I should be napping right now because that's what any sane, responsible mama would do when a baby girl is headed down the pipeline any day now and her two older sisters are tucked away in bed for a short nap. But no, here I am because the insomnia continues and will not grant my mind peace.
Nearly every morning around 4:30-5, I hear the muffled shuffles of one very wide awake three year old trudging toward me. She places her soft, warm hand on my cold cheek and without any words exchanged, I lift my comforter and allow her to crawl across my small mountain of a belly and nestle her tousled hair in between my shoulder and my chest. Her morning breath warms my cheek, and she whispers, "I have energy mama. I woked up. I love you the most." I open my heavy eyelids and whisper back, "I love you the most too baby. Now please go back to sleep," and I promptly close my eyes again only to breathe in the sweet smell of her Johnson's baby shampoo. Some mornings, she surrenders and falls back to sleep, but most mornings she squeezes her eyes shut for a few minutes before her body gets restless. I peek through squinted eyes to see what she her staring back at me, hoping I'll give her the okay to wake up for the day. It doesn't happen, and a small struggle ensues until finally Tim's alarm buzzes and we're all jarred awake for another long day.
Oh my Genevieve. My sweet angel of a child...why don't you sleep? Why doesn't your body require more than a few hours at night?
I used to get angry at her early morning wake-up calls until I realized being angry didn't make them go away. She just kept placing that hand on my cheek each morning no matter how I reacted so I have begun to love my morning cuddles with her. I still hate the early hour, but I have tried to look at the time as a gift to snuggle a girl who rarely likes to be snuggled. I whisper in her ear at least five times each morning how much I love her and why I love her, and I know my words mean something to her. Genevieve has so much confidence in herself. I admire her, and I then I remember I'm shaping that confidence and without our morning talks, would I remember to stop and whisper sweet things in her ear during the day? I hope so, but I admit it is harder to see all the sweet stuff during the rough patches of the morning and afternoon so I'll stick to our morning routine, even if the hour is ungodly.
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"Be kind and considerate with your criticism... It's just as hard to write a bad book as it is to write a good book." Malcolm Cowley