{Originally published on Just Another Mama Blog}

We had a couple of rough nights around here. Two nights ago, Luke was tossing and turning and moaning with a high fever for much of the night. He came up to our bed and I didn’t sleep much. And last night, Henry came upstairs crying around midnight because of a leg ache. I ignored him for a while due to my exhaustion from the night before, but finally, I had to attend to his pain.

Two nights ago, when I was awake with Luke, my nighttime despair began to creep up on me. For a period of time when I was a child, I used to hate nighttime. I had an overactive sense of guilt and at night, I worried a lot. I dreaded nights. And more than anything, I hated spending nights away from my parents. I usually avoided these situations, but if that was impossible, I often spent the night nauseated and restless. While I eventually grew to love sleepovers by my teenage years, I still often struggled with waking in the night in a panic. Now, sleepless nights sometimes bring on a bit of this fear.

As I was feeling a little panic two nights ago with Luke, an airplane flew overhead, and at that moment, my worries abated. My maternal grandparents lived near an airport, and when I spent the night with them, the sound of the airplanes flying over me all night long helped to soothe my worries. Something about being tucked away in their little guest room under the rhythm of the jets overhead made me feel that the world was an orderly place.

And last night, as I fixed a heat pack for Henry’s leg, I was transported back to the days when my own mom fixed a hot water bottle for my own growing pains. In my memory, I am lying on the couch in the dim midnight light, knowing that relief will come, listening to the sound of the water running and running as it gets hot enough to fill the bottle. My mother’s calm, measured actions, performed so many times, took on that same soothing nighttime quality as the jets.

Part of growing up for me was learning to fear the night less, learning to let go of my strange and overactive senses of worry and guilt. It has taken me a long time to learn to be peaceful in the night. I have suffered many growing pains over the years, in my legs and in my heart, and always at night.

I wonder, in the dead of the night, what growing pains my children will face. Just as I have overcome some of mine, theirs are beginning. Just as certain aches of mine fade away, I help to soothe theirs. And I can’t know which of these things they will carry with them into the future, as memories, as part of the rhythm of their beings. I hope the moonlit shadows, the warmth of the heat pad, the murmers of comfort in our bed, are enough.

Editor’s pick by Amy Turn Sharp of Doobleh-vay: I love Ser’s blog. She is a smart mama living in Ohio that I love. She has been published in Literary Mama and will make you wish for a childhood like she had! Please visit her blog today!