We were in the eye of the storm in more ways than one! Whilst the storm wreaked havoc on our home last night: it pulled half our fences down, flooded the paddling pool, caused multiple power cuts and murdered a tree, it also created chaos with our daughter's sleep routine!
Firstly, she took twice as long to go to sleep and secondly, she had a very unsettled night, lots of tossing, turning and repositioning herself. This could have been due the raging storm or the Wi-Fi constantly crashing, which interrupted the playing of the white noise that we play to help her to sleep.
Then, as we entered the Twilight Zone, about 1.00am, our daughter who usually sleeps straight through the night, stood up at the side of her cot-bed, seemingly transfixed by an unseen phenomenon. She stood silently hypnotised for some time.
I prayed that she would not end up in our bed as it would be impossible to sleep with a starfish, on such a hot night. Recently, she had learned to climb into her cot, but although she had tried to climb out, she had failed, however, she is an incredibly determined two-year old, so we knew it would not be long before she was successful. I said another prayer, that tonight would not be the night that she mastered climbing out and that she would be safe. She then settled down but she was soon stood up again mesmerised, this went on for about twenty minutes. She then lay down and thankfully found sleep.
However, less than an hour later, an unfamiliar night-time noise was blasted through the monitor. I shot up like a rocket, levitating, confused and frightened. What was going on? My heart was in my mouth. Then a slow cold dawning of realisation occurred, our daughter was out of bed and watching "Peppa Pig" on the iPod. (At this time of night it was strangely eerie). This was confirmed as soon as I opened her bedroom door and saw her, unharmed, sitting on the floor and watching "Peppa Pig."
Oh, how I laughed inwardly, marvelling at her agility and cunning. Was the earlier transfixion the escape route being plotted or was it an unidentified object that had caught her eye? Perhaps aliens had visited, helped her out of her cot and left?
Then another reality hit me, she was not going be going to sleeping any time soon and she would be in with us for the night. ARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!
Every time our daughter was silent, unmoving, we thought it was safe to move to get comfortable, so we could sleep, however, she was not asleep. Her quietness until this point was unnerving. She would then sit up, chatter like the "Chipmunks," on Speed, and then climb all over the bed. I was beginning to see what was meant by storms bringing out the "crazy" in us...Two hours later, sleep was welcomed in!
Not long after this, the inevitable happened, I needed the loo. Ninja-like I made my way there and back across the normally deafening floorboards, successfully, only to find I’d need to be an ant to fit in the vacant space, so, I had to sleep at the end of the bed on the bunched-up duvet, which was like a rock. I somehow managed to fall asleep only to be woken up, in what felt like minutes later, by the alarm. Of course, this would all happen the night before her football club where we needed lots of energy!
Tonight, I will be praying that there is not a replay of the previous night’s escapades!
The weekend will need to be spent removing the bars to her cot-bed and making her bed safe.
I will never be able to look at "Peppa Pig" in the same way again, I am scarred for life!
I relayed the possibly supernatural event to a friend today, she said I should feel lucky that I had not experienced what her daughter did in a similar situation when she was younger. My friend had awoken to find her kitchen flooded as during the night her daughter had channelled Houdini, escaped into the kitchen, turned the taps on, and then gone back to bed…Hmmm…
I am sure there will be more escapades to come, and I am sure some of you have your own tales to tell and maybe some tips. If so, we would love to see them in the comments section of this blog.