The year my son was born, after I went back to working 50-60 hours a week, with a 6-year-old having started 1st grade, my husband and I forgot to get each other Christmas gifts. We remembered everyone else in our family, because, seriously, you're not allowed to forget ANYONE, lest you want to be branded a scarlet letter for being the worst daughter/son/sister/cousin/nephew/etc...

My husband and I made sure the list was completed.

Christmas morning, the day after all the festivities with our families, my daughter and I sat at our dining table in our pajamas to create some art. My son was in his baby seat sucking on something - at six months old he sucked on everything - and my daughter pulled out all her art supplies. She was always drawing something back then. As she colored, I drew a stick figure wearing a red and white Christmas hat, whipping at reindeer as it stood on a sled flying across the sky. I wrote Merry Christmas 2007 at the bottom and showed it to everyone. By "everyone" I mean my daughter who loved everything and anything I drew, my son who stare out the window while trying to lick the paint off some plastic toy, and my husband who was asleep on the couch. We were taking turns napping during those days.

For the past week, I've been waking between 3am and 5am. Usually, it's a noise outside, or my hubby snored too loud, or a dream scared me awake. Sometimes, I just have to pee.

Too tired to get out of bed, yet too wired to actually go back to sleep, I stare at the dark ceiling and count objects in my head to relax my anxieties. I float in an out of consciousness, and just as I think I'm about to fall asleep the alarm goes off. Time to wake up for the day.


Insomnia sucks.