Some days are just are meant to last forever and ever in our minds. It could be something beautiful, or happy, or ugly, or sad, or massive, or teeny-little-tiny. It could be something that lasted a moment, or a few seconds, or a few minutes or more. The impact of an action, a thing, any circumstance, or a person is not always proportional to the intent or even what goes into making it happen. Obviously, this weird psychotic analysis of a simple phenomenon is the result of my not-so-simple mind working overtime, trying to find the meaning and reason behind every little detail of the day and the week and the month and the year.
The point is, something like this happened yesterday. A memory forever etched in my brain. I didn’t know what to feel about it. I was happy. But then I was sad. And then I was kind of depressed and sulking. Here is what happened. Night time routine is one of my favorite things as a parent…reading books, singing songs, singing rhymes, telling stories and watch my kids fall asleep. There is something very satisfying about that experience. Off late we started sleep training Samaira (and yes, she is all of/mere 2.5, depending on your parenting philosophy) to help me out when Siddharth is traveling for work. She isn’t fond of us leaving her room while she is still awake but she is kind of getting the hang of it. Siddharth is the one who typically puts her to bed. Sammy knows that when he is done reading all the books and singing all the songs and telling all the stories, it will be time for her Daddy to leave the room and she needs to close her eyes and go to sleep. She gets the drill. When Siddhu kisses her good night is the time when she will typically put her arms around him and say “no….hug”…translated as “don’t go yet…give me a hug.” I definitely belong to the new-age-parents category who find every little thing heart-melting and micro-analyze every little thing we/our kids do or feel or don’t do or don’t feel. So when I found out that she puts her arm around Siddharth every night in an attempt to stop him from leaving the room…my heart kind of broke a little. All sorts of maybes popped into my head and I started questioning what we were doing. Maybe we shouldn’t sleep train her. Maybe we should try this a few months down the line. But then we continued trying to get her to sleep on her own.
Yesterday when Siddharth kissed her good night and was about to leave the room…Sammy said “Daddy go. Teddy hug.” She didn’t cry at all when Siddharth left. She went to sleep right away. My first reaction when Siddhu told this to me was “yayyy….she is a completely independent sleeper now!” My immediate next reaction was “Oh no. She is so grown up now. She understands so much now. Did we do the right thing? Was it too soon? Should we have slept with her a little bit more? What was the hurry? There will come a dreadful-teenage-time when she wouldn’t want us in her room anyway. Why did we rush? She is so small. My little girl is so mature!” My internal rant went on and on. And then she woke up happy & chatty. Basically her usual self. That surely made me feel better.
There are so many times I am conflicted on the right thing to do as a parent. My heart tells me one thing. My head tells me another thing. Knowing that my kiddos can survive anything is probably the only thing that saves my day.
All said and done. Every sudden reminder that my kids are growing up hits me a little hard. That “Daddy, Go” is going to ring in my head for a very very long time!
The point is, something like this happened yesterday. A memory forever etched in my brain. I didn’t know what to feel about it. I was happy. But then I was sad. And then I was kind of depressed and sulking. Here is what happened. Night time routine is one of my favorite things as a parent…reading books, singing songs, singing rhymes, telling stories and watch my kids fall asleep. There is something very satisfying about that experience. Off late we started sleep training Samaira (and yes, she is all of/mere 2.5, depending on your parenting philosophy) to help me out when Siddharth is traveling for work. She isn’t fond of us leaving her room while she is still awake but she is kind of getting the hang of it. Siddharth is the one who typically puts her to bed. Sammy knows that when he is done reading all the books and singing all the songs and telling all the stories, it will be time for her Daddy to leave the room and she needs to close her eyes and go to sleep. She gets the drill. When Siddhu kisses her good night is the time when she will typically put her arms around him and say “no….hug”…translated as “don’t go yet…give me a hug.” I definitely belong to the new-age-parents category who find every little thing heart-melting and micro-analyze every little thing we/our kids do or feel or don’t do or don’t feel. So when I found out that she puts her arm around Siddharth every night in an attempt to stop him from leaving the room…my heart kind of broke a little. All sorts of maybes popped into my head and I started questioning what we were doing. Maybe we shouldn’t sleep train her. Maybe we should try this a few months down the line. But then we continued trying to get her to sleep on her own.
Yesterday when Siddharth kissed her good night and was about to leave the room…Sammy said “Daddy go. Teddy hug.” She didn’t cry at all when Siddharth left. She went to sleep right away. My first reaction when Siddhu told this to me was “yayyy….she is a completely independent sleeper now!” My immediate next reaction was “Oh no. She is so grown up now. She understands so much now. Did we do the right thing? Was it too soon? Should we have slept with her a little bit more? What was the hurry? There will come a dreadful-teenage-time when she wouldn’t want us in her room anyway. Why did we rush? She is so small. My little girl is so mature!” My internal rant went on and on. And then she woke up happy & chatty. Basically her usual self. That surely made me feel better.
There are so many times I am conflicted on the right thing to do as a parent. My heart tells me one thing. My head tells me another thing. Knowing that my kiddos can survive anything is probably the only thing that saves my day.
All said and done. Every sudden reminder that my kids are growing up hits me a little hard. That “Daddy, Go” is going to ring in my head for a very very long time!
Need a tight hug from my kiddo...who is independently sleeping in her room...
1 comment:
I am happy that she is sleep trained - however the journey does seem very sad. Feel for you girl.
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