I am exhausted. My baby is 4 months, 1 week and 3 days old. He sleeps all day and “plays” all night. This has been my life since he was born. I can not even remember the last time I had a decent night’s sleep.
Things have actually improved as there was a time during his first two months where the playtime at night consisted mostly of screaming and screaming and more screaming. Now after sleeping from 3am until 11am, waking for a feed and sleeping again until 1pm for another feed. Followed by, you guessed it, more sleeping. Which roughly totals 10 hours sleep!! He will be awake from 3pm or 4pm. There might be a short nap until 6pm or 7pm. After that he’s awake until the next morning.
You might be wondering why I am writing about this. Well, recently a pregnant friend told me I did not adequately prepare her for the last trimester. Ha!! That’s my response to her and anyone that is expecting a baby or those with newborns.
Nothing and I mean absolutely nothing prepares you for pregnancy, labour and motherhood. Not even having gone through the process already. My eldest is 8 years old, but even that comes with its own set of expectations and experiences.
I mean here I expected him to sleep a few more hours, but I can hear him cooing from the room already. Not even the day before prepares you for today.
My best advice…enjoy every moment! Let go of your expectations of how things should be.
On the days I manage to follow this advice, I reach the end of the day a little saner and my family has experienced a better side of me.
I try to remember – through every diaper change, feeding and hour I’m not sleeping – that time is fleeting. That this too shall pass and that soon I am not going to be with him every second of every day. That I only have 61 days, 17 hours, 10 minutes and a few seconds left where it will just be the two of us.
Soon he will go to daycare and I will go back to work. Soon I will change my last diaper, give the last feed and we will start sleeping through. For some of these it might be days and for others months or even years before it is the last time, but eventually it will be the last time.
So for now, I am going to go change his diaper and feed him. Enjoying every sweet second with him, because I simply don’t know when it will be the last time we experience each of those moments.
I recently found this poem online and it perfectly describes this time of my life.
Originally posted on: https://marjohdaames.wordpress.com/2016/08/02/the-last-time/
Emjay's Musings 