping at home is that it follows you on the road. Even when I travel or when my wife and I sneak away for a weekend, I still can’t get eight straight hours of shut-eye. My body has adapted to waking up a couple times a night and to getting up after six or seven hours in the sack.

I’ve learned to cope. I moderate my caffeine input based on the previous night’s sleep. And I’ve found that exercise and a glass or two of red wine helps the process of actually getting the eyelids closed — the more exhausted I am, the better. That’s not generally a problem.

I doubt I’ll ever go back to those halcyon days of waking up at noon. My daughters, however, are starting to sleep late on weekends — the teenager attempts it every day — so the opportunity for revenge will be plentiful. I like to start my early mornings with a smoothie made in a blender powered by a jet engine before mowing the lawn first thing.

It seldom works. They stumble, bleary-eyed, down the stairs in the early afternoon and begin rummaging around the kitchen for something to eat.

Disturbing my nap.