When I don't get enough sleep, I am cranky, vulnerable to headaches, and my concentration is poor.

I am convinced that during bouts of insomnia, I have sometimes slept without knowing it.

I am always suspicious of those who impose 'rules' on child rearing. Every child is different in terms of temperament and learning, and every parent responds to a particular child, not some generalized infant or youngster.

I am a poor hater.

It is tempting to think of this form of insomnia, the inability to fall asleep, as a disease of agency and control: the inability to relinquish high self-reflexive consciousness for the vulnerable, ignorant regions of slumber in which we know not what we do.

There is no reason we should expect young children to enter the nocturnal darkness of sleep and dreams without help.