Disappointing lesson today. Ella was not able to focus, guessed a T goes between 7 and 9, and couldn’t remember the day of the week after 3 or 4 reminders. Gee, I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that she went to bed at midnight last night after an evening in town at a Sicilian blues festival and got up before 9 am. We struggled through a few activities, even tried to write a poem, but after splashing her face with cool water for the 3^rd time, she finally said, “I need a nap.” So, she finally took one. And it’s a good thing too – tonight she is off to a 10 pm concert by provocative piano player, Giovanni Allevi, at an outdoor theater set below the temples of Akragas.

Ella has always struggled with getting to sleep. When she was a baby it took hours of rocking, singing, bouncing and swaddling to get her to sleep. We used to sit on the edge of the bathtub with her on our softly bouncing lap, tummy side down, with the faucet running. As she got older, it took lots of reading, tossing and turning, story telling, audio books, etc. Even now, no matter how late, we must read. Some would say, we should have ‘put our foot down’ and not encouraged these lengthy bedtime rituals or we should have kicked her out of our bed much earlier. But they don’t know Ella. We never believed in letting a child cry themselves to sleep alone. I could go on and on about “sleep training” and children, but I’ll save that for another summer. The point here is to understand Ella’s need for engaging in the world and her difficulty in letting go.

Three to six year olds need ten to twelve hours of sleep per day. Both girls mostly get this. But not without a lot of nagging, and party-pooper activity by mom. This mother is usually seen here in Sicily as perpetually tired, uptight, unable to relax, and generally nervous. My inability to really talk to anyone about the things I’m interested in adds to my frustration and to this perception. However, I know what happens when Ella is tired. She can’t think; she is impulsive; she can be mean and rough; she is inflexible. She certainly can’t learn the things that are absolutely the most difficult for her. But after a good nap? She can be a different person, eager to learn, reaching for the stars, ready to hug the world around her.

Ella does have a deep sense that she can talk to us about things, that she is ultimately safe, that sleeping is rejuvenating, and waking up is a special moment that she shares with the three most important people in her life. She has this sense because we have worked really hard to make sure she feels this way. Even when she acts like an over-tired boxer, she usually comes around a few minutes after an outburst with an apology.

I truly believe that if we had pushed her to sleep more independently early on, coupled with the particularities of the brain she was born with, we would have damaged her. She would be more insecure and less able to overcome the challenges before her.

I vow to continue to fight the midnight bedtimes in Sicily. At least until Ella can read one complete paragraph on her own. Or unless there is a true moment of artistry to experience – and now she’s off to the concert!

Distractions/tangents:

• 10 Reasons not to let your child cry it out at bedtime
• A description of the quality of sleep in dyslexic children
• Giovanni Allevi