How a long-haul flight didn’t save Christmas

It’s July and it’s intensely hot, so when’s better to write about Christmas? Well, not Christmas exactly, but about sleep, sensory issues and dyspraxia.

Every Christmas Eve my son gets an average of 3-4 hours’ sleep - about 30% of what he needs. We don’t do ourselves any favours in the run up: “tidy your room or Father Christmas won’t come!”; “don’t strangle your brother because Santa will tear up that letter we made you rewrite three times and you’ll be present-less!”

Unsurprisingly, he can’t sleep for anticipation and then wakes up in a state of ecstasy at 3am, the moment his foot touches the filled stocking.

The Boy, his mother and I have had an arduous battle with his sleep. On his first ever day at home more than seven years ago, he slept for eight hours solid and a calm but firm midwife, when we phoned to ask what to do, told us: “wake him up and feed him. NOW!” That was pretty much the last time he slept continuously for three whole years.

We consulted a sleep specialist and we tried method upon method, but ultimately it was to no avail. The only way we could get him to sleep solidly was to do what everyone told us not to and take him to bed with us. We did that a lot.

Then, when he was three, he moved from a cot into a “Big Boy Bed” and - for a time at least - he started sleeping well. But he still struggles to sleep on many nights, especially at this time of year while it’s light.

When I asked him why he struggles, he explained the conflicting problems of how it was too bright and that he didn’t want the door shut. I’d just returned from a long-haul business trip so I asked him if he wanted to wear my “magic” eye mask. It works perfectly and only fails when he removes it for a secret read - which is most nights.

One of The Boy's array of eye masks

It makes more sense now. My theory is that, before the “Big Boy Bed”, the cot’s bars, shadows and other sensory stimulation sent his developing mind into overload. Coming into bed with us was the safest place to be. In retrospect I feel so guilty at the times we screamed “just sleep!” and no doubt added to an already a frightening situation.

I’m beginning to understand just how much things can stimulate his senses: the shocking noise of a hand dryer (James Dyson, you’re not that clever), the tilt of his bicycle on a kerb, the abject fear when he first attended swimming lessons, the angry ravages of hunger. He shuffles from foot-to-foot constantly to get “feedback”, and many who don’t understand call out his “fidgeting”.

I try so hard - sometimes failing dismally - to see the world through his eyes. I wonder whether it’s sometimes scary or sometimes vividly beautiful - hence his love of movies.

Occasionally, he even enjoys sleeps. And by my reckoning he’s got 165.3 of them before Christmas.