Cohabitants

So, you ask (well, one of you asked, and I'm sure my mother wants to know), how is it going with the two feral boys in one sleeping cave? Funny stories there. Though they didn't seem all that funny at the time.

On the first try at putting Charlie down for a nap in the new room, it took me over an hour to get him to sleep. In the accompanying screaming and thrashing, he smashed into my mouth with the top of his head and slightly loosened one of my front teeth.

Off to a rousing start! (The tooth is fine now; no permanent damage.)

That night he didn't go to sleep until nine o'clock, which is well over an hour after his usual bedtime. Cubby tried very hard to be helpful, even telling Charlie a bedtime story involving a bear trying to steal honey from some bees and covering himself in old rubber tires so he wouldn't get stung. The bear got the honey and then went for a walk in the woods, during which there was a thunderstorm, but those handy rubber tires kept him safe from the lightning.

It was a really great story. Almost worth the other 74 minutes I spent trying to get them both asleep.

Charlie woke up a couple of times that night, as well as too early the next morning, which in turn woke Cubby up, which meant some really cranky children (and mother) the next day.

The next day the before-nap hysteria lasted 45 minutes. Progress! Of a sort. That night was another nine o'clock finish. This might have been my lowest emotional point in the whole process, as I imagined never getting an evening to myself again and instead listening to screaming and dealing with bed-escaping children for hours every day.

But then on Monday, Charlie went down for his nap with no screaming. Just like that. I called A. at work to share the miraculous good news.

Bedtimes still require that I literally sit between them--there's a chair between their beds--to keep them from talking and keeping each other awake for an hour until hysteria sets in, but they're both going to sleep by around 8 p.m. Charlie still wakes up on occasion at awful times like 2 a.m. or 4:30 a.m. and I have to get him back to sleep, but that's just Charlie, not the room.

So, in sum, we're not really where I'd like to be yet (that is, to the point where I put them in their beds, sing their lullaby, close the door, and walk away), but it's better. Bearable. And I haven't sustained any more physical injuries. Success!