Alligators under the bed

It shocks me how much my daughter is like me sometimes. But I think it also helps me empathise with her too.

Tonight as soon as I said goodnight to her, she came running out of her room in hysterics. She begged me to let her sleep in the top bunk of Brady's bed, she promised not to cry or roll out of it. She simply could not bear to sleep in her room tonight.

It started a couple of weeks ago when I noticed that she started asking me to shut her closet door (the head of her bed looks right into her closet door). I had a feeling this was just the beginning.

At school today they read a book (or so she told me) about alligators under a boys bed, and that the dad moved the alligators into the garage so the boy could sleep.

I grew up with alligators under my bed, Indians in my wallpaper, and a generally bad guy in my closet. So I would insist on having the closet open (so I could have a visual if he should appear, I didn't want to be surprised by him), and the Indians would come out of the wallpaper when I slept (they had hatchets to scalp me), and I would jump to and from my bed each evening and morning to avoid getting nipped by an alligator. Let's not look to deep into all of this, let's just say I had an active imagination.

The fears got so bad that my Aunt Judy painted me a yard gnome (that looks like one of the 7 dwarfs) and planted it at my doorway. He became my guard gnome. He was good at his job, because the fears diminished. I was still a paranoid little girl, but it was much more manageable (right, mom?)

So tonight Natalie was very fearful that these alligators had gotten under her bed, and she didn't like her closet door open, and she just simply didn't like her room. So I snuggled her and we talked about it, and she finally said I could leave (close my door real hard, mom.)

I was one paragraph in to writing tonight's post when my sobbing daughter wandered back upstairs (I just can't sleep down there tonight, mom!) So she is curled up happily in her mom and dad's bed (someplace I was forbidden as a child, but a haven for my children for early morning snuggling or late night nightmare consoling).

I still have my guard gnome, in fact he is about 2 feet away from me right now. I think he's moving to Natalie's room tomorrow. Time to come out of retirement!

Ugh. Having a girl is SO much more. More drama. More tears. More talking. More.