Sometimes its okay to break the rules

From a young age we are taught the value of rules and boundaries. Color in the lines, don't stick your hand in the fire (yes in Africa I grew up with a fire place), wear matching clothes and behave! The entire school system is based on following rules in order to achieve the desired outcome. We are so institutionalized in this way of thinking that certainly the idea of "thinking outside the box" is sometimes so far out of our comfort zones we are afraid to do it. Many parenting books (especially the sleep ones) are simply a compilation of rules and boundaries set up by that particular author, follow my formula and your baby will sleep.

Admittingly, I am one of those people  who thrives in rules. Give me a structure so that I can function safely within it. Last night I received a wake up call. Since its the last month of our school year, we are very busy with end of year concerts. Naturally they are all in the early evening because I am clearly the only parent in Jerusalem who is following the rules of a regular bath and bedtime. Yesterday evening I BROKE THE RULES at six o clock in the evening my children (aged 3 and 5) were not in their scheduled bath but rather sitting in a hall watching their sisters dance concert. The sleep consultant had broken her bedtime rules, the sacred schedule had been tampered with and guess what my children not only survived they had fun. While it felt good to bend the rules I do have some cautionary comments to make:

1.Adjusting the bedtime routine is definitely allowed from time to time but there needs to be a norm which is firmly established so that children and even young babies will be able to sense the difference.

2. I didn't break the rules, I bent them. I still bathed my children before we left and packed sandwiches for them to eat so theoretically they still ate dinner at their regular time. When we arrived home at eight thirty all we had to do was change into pajamas, brush teeth and bedtime.

3. You need to know, this is especially true of babies, that sleep deprived kids usually do not sleep well at night. Sleep debt is not something that once incurred can be paid off with subsequent sleeps. Once you have lost that time to sleep its gone forever. Remember that your body is not sleeping while you are sleeping. Many vital processes occur during sleep and persistent sleep deprivation will eventually take its toll on your physical well being.

4. A routine itself should allow for some degree of flexibility. As long is your child is going to sleep at the same- ish time every night and that the series of events  that lead up to sleep usually occur in some regular order, then you have successfully established a bedtime routine.

So I confess that even the sleep consultant occasionally messes with the bedtime routine but in order to bend the rules you have to have them firmly established in the first place.