Once more with the sleeping problems

I realize that a birthday is essentially a pretty arbitrary date, but it's striking how closely Daisy's sleeping problems have paralleled her birthdays. She began a pattern of sleeping problems on the exact night of her first birthday. For some reason I am fuzzy on her two-year-old birthday, but I'll bet if I checked back through this blog, there was something around then. And now--after such a long stretch of good sleeping--here we go with brand new problems, right around her third birthday. We've been having some tough times. The other night she launched a shockingly bold rebellion against the whole concept of going to bed. She got out of her bed (we had been wondering why toddlers stay in their beds, and I guess it finally occurred to her that nothing was trapping her there, as in her crib days)--she was walking around the room and coming out into the living room, staunchly refusing to go back to bed. When we asked her why she didn't want to go to bed, we got crossed arms, a stubborn look, and the phrase, "Too bad!" This is what she says these days when she's letting us know it's a rebellion.

Then, last night bedtime went fine, but she was up three times in the middle of the night. I don't know what's going on. She doesn't seem afraid of the dark anymore, but I think she doesn't like the concept of being alone. I also think some part of it is experimentation with defying us. It's starting to be an issue that she doesn't want to be told what to do and wants to make her own decisions. That makes sense, and I remember hating to go to bed, too.

She's pretty sleep-deprived, though. She has been taking a nap for the last three hours, and she really needed it. I wonder what she has in store for us tonight!