Grumpy? Me? I don't know what you're talking about.

Allegedly, I am a grumpy sleeper. As in, I am terrible to anybody who wakes me/moves me/makes too much noise during my sleeping hours. I say allegedly, because there is no hard proof. I'm just going on what my husband says. (My terribly honest, couldn't lie to save his life husband.) But without the concrete proof, I'm sticking with allegedly.

Before I go any further, let me explain exactly why sleep is so important to me. I'm one of those people who needs sleep. As in, I will get extremely grumpy and even sick if I don't get any sleep. I was never the type to pull an all-nighter. Nope, never. I was the one who went to sleep in the middle of all the fun. (I'm fun at parties.) When I get tired my body starts to shut down. Literally, I can't function. Add a son who wakes me up several times a night, and you've got a woman who values her sleep more than all the riches, and chocolate, in the world. Yeah. That much.

Now let me tell you about my son. He, unfortunately, got my "need for sleep" genes. He gets sick at the merest hint of sleepiness (hence all the throwing up he does, like last night, in the middle of the restaurant. He's fun at parties too.) He also got my "light sleeper" genes, and the combination is not a good one. So when he wakes up at the slightest noise, like, for instance, the air conditioner turning on, he is very grumpy. And he needs to be tucked back into bed. (He cannot sleep unless the covers are tucked neatly between the bed and the wall, and pulled tightly to exactly under his chin. All of which he cannot accomplish on his own.) Which brings him to the side of my bed to wake me up and tell me he needs to be tucked in. Needless to say, this has seriously interfered with my precious sleep. (Hee hee, I said my precious. Now I'm imagining myself as Gollum.)

So last night, after the second trip to tuck him back in, I said, "This is the last time I'm going to do this. You'll have to get yourself back to bed." At which point he said (very pitifully, I might add,) "Don't make me cry, Mommy." As if I was a horrible mommy-monster who lived for nothing other than to make children feel bad. As if I wanted to make him cry, and do it often.

This makes me think that maybe, just maybe, I am grumpy at night.

Now what about my daughter, you ask? She got her dad's "I can sleep through anything" genes. She's slept through the night since she was a baby, and still does. And she can pull her covers up herself, because she really doesn't care how they are arranged, just that they keep her warm. She's also always the last to wake up. And she likes to stay up late, really late. (I fear that she might actually be fun at parties.)