Those Were The Days

I am proud to say that I am learning to survive Baby A's random awakening sometime during the night. Even though it sucks harder than a Dyson vacuum cleaner. To all of you mamas who have been getting up in the night with babies constantly since birth, kudos, well done, you are my hero. I however, have been spoiled.

When Audrey first began sleeping through the night at around 3 months I thought it must be some kind of cruel joke she was playing on me. That I would become used to it for like, a week, and then she'd be back to getting up every two hours. Then I decided my darling baby was trying to make it up to me for putting me through hell and plunging me into what I call “middle ground” postpartum depression. Eventually I began to take it for granted. Yeah, she sleeps through the night, whatever.

Now the nights that she gets up out number the nights she sleeps through. I am back to waking up some mornings saying “Wow, she didn't get up last night.” When she does get up it nearly kills me. The following morning Peter will get up and get ready for work and I will barely hear him. This is unusual. Normally I hear him and then I can't sleep anymore whether I want to or not. Napping is not really something I am interested in unless I seriously can't function or I am sick.

Not that there needs to be a reason for her sudden bout of night waking but I think it may be due to either her teeth or a need to poop. She has been having a little trouble with constipation in the past couple of weeks. I'm not sure why. The last time she had a particularly bad night she finally had a poop the next day (with great difficulty). I guess things must have been working their way through her system and causing her discomfort. Those times when she wakes up it just seems to comfort her when I am with her.

Realizing how crappy I feel with the small amount of sleep lost these days it's no wonder I felt like I was losing my mind after she was born. I cannot cope. I was literally a different person. A person that I didn't like very much. I was miserable and I was a nasty wife and a cranky mother. I think your body does adjust somewhat over time. I did marvel at how I could function at all having so little rest. The trouble I'm having now is that my body is not used to this. Sometimes I get a full night's sleep sometimes I get up at 1:30am sometimes 4:00am. It throws me off and then sometimes the problem is compounded by the fact that after I get her back to bed, I am wide awake. I start stressing about stuff or just thinking about something and I can't shut my mind up. I have made weak attempts at relaxation exercises. I lay there and concentrate on relaxing my feet then my calves then my knees, etc. Sometimes it works. Usually it doesn't.

I'm hoping that this is not a new trend. That she will again be the wonderful sleeper she once was. That I won't have to watch the infomercial about "The Greatest Vitamin in the World" But judging by how hilarious she finds it to be when I yawn I think I'm in for a lot more nights of interrupted sleep.