Wake Up Call

Waking up, when you have children, is an entirely different proposition to when you don’t.

I used to wake up to an alarm that I set the night before going to bed. This alarm was adjustable based on where I had to be and at what time. Sometimes, I could even ignore the alarm and choose to sleep through. These days I wake to a variety of very different alarms – so much so that I don’t even bother to set an alarm on my phone any longer. 

None of these 'new' alarm calls are adjustable and they occur completely at random between the hours of 2.30am and 6am. I have summarised a few of these alarms to help ‘prepare’ prospective parents for the value add children contribute to our sleeping patterns. 

The Stock Alarm

The Stock Alarm usually goes off between 2.30am and 3.30am and is a pretty fairly straight forward bout of screaming from our year-old boy Sebastian. This alarm has an additional feature to ensure proper waking which requires you to carry Sebastian around the house for approximately forty-five-minutes-to-an-hour whilst he points at an array of different things and says the word ‘cat’. You are welcome to go back to sleep after the initial alarm call, but be warned that there is a very persistent snooze function that will cause the alarm to reoccur every half an hour (or so) until -eventually- Sebastian refuses to go back to sleep altogether at around 5am.

On the off chance that little Sebastian sleeps through to a reasonable time, backup alarms are provided by my three-year-old daughter Amélie. Amélie has a variety of more creative and physical measures of ensuring my awakening. I will summarise her methods into four main categories below - in no particular order of preference ;-)

The Grudge

The earliest ‘Amélie’ alarm call usually occurs around 3am and is known to my wife and I as ‘The Grudge’. For those of you that haven’t seen this particularly creepy Japanese horror movie, I will elaborate. 

Upon waking, Amélie will slowly and quietly walk into our bedroom and randomly select a side of our bed (usually mine). She will sidle up to within an inch of her chosen victim’s face and, once in position (with her hair completely covering her face) she will whisper incoherently. After you have jumped out of your skin (and bed), Amélie likes to make sure that you are awake by insisting that you immediately take her to the toilet. 

Thankfully Amélie likes to reserve ‘The Grudge’ alarm for special occasions only– usually when you have a busy day ahead with a bunch of really important meetings scheduled.

The Trampoline

Whilst ‘The Grudge’ is scary and bloody early, it’s preferable to the 5am ‘Trampoline’ alarm call. This is as self-explanatory as it reads... Amélie enters our room at pace and mounts the bed - somehow avoiding her Mum completely - and proceeds to use my sleeping body as her personal trampoline. 

I always thought this was something that happened only in slapstick comedy movies about parenting... but, alas no, this actually happens in real life.. my life...

As with 'The Grudge', once awake, you are once again obliged to take Amélie to the toilet.

The Remix

The Remix alarm call is a collaboration (of sorts) between Amélie and Sebastian. It usually occurs around 5.30am. 

On the rare occasions that Amélie wakes up in her bed and decides against jumping on my head (see Trampoline), she will pass the time by singing - currently, the song of choice is ‘Let it Go’. 

This sounds sweet and initially, it starts out that way but when I say singing, I probably should qualify that it’s more like shouting. The ‘singing’ also escalates, getting progressively louder, until at some point the noise elicits the support of her Brother’s screams also  – producing what can only be described as a colossal remix of torture. 

The eventual crescendo is impossible to sleep through, there is no snooze button even getting up out of bed doesn’t guarantee you silence. In fact, the only thing you are guaranteed by getting up is an obligatory visit to the toilet with Amélie.

The Picnic

‘The Picnic’ alarm is perhaps the most civilised method in Amélie’s array of sleep deprivation tactics but it is also the one that I most fear. She saves this one for the weekend and usually a Sunday -when I get to have a ‘lie-in’. 

Specifically, my lovely wife will rise early with the children and take them downstairs so that I may sleep in peace. However, as the morning progresses, usually between 8.30am and 9am, Amélie will find the will-and-the-way to sneak back upstairs and into my bedroom. She does this ever so quietly -of course- because her mother has told her not to wake me up. However, her mother didn’t say anything about NOT having a pretend picnic on Daddy’s face. 

I will usually wake up at the point Amélie starts to get brave and inserts a pretend piece of plastic food into my mouth. Whilst the surprise choking sensation is pretty unpleasant, you also have to deal with the array of plastic food items that have been scattered, literally in their thousands, around your body. 

Amélie will typically expect you to continue playing ‘picnics’ the moment you wake up and if you don’t (or even if you do), she will insist on you taking her to the toilet. 

I really really miss my old alarms.

Thanks for Reading,

Chancey

P.S. In the name of science (and FUN), please feel free to tell us about your child's 'wake up' calls in the comments section below.