Bedtime Monster

So, I might have done something that will for sure not win me the Mother Of The Year Award.
 Ok, I definitely did.

Yesterday in a desperate attempt to get Jace to fall asleep for a nap, while semi-restraining him in my arms on my bed, I told him that if he got out of bed again, he would turn into a monster. A MONSTER?? he asked. I went into great detail about why that would be so sad - because monsters have to live in caves way up high in the mountains. How they don't have toys to play with. How it's cold up there. How much we would miss him. Blah blah blah. It worked. He calmed down enough to fall asleep while still wrapped lovingly, and very tightly so as not to bust loose, in my arms. Perfect, this will be the new way I get him to go to sleep I said to myself while casually patting myself on the back. That's one for me.

So last night, it wound up being a late night because, yay me - I got him to have a long nap. (wait, that didn't seem so much like a win anymore.) It was okay, we were busy putting together a new bed we had bought for their room and they were super into the Tinker Bell movie we put on to keep them out of view of the fight that was sure to ensue when putting together a piece of Ikea (type) furniture as a couple. It was 9:15 by the time we were putting them down and it was wayyyy past their bedtime. The crying reminded us of that very fact. Anyways, we got them tucked in, and I leaned in to snuggle Buddy and casually remind him what would happen if he got out of bed. This time I maybe added a little more. Like, that if he got out of bed, an evil witch would turn him into the monster. And we all know that you don't want to fuck with an evil witch, right? Even a two year old knows that. So, he rolled over, snuggled his back into me and was asleep in literally seconds. Again, with the pat on the back. I am soooo winning. I climbed up onto Maizeys new bed to snuggle her quickly when out of nowhere up the ladder comes Jace, vibrating. He climbs over us, gets under her covers and is asleep in seconds again. What the hell was that? I wondered. Oh well, he's asleep. I got Maizey settled down and left their room. I don't know, maybe five minutes of peaceful silence went by before an absolutely terrified scream came from their room. Thats weird, we said to each other. Brian went to see what was going on and was gone a long time. He came back with a story about how he's never seen Jace like that before. He seemed like he was terrified of something. He leapt at me off of Maizeys bed with no regard to falling or me catching him. And he was kind of shaking. I don't know what that was all about, but I snuggled him and got him calmed down and he fell asleep again in his own bed. Maizey said she tried to help him, but he was just screaming and screaming. I knew. I knew what the problem was, but I wasn't just going to say what I had done. I mean, I wasn't like, 100% positive. It could have been any number of reasons that he was so scared. Awhile later, I tried to act as though I had just remembered, I casually mentioned what I had done to get him to go to sleep earlier and that maybe I had done it again tonight, and that maybe I had added an evil witch. Brian gave me the look. You know, the one that says that was so stupid of you. There were very few words exchanged over it.

Cut to tonight. Buddy remembers and he is afraid. He climbed straight into bed, he snuggled down, he whispered to me no witch mama, no monster. His eyes were darting around nervously and every sound Maizeys bed made above him, had him snuggling down further under his covers. He didn't take his hand off my arm, he barely moved. You guys, he is seriously afraid. I whispered that there is no witch, it was just pretend, he won't turn into a monster, it was just to be *ahem* funny. He didn't believe me, or maybe he did, but he still didn't get out of bed. He called me to ask if he could go to the bathroom, which has never happened, ever.

I feel bad. I won't say it anymore. I don't want him to be afraid of going to bed. At least, not THAT afraid. But I do want him to go to bed and stay there. I don't want him to come upstairs a million times every night and get into trouble almost that many. I don't want him to need 75 drinks and to go to the bathroom 15 times in one hour. I know it's all fake just to get to keep coming up. I want him to go to bed at 7:30 and go to sleep. He's tired. But he's wired and he has a hard to settling down. We've tried reading many many calming stories before bed, having a warm bath, watching some tv, snuggling with him, locking his door, leaving a lamp on, singing songs. Putting Maizey to bed first. Putting him to bed first. I'm out of ideas. Our (my) new tactic won't work. I mean, it will, but at what expense?! Our old ways stopped working. All of the in-between ways didn't seem to be much better. I'm getting to the end of my rope. I am losing my mind having him stay up until 8:30-9:00-9:30 every night and then get up at 6:00 every morning, at the latest. I feel like I am not getting enough time to decompress at night. I need some quiet time, those two hours every night are literally the only silence I get all day. I'm desperate for this stage to pass and bed time to get easy again. I don't want him to turn into a monster, I just want him to stop acting like one.