For the first twenty months of his life, Bubba lived like a rooster. As soon as so much as a glimmer of sunlight twinkled into his room, he was up and raring to go. With the exception of a few glorious days when the daylight savings time switch temporarily confused him, 6:00am was our default wake-up time for ages. It was unpleasant and I’ve been dreaming of the day that he’d sleep in a little longer for nearly two years now.
At long last, in recent weeks he has been sleeping till 7:00 or even later! This is likely because he wakes up asking for a bottle every morning at 3am and instead of training him not to do that I just take 30 seconds to chuck a bottle into his crib before running back into my own bed and diving back under the covers, but let’s not analyze it. I really don’t care why he’s sleeping later (we’ll deal with that bottle addiction and certain tooth decay…later), I just know that I love it and don’t want it to end.
The situation is tenuous, though. There’s a part of him that still wants to be a rooster, and he will take any opportunity to wake up once the sun has risen. I could throw a dance party right outside his bedroom at 4am and he most likely would not notice, but after 6am even the slightest whisper is liable to wake him. Morning breeze making your room a little too chilly? Don’t even think about shutting the window — Bubba will wake up immediately. Hankering for a drink of water? You best wait it out, because he’s definitely going to hear the faucet. And don’t even think about getting up to pee: between walking to the bathroom, shutting the door, peeing, and then flushing the toilet, there’s only about a 5% chance of him sleeping through that cacophony.
Tragically, since my body became so accustomed to rising at 6am every day, I now wake up needing to pee every morning at 6am on the dot. Each morning is my own personal Sophie’s Choice: do I ignore the urgings of my bladder and stay in bed so Bubba doesn’t wake up, or do I go the bathroom, knowing full well I will almost certainly be dooming myself to spend the next hour watching Sesame Street with a toddler and approximately sixty-five stuffed animals instead of snuggled up in my bed?
While the latter option is pretty freakin’ cute, I’d still prefer the sleep, even if it is uncomfortable half-sleep on account of my distended bladder. If the price of an extra hour of rest in the morning is a kidney infection, I’m willing to pay that price, and I expect the same of anyone else sleeping in my house. Consider this your warning, dear husband of mine and any future houseguests: plan accordingly, because if you get up to pee at 6:01am and wake the damn baby up, your next move better be to go get me fountain Dr Pepper to make up for your treason. Forgiveness does not come easy when I am tired.
Even if the damn baby in question is the cutest human on the planet.
The Baby Is Fine 
I always am tempted to refuse the hearing tests at our annual well check-ups. I want to say, “Honey, come over my house at 5:00 am and drop a small pin onto the carpet. They will hear you.”
Lol! My hubby has no appreciation for sleep and flushes the loo all the time and wakes the baby up. It drives me crazy. I would rather sit all day with a stinky toilet (because often the only time I go is when he’s asleep) than wake him up!
My children were always early risers. Now that they are tweens, they go to bed later, and I fully expect them to start sleeping in. I get up at 5 am to get some peace and quiet to myself. All those years of getting up with babies at 5 am, now I’m doing it willingly.
It’s my experience that sleep issues with children don’t stop when they get older. They’re just different. Fortunately, when you wake them up at 6 am to pee you can just tell them to go back to bed, and they will.
I still have roosters! Keep wondering when those hormones will kick in and all they’ll want to do is sleep!