On never sleeping through the night. Again.

I thought once I became a parent that I would lose a little sleep. You know, mostly during infancy.
I thought that I would need to get up a few times during the night to feed our babe, but then by around six months old they would be sleeping through the night.
Forever.
BA HA HA!!
What on earth was I THINKING?!
While both of our kids were sleep-trained around five months and for the most part, sleeping through, my restful nights have yet to come back to me.
First, once I became a mom I became deathly afraid my baby wouldn’t live during the night, so I constantly checked on them during the early months while they slept peacefully.
Then, my ears suddenly became in-tune to every little noise I heard (or thought I heard) through the monitor. I was horrified at the thought of not being able to hear my poor sweet babies crying in their rooms, or worse, getting sick, so we still, to this day, have two monitors in our room in case one of them needs us. Both kids also sleep with a sound machine, so we listen to that beautiful fuzz all night too.
And we are now at the stage where Gwyn will wake up at least once to use the bathroom during the night, not wanting to go alone. So I am scared shitless greeted each night in the complete dark to Gwyn putting her face two inches over mine telling me she needs to use the potty in a loud whisper.
It’s absolutely terrifying.
The other night, I was awoken five times. FIVE! I think that may be more than during infancy.
Two times Gwyn needed to use the potty, once she was cold, once Cal woke up for a diaper change and the other Gwyn just woke up early since she could see light. We were staying at my brother and sister-in-law’s house and things were different than at home, but still. FIVE.
So when I thought that once the kids were sleeping through the night after infancy that I too would get to restfully sleep again, I couldn’t have been more wrong.
My strangest encounter was being awoken to a strange body part touching my face. It was Gwyn’s toe,  on my face. And I only learned this after frantically grabbing my phone for light in which Gwyn then tiredly asked me to look at the new Band-aid that was on her owie toe. At 4:00 am.
 

I will never sleep peacefully again.
I now have that mother’s ear.
The worried ear.
And I just know that it’s not going to get better, either.
Once the kids start hanging out with friends instead of us, I know I won’t be able to sleep until they are safely in their beds. Until they are home from the movies. Until they are home from their first overnight camping trip. Until they’re home from their first gulp date.
That’s it. Sleep is just gone.
But, our bodies have somehow miraculously adapted and will continue to do so as the years go on. And although there are times that I want nothing more than five more minutes of restful sleep, I have just accepted that for me, that phase of life is over.
Morning snuggles, warm baby bodies and whispers of “I love you” sure do make it easier, though.