To be honest, I fought this mantra for about a week before resigning myself to it…mostly because I don’t want to giggle every time I tell myself, “Jen, arise. Arise, Jen.” (Thank you, Billy Witch Doctor Dot Com. ATHF fans, where you at?) But sometimes the mantra chooses the…mantra-er? Whatever. This was the right mantra for this month, ridiculous associations or not.
For the bulk of my parenting career, I’ve let my children dictate when I get out of bed. Meaning I stay in bed until they are standing literally inches from my face demanding breakfast. Even then, I defer to David as often as possible.
I can’t say I was surprised when Margot told me, “You’re such a lazy mom,” the other day, but I was a little hurt.
In my defense, though, I haven’t gotten enough sleep for more than a few nights in a row in almost seven years. I have three children who, despite being perfectly capable of sleeping through the night, take turns waking me up every couple hours for trivial things. And I have a husband who is magically able to remain oblivious to all of it.
I’m not lazy. I AM TIRED.
I’m also DONE. I’ve spent the last couple weeks retraining everyone to let Mama sleep. The girls know what I will get up for (vomiting or potty accidents) and what I will not get up for (refilling sippy cups or putting their blankets back on them). Ryan is back to sleeping between ten and twelve hours a night. In theory, I’m set.
So, obviously, I’m doing the most logical thing under the circumstances: I’m gonna start waking up earlier. Makes sense right? Amass a huge sleep debt, get to a point where you can start to pay it down, then sleep less on purpose.
I promise I’ve thought this through.
While I may never be a morning person, I see plenty of value in having some quiet time to myself before the day really begins. I might have time to do yoga or go for an early bike ride. Maybe I will eat healthier breakfasts instead of scrounging up something quick before I turn into a hangry gremlin. Getting out of bed before everyone else would give me a chance to breathe before the day comes rushing at me like a cranky toddler with poopy pants.
Notice, however, that I’m not planning to use my early mornings to blog or check emails. That’s because this mantra, arise, goes deeper than that.
You see, today is the beginning of Lent.
(Yes, I’m a Mormon, and no, we don’t traditionally observe Lent the way Catholics or some other Christians do. But when have I ever been traditional in that sense?)
In the Bible, God frequently tells people to arise, followed by instructions to do something specific. Arise, and go to this place. Arise, and tell the people what I said. Arise, and be made whole. That kind of thing.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying I feel called on by a Higher Power to do anything in particular. Yet. I guess I just want to be ready if such a call comes. I want to be able to hear whatever God wants to tell me.
Seems to me this is a small (hopefully) short-term sacrifice that could do me a whole lot of good in the long run.
TLDR?
I’m giving up a little bit of sleep for Lent. I’ll set an alarm, get up before the rest of my family (I hope), and use at least a few minutes of that time to commune with deity. Pray, read a verse of scripture, meditate…whatever feels right.
And then I will arise and get to work.
I love this. And am legit in awe of this. I am *not* a morning person, I usually have to set 5 alarms in order to get out of bed before 7am (each with a 3 minute snooze, basically, I need alarming for 15 minutes straight before I’m cogent enough to get out of bed). Part of me would love to be able to beat that, the other part of me knows it’s something I’ve struggled with for 34 years and may never conquer. BUT! Perhaps a short-term gig? I can do (almost) anything for the short term. Hmm, now I’m all consider-y on this whole idea.
xox
I worked a 6AM-3PM shift for almost 2 years and it was the WORST. But somehow my body knows the difference between when I NEED to get up (i.e. for work) and when I SHOULD get up, and the latter is a billion times harder. Two days into this and I’m failing. I’ll keep trying, though.
I’m a natural night owl (in college I never had a class before noon and did 90% of my schoolwork between 12am and 2am). Over the years I’ve struggled with it a LOT because the world is built for early birds and kids don’t respect normal human sleep schedules. I’ve slowwwly trained myself to go to bed early and wake up early. It’s still a little painful but I get up at 5:15 and have over an hour to go work out at the gym and do some prep for the day before my kids get up. I’m sure I’d still be happier with going to bed at midnight or 2 and sleeping in but that’s not how life works so, for now, I’ll take this instead. It works.
Point is: you can do this. It really helps that my phone reminds me every night at 8:45 that it’s time to start winding down and getting ready for bed. It takes me a while to wash, floss, brush, etc. so it’s still another hour or so before I’m actually IN bed but the reminder really helps.
A bedtime alarm is a great idea. The later it gets, the harder it is for me to get into bed, so that may be the key to this experiment working.
Catching up today on your blog–I love this post. It’s one of my goals right now too and is soo challenging. I would really love to pick your brain sometime about you retrained your kids to sleep all night. Our bed feels like a revolving door for our kids most nights, although I’ve tried so many things to help them stay in theirs. That plus baby on the way makes me feel nervous about the demon I may well become once I am getting even less sleep!