"My daughter, the cuddliest sleep thief in the world".

The first glimmer of consciousness is sweat. From the base of my neck down the length of my back I am soaked.

I am uncomfortable and hot. In a groggy, growing awareness I realise that my perfect sleep has been interrupted. And for some reason I am pushed up against the edge of my bed hanging on with the grim determination of a mountain goat.

Then I hear it. The unmistakeable soft snuffling, right behind my left ear, of my five-year-old daughter, Georgia, as she dreams the dreams that only those in the most contented deepest slumber can dream.

Clinging to the bed I am now fully alert. I lie there and listen.

This most gentle of sounds accompanied by a warm rhythmic breath reeks of injustice. I look at my watch. It is twenty past two. How is it that Georgia is in a state of unbridled bliss in our bed yet I am wide awake?

Because Georgia is a sleep thief.

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But should I complain? For, it is coming back to me now.

Vaguely, I can remember a plaintive face looking at me, as Georgia stood by the side of the bed seeking entry earlier in the night. There may have been tears, the residue of a nightmare. I’m not really sure. There was certainly a quivering bottom lip.

Was I really intending to wake up properly, exert some discipline and accompany Georgia back to her bed? I think not.

Georgia had cast her spell, which has me totally in her control. Effortlessly, she entered the bed as she always does.

And now I am paying the price.

It is not always the case. Sometimes Georgia will gravitate to her mother and cling to her back like a spider-monkey. On occasions I have rolled over in the middle of the night, opened my eyes, and seen Georgia snoring as she literally uses Rachel’s face as a pillow.

When I see this I make a hasty retreat, moving away quickly and quietly, hoping that the discomfort and the sleep deprivation won’t come my way. It might not be very chivalrous but when sleep starts to be stolen, this becomes a brutal sport.

It is every man for himself.

On other nights, Georgia will kill both birds with one stone, spreading out like an expandable starfish, with a hand on Mum’s neck and a foot in my back.

But tonight there is no escape. I am the sole focus of her slumbering attention. It is my sleep, which is being pilfered.

Georgia’s robberies are not confined to her parents.

Walking to the loo in the wee hours, I have found Georgia sleeping in her seven-year-old brother’s bed, comfortably wrapped up in his doona and lying peacefully on his pillow, while Harvey is shivering down the end of the bed with his head on a discarded shirt and a leg hanging off the edge in mid-air.

Two nights later she’ll be in her ten-year-old sister’s bed snuggled up against her back while Bella is pressed against the wall with the jarring discomfort of a commuter in a peak hour train.

The night bandit is terrorising the entire top floor of the house.

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I think about her nocturnal decision point: that moment when she has woken in her own bed, risen to her feet and makes the call that will determine which member of her family will wake the next morning with bleary eyes and a sore head.

What thought process is involved? How does she pick her prey? Because from the point of view of the rest of us it feels so random as to whether we are allowed to sleep or not.

Make no mistake, this is a real issue.

Through the centuries sleep disruption techniques have been stock in trade for the practitioners of the dark arts of making people talk. And right now there is a collective sense in our family that we have a little torturer in our midst.

I have survived Georgia’s three older siblings before her, all of whom have entered the bed to a greater or lesser degree. I understand that sleepless nights are central to parenthood and I’ve had more than I can count. But in my nineteenth year as a parent, I really thought that this was a phase that should have ended.

Then I roll over and gently push her across the bed to create some room.

And in the dim light I look at her cherubic hair and her happy face, and suddenly I feel very lucky. Putting my arm around her I resettle, and drift off to sleep, comfortable in the knowledge that while Georgia is certainly a sleep thief, she is most surely the cuddliest sleep thief in the world