Project: Silent Kindness

Last night I spoke kindly to Olivia, laying out the plan for the night. I told her gently yet cheerfully that if she woke up that night, she was going to just lay there and then roll over and go back to sleep.

She blinked at me.

I continued with, “You’re going to just stay in the bed with Lyssie and sleep and sleep and sleep, right? You aren’t going to need to get up and come to Mom’s bed at all, are you?”

Blink, blink, blinkblinkblink.

And then we went about our night.

At about 11:30, a good four hours after she’d gone to sleep, I felt a tap, tap, tap on my shoulder. I ignored the tapping for several seconds.

She tapped again, silently.

I finally rolled over and, like her, silently pulled her into bed.

I’m trying to make coming to be with me less inviting and pleasant than I’ve done in the past. But I want to do this kindly rather than angrily. So silence it is. There will be no hushed whispers of love or goodnights. No, she gets plenty of that in the waking hours.

I want her to learn that night time is for sleep, not for seeking me out.

I know this is a long process and it’s very, very boring blog fodder. For that I apologize. But this is our life right now and that’s the whole point of this blog thing anyway, so there you have it.