A Tale of a Won’t-Stay-Asleep Newborn

At high noon, one November 14th, David Marshall Detweiler was sucked into this world. His eyes banged wide open and stayed that way, his daddy fondly observed, because David seemed to be on full alert from the moment of birth.

But who could blame him? If your placid, warm, bubbly bath time was suddenly invaded by a giant, alien, vacuum cleaner that plucked you out by the head and transported you to his world, how would you like it? Wouldn’t you be reluctant to close your eyes and drift off to sleep? Wouldn’t you open your eyes wide at every teensy sound, anticipating the great sucking thing to attack again?

The next day, we brought our suspicious newborn home to our 1,100-square-foot, thin-walled nest. We quickly learned if anyone was going to get any sleep again, all suspect sounds must be avoided. My vow that I would never be one of those moms that tiptoed around and shushed people went you-know-where. And to think I had boasted, “I’m going to vacuum under the crib while my child sleeps!” Oh, the ironies of life.

But there were evil sounds aplenty: The menacing “click” of the kitchen cupboard doors closing, the catastrophic “pop” resulting from the careless person closing the microwave door without inching it to its resting place, the innocent “whoosh” of the toilet unconsciously flushed. All jolted our boy from any tentative snooze in progress. Needless to say, we struggled with our new identities: from competent, reasonably well adjusted, happily married individuals, to clueless, tired, sucking aliens.

But then, one glorious day, we discovered the common ground between David’s womb world and his new alien abode. MUSIC.

Jon would hug our tense little newborn to his big, warm chest and lay in a recliner in front of the CD player. Being Christmas season, they listened to Handel’s Messiah for hours. And David would fall sound asleep!

Perhaps he remembered the melodies he’d heard before. Perhaps he was comforted by the divinely inspired notes. Perhaps colic, whatever that is, and classical music are polar opposites.

Whatever the case, music became the soothing backdrop for David’s life and by 3 months or so, he seemed relatively sure his parents could be trusted and would close his eyes now and then for awhile. By 2 years old his musical taste had broadened and a good bluegrass tune would get him flapping his arms, ready for takeoff. By 5 years old, he was playing the piano on his own.

So what if I had to blow my hair dry in the garage for 2 years. Who cares if “sleeping like a baby” was an oxymoron in our home? Who needs 8 hours of sleep a night if you can get a full 8 hours each week? The up side is that our home became filled with music. And more importantly, so did our son.

-posted by Donna Detweiler, whose 10-year-old son David still doesn’t care for vacuum cleaners but thinks aliens are pretty cool.