Tuesday and Wednesday nights were fine too; both nights I turned off my phone around 30 minutes before I’d planned to crash for the night and that seemed to help. It’s not that I’m such a major phone person but incoming calls and texts are a distraction.

Thursday night didn’t work at all and that’s when I realized that every “rule” needs an exception. I went out to eat with friends one of whom had come in from overseas so it was pretty much unavoidable. We didn’t leave the restaurant until 11 p.m. so I was already late and then we got into philosophical arguments on the corner of 48th Street and 12th Avenue until after midnight. We covered Satmar versus litvish hashkafos censorship girls learning Gemara and the Mishpacha rabbinical board. I didn’t get home and into bed till almost 1 a.m. got a little over four hours of sleep and crashed Friday night.

Week 2
This was the week when I realized that Life takes over whatever good intentions I might have. Literally each night I had an airtight excuse: A friend’s wedding one night going out to eat (again) with a friend who’d come in from England another night — someone had to show off Brooklyn’s dining scene right? I went to sleep early on Friday night only and that was just because I could barely keep my eyes open by the time the meal was over.

Week 3
At the turn of the century during the Boer War in England a huge percentage of the men eligible for the army draft were turned down because of overt nutritional deficiencies and their resulting stunted growth. The English government’s solution? To lower the minimum height requirement from five foot three to five feet.

Taking a leaf from their book I lowered my standards. I saw that a 10:15 bedtime wasn’t really working so for week three I postponed my bedtime goal to 10:45. That seemed to help. (Excerpted from Family First Issue 562)