Be consistent. Be exhausted. Be rewarded.

There are a gazillion books on parenting with conflicting ideas, points of view, suggestions, and styles, and as parents, it is up to us to choose which one fits our values, beliefs, and physical and mental ability to comply. Co-sleep/don't co-sleep, let cry/don't let cry, spank/don't spank, let siblings fight/don't let them fight, potty train by age 2/potty train when they are ready, eat only organic/fine, eat some Cheetos ever now and then. Sheesh! If there were ever an area of life to which the widely known saying 'more than one way to skin a cat' is applicable, it would be to the daunting, yet ever so critical role of parenting.

However, there is one area in which all books actually agree. Across the board, they will all say that 'consistency' is key. It is crucial. It is do or die. Not one book that I've read, and trust me, my library of this child psychology/parenting stuff is cluttering my existence these days, but not a single one says, "whatever you do, don't do it consistently."

Well, duh. You would think, right? Once it is no longer broken, why re-fix it? Well, because we are exhausted, overwhelmed, mentally and physically drained parents and sometimes our kids just simply have more energy than we do. Simple enough. But unfortunately, no one wins that battle.

My husband and I have struggled to get a bedtime routine that works for years. We have fours kids of varying ages, which definitely deepens the cavern of nighttime despair, but we still slave away at a strategy that will finally be 'the one'. I've read many sleep books that vary in beliefs, from Three in a Bed to Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child to much harsher 'let them cry' philosophies. I am not sure how many times we have had a fairly successful evening at bedtime and as we plopped into bed, not even up to brushing our own teeth, and said, "Okay, that worked. Let's stick to that." But then the next night, something comes up, and one kid is on strike to brush teeth or put on pajamas, or they want juice, or water, or to build a fort, or show us their new gymnastics move that we have to see right that minute, and by the time we say 'no' a million times, it's late, we're tired, and we totally shift the routine so we can 'just survive' the night. Then we decide we are tired of being tired so just forget it, let the kid rule the dang household for all we care!

Well, it always backfires, and we'll have to wade through a few nights of deep waters until we find the shallow end again, but then we flop onto the bed, barely able to move our limbs, and say, "Okay, this time, really, we are sticking to it." Urch! Not so fast. If there is one thing we are good at, it is that we are consistent at being inconsistent.

I wish inconsistency was the 'new black', but it's out and has been forever as far as child-rearing is concerned. There is around-the-world agreement that kids thrive on routine and boundaries. And when raised with both of these, they have the best chance of turning out to be responsible, compentent adults.

So, we continue to work hard each day to keep as much routine as possible to their well, routines. And we're totally spent, tired, exhausted, bleary-eyed parents. But one day, maybe when we're 90, we'll rest easy. Just maybe if we can continue to just give our best effort at consistency, not even perfection, just effort, then maybe even as soon as 20 years from now, we can sit back and enjoy that foreign concept called 'relaxing', and reap the rewards of our exhausting hard work.