5pm came the "can I have a sleepover" phone call. I knew the family fairly well, we'd had various play dates at each other's households before, plus it's school holidays and so it was an easy 'yea, sure' from me.
Now, I knew it was likely to end in tears, sleepovers have before and I'm sure they will again. The-matter-of-fact is that as much as Natalie wants to have sleepovers she also likes her own bed at night. Her routine is, in bed at 7.45pm, a story with me until 8pm, drink bottle and watch beside her bed, and then door closed and pitch black to sleep. She's naturally an early riser, always awake by 6.30am, twice a week awake by 5.30am for swim training. She's highly active, extremely motivated in school and sport and at the end of a busy day, needs her sleep. So at 8.45pm when I received another call from her saying her "her tummy was sore" I wasn't surprised in the slightest. I knew there was no sore tummy, or at most, just a nervous tummy and my response was a simple "shall I come and get you?"
Once home, with Natalie tucked up in her own bed with a hot water bottle on her "sore tummy", the discussion of how we should handle this sleepover "anxiety" came up with my partner. He believes I should have given her more encouragement on the phone to stay. And maybe he's right but here's why I didn't.. please bare with me as I try to explain, this could be a long one.
At present, as a teenager and even as an adult, prematurely leaving social situations can be stressful and often not easy. Peer pressure to stay starts early and navigating it can be difficult. I mean, who then wants to justify leaving somewhere to their mother, their most trusted companion who should always have their backs.
Last night Natalie felt the need to tell her friend she had a sore tummy to justify wanting to go home. Although she also initially replayed the same excuse to me, I'm hoping by using a 'no questions asked' approach, that next time, or sometime soon, she won't feel the need to give me the excuse because she'll know I'm not going to encourage her to stay if she doesn't want to. A simple 'Can you come and get me' will do the trick.
OK, so I know she's only 9 but I'm also already thinking ahead to those all important and scary teenage years. If she ever finds herself in a truly uncomfortable or dangerous situation, I want her to have the confidence to call me straight away and not have to worry about justifying how she got there to me. I'll be there to pick her up, no questions asked! (Obviously I hope it would come up in the hours or days to follow)
Today we've discussed what happened and talked about strategies that could help her overcome that bedtime worry in the future. She's at the age where everyone is having sleepovers and she doesn't want to miss out. However, as much fun as she has in the evening leading up to bedtime, sleeping its self always worries her. Sometimes she's soldiered through, often she calls me to come home. I've heard all the reasons, "the blankets looked too cold", "they wanted the nightlight on", "I forgot my drink bottle", the list goes on.
And so where do we go from here?
One idea that came up was how she could politely decline to stay the night in the first place. We discussed that next time the topic came up of staying the night she could say something like, "I'd love to stay for dinner and a movie but i'd like my mum to pick me up by 8pm" That way she can enjoy the evening worry free, knowing that she'll get a good night sleep at the end of it. This idea seemed to sit well her so we'll let you know how that goes in the future.
But for now, Have you got a fussy sleeper or a child that suffers from anxiety? What did you do to help them overcome it? Maybe they grew out of it eventually? Let me know in the comments below.
Good Night
Jessica x
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