But the fact is that once a baby appeared on the scene, it was so much worse, because my nights were perpetually broken into unhelpfully small chunks. Now, at five years old, Bernard sleeps through most nights. He sometimes wakes once, and usually comes through to wake me up when he does; he hasn’t yet figured out that he just needs to go to the toilet and back to bed, and he’ll soon drop off again. I take him back to bed and tuck him up, and he drifts back to sleep. I return to my own bed and lie awake. Some nights this happens two or three times, some nights not at all.

In low moments I blame myself for his inability to get asleep. I hear so often in antenatal classes the concern that if one comforts one’s child to sleep, they will never learn to go to sleep by themselves, and on the surface it looks like that is exactly what has happened here. I helped him to get to sleep by breastfeeding him for such a long time, and then by staying with him until he fell asleep, that he cannot do it by himself.

And yet, in not-so-low moments, I wonder if that’s the true picture. My mum says I was a great sleeper as a baby. And then she adds that she did leave me to cry sometimes. And she seemed to have forgotten the difficulty I had getting to sleep as a child, until she came to stay and saw Bernard doing exactly the same thing: appearing on the stairs ten minutes after lights out, whining that he can’t get to sleep. So he and I were parented to sleep in completely different ways, but have very similar sleep patterns. My dad has chronic insomnia too, and that makes me feel absolved^[1].

Leaving Bernard to cry himself to sleep clashed with every maternal instinct I have. The ensuing comments, which I hope do not appear, telling me that some babies ‘need’ to cry themselves to sleep, will make me reflect on how society undermines maternal instincts. Babies in non-western societies don’t appear to ‘need’ to cry themselves to sleep; how is that possible? Not only does it clash with my instincts as a mother, it also clashes with my knowledge as a breastfeeding counsellor, that leaving a baby to cry is not emotionally or neurologically healthy. Here is a well-referenced article that can give you more detail on that.

I am satisfied that I didn’t cause Bernard’s sleeping issues by parenting him to sleep. If I take a long term view, I can see that his sleep has improved gradually over the years, and the way Pete and I parent him has changed in response to that, not the other way round. We have met his needs, and his needs have changed. In the last few days we have seen another step forward at bedtime, as well as consistent night-time dryness: both things that happened when he was ready.

1. thanks Pete [↩]

You mean like swans?

No. Swans and gooses are just ducks. They are not birds.

Yes, they are birds. Owls are birds too.

No. Owls are not birds. Birds can only come out in the day, and owls come out at night.

What are they, then?

Swans and gooses are ducks, and owls are not birds.

But we looked at the Observer Book of British Birds, and it had swans and geese and owls in it. So they must be birds.

No. That book is wrong.

There were noticeable changes in his malleable little self, almost from the start. Quite a lot of rather surprisingly sensible behaviour suddenly manifested itself, and he was clearly extremely tired to start with. His always-fragile sleep patterns have been disrupted; on the whole I think we are getting more sleep-throughs, occasional lie-ins (sometimes until 7am!), but also he is having difficulty getting off to sleep at night. More so than usual, that is.

He has thrown himself with enthusiasm into learning stuff. By his second week, he was telling me how to say ‘hello’ in french, spanish and chinese [though it took me some time to figure out what ong-jewer was supposed to be]. He was already reading fairly fluently. When I collected him on his fourth day, his teacher told me he had just read The Gruffalo to the group, while she had a nice rest.

In his uniform, he looks both tiny and vulnerable, and surprisingly large for a child who was my baby only a very short time ago. I am happy that he still wants to hold my hand to and from the school gate; I suppose it won’t be like that for much longer. At bedtime the other day he said I love you, silly lady, and buried his head in my dressing gown, going all giggly and shy.

I laugh. You got that Serious Expression out for this? I thought you were going to tell me he had beaten another kid up. She says they immediately contradicted him, so that’s okay then. Status Quo restored for all the other children and their magical fairytale beliefs, but Conrad is now confused about whether or not his parents are lying to him.

I can’t help wondering if, were we Jewish or Muslim, our belief system would be of such small importance to the school. ‘We’ are not anything, but if this family chooses not to perpetuate the marketing strategy that is popularly known as Father Christmas, surely we have the right to do that.

Facebook erupts in horror. They are children for such a short time, I have stolen the magic and wonder from him. [Interestingly, Twitter friends just snigger]. I ask the Small Boy who Santa is, and he confirms that he’s a made up story. I ask him who will put toys in his stocking on Christmas Eve, and he confirms that Santa will be doing this. He then adds that granny will be pretending to be Santa. He also asks how many sleeps before we go to granny’s, because he’s excited to find out what will be in his stocking. Meanwhile, I confirm with granny that the stocking will be just that, and not a giant plastic sack.

Next year we won’t be going to granny’s for christmas, so there probably won’t be any visit from Father Christmas. But I will explain to him that when we celebrate Yule on the 21st December, the presents he gets then are instead of a stocking, and the other children don’t get this. But I’ll also tell him about the children in Hungary who get sweeties in their shoes on December 5th, and any other interesting stories I can find out. For some reason, he would particularly like to know what happens in Uruguay; can anyone tell me?

Do you? Where did you learn that?

I didn’t learn it, I just had it in my head.

How did it get into your head?

Someone else must have dropped it out of their head, and I just picked it up.

No, I don’t remember. Do you remember?

Yes, I saw her.

Can you put it into my head?

He will be four and a half. Socially and intellectually, absolutely up for the challenge. But he seems so small! In fact, he has clodhopping size 10 feet (baby/toddler sizing, that is), and most of his jumpers are too small. Yesterday he had a haircut at a barber’s, and looks cherubic with his violet eyes and short fringe.

Yule and school, he crows, they both RHYME!

Bernard likes to build Lego cars with his dad, and at nursery his favourite activity is Playing Outside. His favourite film is Cars, but recently he has been watching the Wallace and Gromit films a lot. If he is good at bedtime, he can earn up to three bedtime stories, and he usually chooses The Owl & The Pussycat, which he knows off by heart. His favourite food is sandwiches, and he would very much prefer it if I never made him eat lentil soup or meatloaf, especially if it has peppers in it.

His best friend is Stan, who shared a due date and came out three days later. Stan’s mother Alice is looking after him this half-term week, while his regular childminder is on holiday in Turkey. Bernard wants to know where Turkey is, and I’ve shown him on his illuminated globe, and looked up the flag. He finds flags very interesting, following the fun of the Panini football sticker album he had during the World Cup. Alice gives him jelly.

Bernard has an awful lot of toy cars, but not too many noisy plastic toys with flashing lights; partly because they break easily, and partly because our friends and family know better. Simple toys like cars seem to appeal to him more; he can crash them, and fly them, and chase the cat with them. He wanted an ELC Dino Rally for his birthday, and got one, but he doesn’t really play with it; those cars only go round and round the track, so it really isn’t very interesting once you’ve constructed it.

He is afraid of dogs and the dark and loud sirens, but likes going fast in the car and telling daddy what the road signs say. He is stubborn, and sometimes as inarticulate as a teenager, especially when you ask him how school was today. He doesn’t like going to sleep, and if I’m around then he insists that I sit in the room with him. I read my book until twenty to eight, which is when he falls asleep, regular as clockwork. He usually wakes up in the night, and comes to sleep on a mattress on the floor beside my bed.

Everyone tells me he’ll sleep through when he starts school, he’ll be so tired. But they’ve been wrong before.

At school he does phonics, which means learning letter sounds and letter combinations, along with funny little actions like blowing out a candle for p. He has a few phonics books that we inherited, and they make excruciatingly boring reads. When he picks them at bedtime my entire being yawns. It’s a bit better now that he reads them to me, rather than demanding that I read them to him. I can switch off and plan my next knitting project. Yes, you heard it hear first: sometimes mothers are not remotely interested in what their adorable offspring are up to.

In the Oxfam bookshop, I found an old Peter and Jane Ladybird book, you may remember the sort of thing if you’re as old as me. It contains such thrilling plotlines as Here is Peter. Here is Jane. Here is the dog. Peter likes Jane. Jane likes Peter. Peter and Jane like the dog. etc. But it’s still better than the phonics books [oil. boil. coil. soil.]

I brought it home and read it to him once, and then he had a go. He started by reading in a staccato monotone, halting completely when he reached a new word. I encouraged him to sound out the word using those boring old phonics, and he has gradually realised that even if he hasn’t tried to read the word before, he can often work it out. I can see now that he is recognising whole words, although he often guesses the ending from recognising the beginning, and gets it wrong until I prompt him to say all the sounds. Then he gets it right. Of course by now he has read the book so many times that he knows it off by heart, and reads it to himself with intonations and real fluency.

Starting to read has also affected the way he says some words, because he is more aware of word endings. Until now, he has often swallowed the endings of words, or simply got them wrong [using hers instead of her]. Now he has begun to enunciate more clearly, which is a big help in comprehending him.

And because the Ladybird readers are so much less dull than the phonics books, I am quite happy to sit and listen to him read. But we may have to move him on to Nabokov soon, just to keep me interested.

Me: Erm… Italy. Where pizzas come from.

Bernard: That man on the stairs is also from Italy.

Me [after eventually realising what on earth he's on about]: Yes, your Pinocchio puppet is from Italy.

Bernard: That’s my bestest country.

I could not square deliberately making my child ill, so no party. We waited, and waited, but the pox did not appear for nearly four more years.

Yesterday I got home from teaching an antenatal breastfeeding class and noticed that the boy was Acting Tired. Shortly afterwards I spotted, if you’ll forgive me, a small scattering of little pink blister-like spots on his face and neck, a few more on his tummy and a big one on his back. At bedtime, on a dose of calpol for the high temperature and general malaise, he was asleep in minutes: always a big clue that he’s Not Right. And this morning he is poxed all over.

Our half term plans to visit Granny up north are cancelled, since Granny has already suffered shingles once and is full time carer to my invalid stepfather. Those whose attitudes to pox parties differ to my own will be welcome to come and entertain us. Lucky it’s a bank holiday week and of course I don’t work Thursdays and Fridays, so we only have two days of emergency childcare to sort out. Now I must away and do some research to figure how long we’re likely to have to isolate him for.

I say more talking, but I mean more reading and writing – it just doesn’t sound as good. A little while ago we unearthed a packet of Letterland flashcards, inherited in a bag full of toys from someone somewhere [i.e. not something I would buy]. These proved reliably entertaining for quite some time, with the added bonus that the boy learned all his letters, upper and lower case. I don’t know if he does much with letters in preschool, but in the last few weeks he has suddenly exploded into reading and writing.

I secretly chuckle when we’re at Alice’s house and Bernard is trouncing Stan on the Speak&Spell.

I have taken him to the GP, who objected to my use of the term tic. They are not tics, because they’re not sudden movements. Nonetheless, I persisted, I am concerned about these involuntary movements, whatever speed they happen at. The GP admitted it was outside his remit and made a pediatric appointment for me, which is what I wanted. I hardly expected a prescription.

I spoke to his childminder and his teacher, both of whom say they have noticed rapid blinking. They school implemented a red book in which we all record our observations. In six weeks’ time, when we get to see the paediatrician, this is going to be useful; especially if the tics don’t show themselves during the appointment.

Of course I am worried. But I cannot spend the next six weeks operating at the height of anxiety about this, when perhaps it really is just something he will grow out of. How will that help? We will see the paediatrician, and something will be done about it.

All three of us seem more confident in our roles these days. That’s not to say it’s easy; we still have pretty major Sleep Issues, and Bernard is certainly stuck in a phase of NO. He knows what he wants. He is pretty damn persistent in getting it. I am so proud that he takes after me. I have noticed that (apart from the whole sleep thing), when we get into a difficult phase, we all change. We are quite adaptable, and we work hard to find the best way through these rough patches. This is probably another way of saying we cave in to his every whim, just as adoring parents should.

But it’s not all rough patches and NO. It’s being woken up at 6am by a rendition of “one, two, threefourfive, once I caught a fishalive.” It’s recognising the kisses that granny drew on his birthday card. It’s telling the man in the Indian restaurant that he prefers curry to chips, and neglecting to eat the chips when he was served them anyway. It’s asking what he’s going to do today, and then trying to rearrange the order of events for no reason. It’s choosing “kontrow” underpants in M&S. It’s alerting me to the fact that a nearby baby is crying, and wants some mama-milk to “feel him better.” It’s warm little animal cuddles when my big boy remembers that he’s a baby too.

Bernard has his own ideas: if asked when his birthday is, he will tell you it’s when he goes to Legoland to drive the car. So Pete took him on Thursday afternoon. I’ve just checked, and he says he’s still two, but he’ll be three next week. When he goes to Legoland to go on the car. You’ve already been on the car, I tell him. Your birthday is on Tuesday, and they you will be three. When I go on the car, he adds. And then, When I have my party.

Uh… party? Ah. We thought this was probably the last year that we could get away without having a Birthday Party. Not all the parents in our group agree, so we are going to Third Birthday Parties on Friday AND Saturday. And the other little boy who goes to the same childminder is three today, so they are having a party on Wednesday. Three years: three parties, and I don’t have to do any of them.

But this does not resolve the question of when to give him his presents. In fact he has already received three books from his Uncle Nick, about a month ago. There are three more items in the garage, one of which is a second-hand bike that a friend has loaned me for a year, so I’m not sure if that one really is a birthday present. Although if it’s not, then Pete and I haven’t got him anything yet.

Personally, I like a birthday that runs and runs; but then I’ve got a good grasp of the concept of birthdays, so it doesn’t matter if the celebration and/or presents are diluted a bit by being spread out over a week or more. But we don’t seem to have much choice, or any decisive powers, so here’s how the birthday will be celebrated:

Thursday: Legoland (check)
Saturday: going out for lunch and clothes shopping. Can we give him new pants for his birthday? Bernard says he wants a suit.
Sunday: presents in the morning, cake for afternoon tea, music all day.
Tuesday: Actual Birthday. Probably a bit of a low-key day.
Wednesday: Childminder party.
Friday: Toby’s birthday party.
Saturday: Visit from Grampy and Josh’s birthday party.