Unexpected Treasure Hidden in the Early Morning

Theme song: Hush Little Baby

Something strangely beautiful happened to me last Friday night.

It started when my younger son woke me up, seemingly moments after I fell -- and it was an exhausting week for a variety of reasons so I do mean fell -- asleep.

The little guy could not sleep.

I've learned to be kind to my children when they can't sleep (I know you'd think being kind to your child is a no brainer, but in fact it's not -- especially during moments of sleep deprivation or intensified stress). I think we all know how terrible insomnia is for us adults, but I imagine for a child it can be much worse. The hours are proportionally longer, the night blacker, the boredom and disquiet greater.

Whatever my parenting pitfalls, I'm grateful to say that I am sweet with a sleepless child. And my younger son was a trouper. Through the long hours of counting breaths, downing (not) sleep-inducing homeopathy, a 3 a.m. reading session, and tears, we were good to each other.

When 4 a.m. rolled around, I could nevertheless feel myself starting to freak out. Dang! I was tired, I was wired, and I started to worry about how I could possibly function on three hours of sleep or less when we needed to get up and ready for the Little League Parade 7:30 a.m. call time. I really couldn't imagine, after all we'd been through, what would ever cause him to fall asleep.

That was when my little boy suggested we do yoga together. Those who know me know I am a certified yoga teacher, so some would say I could have thought of this myself, but I surely didn't. I also forgot meditation and prayer (See how good I am in an emergency?).

We started with viparita karani, a known posture against insomnia, and then we moved on to a hanging forward bend (I like doing yoga at four a.m. That's vata time, when you should be doing yoga!), which was when I noticed how incredibly tense the little guy was. To be sure, I was feeling a little tension (desperation) myself, but the little dude could not relax his neck and shoulders. Nor was he able to take a natural inhale or exhale. I, however, having done a little yoga was calmer. I started to know what to do.

By now his sheets were nice and cool, and so I smoothed out his bed and rearranged his duvet. I had him lie down in savasana, and let him get a little cold, just so the duvet would feel extra good when I smoothed and tucked it around him. I helped him align his sturdy little body, and threw in a little shiatsu, shaking each limb just a little bit to further relax his nervous system. Then I arranged his duvet over him and put my hand on his belly. He still couldn't breathe, so I told him he needed to make my hand go up and down and that is how I would know he was breathing.

At first the breaths were totally unnatural, but then, sometime around 4:30 a.m., his sleeping brother shifted and sighed from his own bed across the room, and my little guy exhaled.

Everything started getting quieter and quieter. I could hear the occasional swish of a car, faint traces of music.

My son asked me how long I was planning to stay, and I said, "Well, I was planning to stay until you fall asleep."

"Thank you so much, Mommy," he said. That was when the magic took hold.

How often do circumstances, internal and external, allow us to truly be there for another human being? The morning got deeper, and my son's breathing became that of a sleeping child.

I sat there listening, listening, and then slowly crept away knowing that I had been given unexpected treasure -- probably the last of its kind.

{image credit: wikimedia/mary cassatt}