A primer in sleep deprivation, or how to drive yourself into the ground
A couple of weeks is all it takes, and you too can drive yourself into an early grave. Be prepared to stay up late, get up multiple times in the middle of the night, and be woken up at the crack of dawn. Can you tell me which of these things does not belong: motherhood, bonding, caring, sleeping. Ding, ding, ding: if you answered "sleeping", you've won! Even though all the books warn you that sleep becomes a thing of the past when you become a parent, it's hard to believe until you experience it first hand. Far from sleeping through the night on a regular basis, our daughter really put her mama through the ringer last week.
Getting up earlier than her usual 7:00 am wake up time wasn't the worst of it. Having no interest in nap time, morning or afternoon, wasn't the worst of it. In fact, even fighting bed time at night wasn't the worst of it. Just imagine yourself crawling into bed at 11:30 to catch a little shut eye. Kind of a bedtime fairy tale for moms, thinking that you might actually get a couple hours of sleep before duty calls. Luckily, reality is there to wake you up and remind you better. Mothers don't get to sleep. Not really. Only in their dreams (ha, ha, ha).
Pursuant to some unwritten but eternal code of babies, tonight is the night that we decide to get back up at 12:30. Quick, up again at 1:30. Replay the entire scenario at 2:30. Scene 1, act 1, take 4: let's try one more time at 3:30 (a.m. by the way, these are all a.m. times, which, in case no one ever told you, really stands for annoy mom). Thank goodness four takes was enough, cause mama was just about to go stab herself in the eyeball with something rusty. Ultimately, the wee one finally did sleep from about 4:00 to 7:00. Very difficult to function on just 3 hours of sleep. When you're an adult, that is; apparently babies are very highly functional on just 3 hours of sleep.
Xmas list for mama: comfy pajamas, clean crisp sheets, relaxing lavender lotion, soothing music, and a new pillow. You just wait till you have kids, then you'll know; ONLY then do you REALLY know. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Getting up earlier than her usual 7:00 am wake up time wasn't the worst of it. Having no interest in nap time, morning or afternoon, wasn't the worst of it. In fact, even fighting bed time at night wasn't the worst of it. Just imagine yourself crawling into bed at 11:30 to catch a little shut eye. Kind of a bedtime fairy tale for moms, thinking that you might actually get a couple hours of sleep before duty calls. Luckily, reality is there to wake you up and remind you better. Mothers don't get to sleep. Not really. Only in their dreams (ha, ha, ha).
Pursuant to some unwritten but eternal code of babies, tonight is the night that we decide to get back up at 12:30. Quick, up again at 1:30. Replay the entire scenario at 2:30. Scene 1, act 1, take 4: let's try one more time at 3:30 (a.m. by the way, these are all a.m. times, which, in case no one ever told you, really stands for annoy mom). Thank goodness four takes was enough, cause mama was just about to go stab herself in the eyeball with something rusty. Ultimately, the wee one finally did sleep from about 4:00 to 7:00. Very difficult to function on just 3 hours of sleep. When you're an adult, that is; apparently babies are very highly functional on just 3 hours of sleep.
Xmas list for mama: comfy pajamas, clean crisp sheets, relaxing lavender lotion, soothing music, and a new pillow. You just wait till you have kids, then you'll know; ONLY then do you REALLY know. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
posted by Tacey at
10:15 PM
1 Comments:
Ohhh. I so remember without fondness the weeks on end when I would see every hour hour of the night. Every night. Every. Night. And I'm so very pleased now that my precious lovey sleeps sounding through the night. Even though it took more than a year. More. Than. One. Year. Ugh.
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Anonymous, at 4/05/2005 7:49 PM
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