My Asperger's Kid, Chapter 2

Two years after Max came Leo.  Wow! What a different baby.  Leo was so smiley and happy, and he loved to SLEEP!  In his OWN bed!  Josh and I had noticed that Max was always very serious, but it became even more pronounced when compared to Leo.  We still didn't think much of it, though.  Neither Josh nor I are very easy laughers, so we just decided he came by it naturally.  We even thought his not wanting to sleep was sort of hereditary, as Josh had trouble sleeping when he was a kid because he just couldn't stop thinking.

Sleeping changed, a little, for Max as time wore on.  A few months after he turned a year old, we put him in his own bed.  We would lie down with him until he fell asleep.  It still took a long time, but he did at least sleep in his own bed for a large portion of the night before he would sneak into ours.  But then we didn't care because we were able to have some time alone and sleep without a little person on top of us or kicking us.

Around the time Max turned two, we saw an episode of The Super Nanny that focused on getting kids to go to sleep on their own and in their own beds.  We thought, "Heck, why not?  It can't hurt."  Her instructions were (after going through your bedtime routine) to sit quietly next to the bed without talking or looking at the child and to scoot a little farther away each night so that by the end of a week you just walk out the door.  We followed her instructions, well Josh did, because I couldn't stand the thoughts of not hugging Max or cuddling him if he wanted me.  It went fabulously!  He had no trouble until the night that Josh just walked out the door.  And cried off and on for about an hour.  However, he got used to it.  He would get out of bed a lot because he "needed to tell us something," but it was so much better.

With the sleeping changed, life focused on other things.  In pretty much all other areas Max was super easy.  He reached all his milestones in the range he was supposed to, and he was healthy.  We loved watching him learn and grow.  Parenting became more simple, and we had a season of refreshment.