I think he's only called out my name a couple of times before he woke
me up. I lift my head to look at the time and then the monitor just in
case it can give me some insight. It is just after 2:00am and his high
pitched voice comes through crystal clear.
"DADeeeee?"
It's Elijah, our two-year (26 month) old son. He's been having trouble
sleeping all night, as if he has been lying in bed for hours restless
but unable to sleep. At one point earlier on, my wife and I thought we
could hear him banging his legs on his mattress.
I smoosh my pillow to make it more comfortable because I know from
experience that he very often can fall back to sleep after a minute or
so. Plus, if I seem confident he will go back to sleep, my wife is less
likely to worry. At least that's what I think.
"DADeeeee, ere are oooooo?"
Apparently, not tonight. Not when he starts really talking to me.
"DADeeeee, ere are oooooo?"
I roll over onto my back and put my forearm on my forehead staring into
the darkness. "Come on, little boy," I silently urge. "Go back to
sleep." In my mind I can easily see him standing in his crib, looking
at the door, waiting for me to open it and walk in. But I need to be
strong. I need to not let it affect me. Going up to get him is often
not the solution. Sometimes I go up right away when he cries; it all
depends on how his day was and the kind of cry. Was he sick today? Out
of sorts? Is it a pained cry? Or more for attention? One night I woke
up to the sound of his screaming and I knew something was wrong. I
raced up the stairs two at a time and burst into their room to find he
had gotten his foot stuck in the bars of the crib. Tonight wasn't even
close to that cry.
"DADeeee?"
But he's calling out my name. My name. Not "Mommy," but "Daddy." That
fills me with a sense of pride and of pressure to figure out what is
best for him.
His voice still has a sing-song quality to it so I know he is not too
upset, but I want to go up and make sure he is okay anyway. I know my
wife is lying next to me thinking of all of the things that could be
wrong with him which only adds to the feeling of needing to handle this
correctly. Does he have a fever? Is his nose bleeding? But I won't go
up - not yet. I want to give him more time to go back to sleep on his
own. A little bit longer and maybe he will quiet down and at least get
some rest and it will all be over, like a bad dream you vaguely
remember when you wake up in the morning.
"DADeeeee, in the crib?"
I think he means he wants me to take him out of his crib.
"DADeeeee, in the crib?"
I grab my pillow and shove it up against the wall so I can sit up. I
stare at the ceiling as if I can see him in the room above us. "Come
on, Elijah. Just go back to sleep!"
Not only does it seem like he is not going back to sleep, but I'm
getting more and more concerned that he is going to wake up his twin
sister, Jordyn, who is sleeping in her crib on the other side of the
room. There has to be a solution, but everything I think of seems to
end badly.
My wife and I go through the possible options that lay before us. If I
go up and get him and Jordyn wakes up, then we've got big problems and
maybe neither of us will be able to get any more sleep. If I don't go
up he might wake her up anyway and we have the same problem. However,
even if I get him and manage not to wake her up, he probably won't go
back to sleep - he'll want to watch "shapes" (Baby Einstein's Baby
Newton) - and one of us is not going to get enough sleep tonight. Since
he's calling my name, I'm assuming that will be me and I've already
been thinking about what needs to be done at work tomorrow and how will
I do it with so few hours of rest.
But I have to do something because lying here and listening to him is like feeling something pierce my heart.
"DADeeeee, ere are ooooo?" he says once again.
"Can you turn that off?" I snap at my wife.
"DADeeee?"
Something in his voice reverberates deep in my soul. My boy is crying
out for me and I'm sitting here in bed listening. What kind of father
am I? What kind of message am I sending him? "I'm here whenever you
need me, Elijah. Except, of course, if you are crying during all of the
time I am at work or when it's late at night and you feel all alone in
your room. Otherwise, I'm here for you, my boy." When he cries out,
shouldn't I respond right away no matter the reason? Even if that is
not what he, or I, need in the long run (i.e.: the rest of the night)?
Even without the monitor I can still hear him. At least I think I can
still hear him and he is getting more and more upset, but I can't tell
if that's him or I'm just imagining this out of guilt. My wife
hears something, too, and turns the monitor back on to check.
"DADeeee, ere are oooo? In the crib? In the crib?"
She turns it off again and I am left to imagine what he is thinking and
feeling in silence. I swear I can hear him without the monitor, but I'm
not sure what he is saying. If I don't do something he's going to wake
up his sister.
I swing my feet over the edge of the bed to sit up, not quite ready to
put my feet on the floor, to make the decision to go and get him.
"DADeeee? DADeeee? DADeee? Ere are oooo? Ere are oooo?" I hear as my
wife checks to make sure he is okay. But he is whining now, working
himself up into a full-fledged cry. I can't let that happen.
I quickly move out of our room, up the stairs and gently open the door
to walk into their room where I see him standing in his crib, holding
his woobie, with his arms outstretched to make it easy for me to pick
him up. And I do. Jeremy Schneider, MFT, earned his master's in
marriage and family therapy from Hahnemann University in Philadelphia.
Mr. Schneider was founder and executive director of Empowering Children
and Families, a Philadelphia-based non-profit organization fostering
the confidence in individuals to create stronger families from 1994 -
1998. He currently sees clients in Manhattan and has written a series
of articles on his experiences as a father of twins born in December
2002. He lives in Long Island with his wife, Giokazta (pronounced
Jo-casta), and their boy-girl twins, Elijah and Jordyn. To contact him
directly, email him at
