Our little visitor

Quinten hasn’t slept through the night since he was 13 weeks. He’s finally doing it again! Well, he’s done it twice.

Bryan sat up in bed around 1:30 am and the dog started growling. I immediately started panicking in my head. Someone is out there! He handed Wrigley off to me and said, “I think Maximus is out there.” He told me later that he heard little hands trying to open the door. Bryan opened the door and saw Maximus walking away. {Where was he going to go?} Maximus turned to him and said, “Hi, daddy!” Bryan picked him up and said, “Hi, Maximus. What are you doing up?” “I want mommy,” he said. I gave him a hug and he immediately told me he wanted some ice and water. In true toddler fashion, he got upset because Bryan started to get his water bottle but Maximus had told mommy. “No! I tell mommy!” So, I handed him back to Bryan and I went and put ice and water in his water bottle. We may be sorry later, but he has a water bottle in his bed every night and it was empty last night. I think I even knew it was almost gone, but I didn’t think he actually drank it during the night. I thought he just drank it when he woke up.

After he drank about half the water, he asked why it was so dark in the house. Then, he asked to watch one Mickey Mouse. Then, he asked to go in mommy’s room. Somehow we stopped all tears and I convinced him to go back into his room. Once there he wanted to read a book. Even though he was wide awake, I got him to lay down. We listened outside his door for a while to make sure he was going to stay in bed and eventually heard his breathing slow down. {Since I was up, I checked on Quinten who was asleep on his stomach with one arm still stuck under him. Then I tried to go to sleep without freaking out about suffocation.}

It was very weird to leave him awake in his room at 2 am. We leave him awake every night, but there’s something about it being the middle of the night and him wandering the house. The whole thing gave me the creeps a little. I’m up in the middle of the night most nights and there are never any lights on. I can’t imagine I will react calmly if I’m ever greeted by my 2-year-old. In fact, this morning I was taking Quinten to his room to get dressed. As soon as the hall light came on I saw that Maximus was walking right at me. I jumped and he looked a little startled until I told him he scared me. He giggled as he ran to find Bryan.

I knew eventually he’d get out of bed and leave his room, but I didn’t think it would be the middle of the night. Lesson learned: someone will always need you in the middle of the night.