Sleeeeeeeep

Sleep.  I never knew that one word could mean so much to me.  It seems like all I ever do is think about or talk about sleep.  When you have a baby who does not nap, and whose sleep has been really inconsistent for the past 5 months, all of your thoughts and conversations are about one thing:  sleep.

You try talking to moms who have babies who are good sleepers and you are at a loss, no advice or suggestions will help you, you realize only one thing:  Your baby does not like to sleep and nothing you can do will change this.  It is both disheartening and kind of freeing when you finally realize it.  No matter what I do, my baby will either nap today or not, and there's nothing I can do about it.  And, that nap will either affect her sleep tonight or not, and there is nothing I can do about that either.

It has been 10 months since I've had a full night's sleep.  10 months.  I never knew how little sleep my body needed to actually function.  And, I am one of those people who loves sleep.  I mean, I love it, I go to bed early just to get it and I could laze around all day, and used to, if I had the chance.  I used to be a couch potato, for sure, and my favorite thing to do was nap in the afternoon, on the couch, and watch movies at night with the hubs.  I used to love cuddling with my dogs, watching crappy TV shows and just curling up under a blanket and lounging around.  But, having a baby allows absolutely no time for any of this and I've actually become a completely different person than I used to be, you will never catch me sitting down now, and if I have free time I'm up cleaning, doing laundry or putting toys away.  For reals, just ask my husband.  Being a mom changes you in many ways and one of the major changes I've gone through is my ability to relax - it doesn't exist anymore.

So, this lack of sleep has been ok with me for awhile now and my bod really didn't protest either.  It used to be that when I didn't sleep enough I could feel it in my body - something just wasn't right.  There were a couple of nights where I had to ask Ian to watch the monitor for me, all night, so that I could get some uninterrupted sleep, bringing the baby to me in bed to feed her so I could fall right back to sleep with her.  My mind was going bonkers during the "4 month wakeful period" and I needed some clarity for a bit.  But until recently, I have been pretty much ok.  In the past 10 months I have only gotten, at most, nearly 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep before either baby or my boobs have woken me up.  Now, it has started to get to me.  It's all I can think about - how can I get this baby to sleep better?  How can I get us all to sleep better?  Is it ever going to get better?  What does a full night's sleep even feel like?

As I type this, my eyelids and under eye area feel like they are made of sandpaper.  They are so dry, itchy and flaky and everything I've read online contributes it to lack of sleep.  I wake up itching my eye lids and have tried everything and nothing seems to work - vaseline, aquaphor, olive oil, etc.  I currently put a ton of vaseline on, then concealer and head to school, because they are bright red if I don't.  I think I just need a full night's sleep, sans baby, and without anything to do that night or next day.  Sleep, lounging around, and just making myself relax.  Is that what it is going to take now?  I guess so.

Lemon is happy all the time and loves being around people.  Despite her lack of sleep she never whines, hardly acts tired (although we can tell when she is) and will be dead tired, go right to sleep and pop back up after 30 minutes, not going back down and crying her eyes out for 30 minutes before we come and get her.  She also has her mom's willpower and will never give up, sometimes crying for two hours straight at night until she's inconsolable and we have to turn the lights on and distract her to get her to stop (so much for our CIO techniques).  She usually does alright at night, with one wake up between 12-3am, and goes right back to bed, most of the time.  But, during the day, sometimes we have two, 30 minute naps (that we have to fight for) and sometimes we have two, 1.5 hour naps.  It makes doing anything or planning anything really difficult because you never know when she will nap and when she won't and god forbid she falls asleep and we have to get her up - I hate that.  Never has Lemon fallen asleep somewhere other than on one of us (this hasn't happened in a couple of months) or in her crib, for us, and never has she slept longer than almost 2 hours.  Melissa has gotten some 2 hour naps out of her and she sleeps in a pack n play for both Melissa and my mom, and actually may do better in those because she can't pull herself up to stand.  But, in her crib, she spends most of her time standing, sitting, playing with her pacifiers or fish tank toy, standing and smacking the wall, throwing her pacifier over the edge of the crib or crying and looking at the door, waiting for us.  And this girl can cry.  She used to just whine herself to sleep but lately it is full blown tears and sometimes we can't stop it with all of our 10, 15, 20 minutes of leaving her and then going in and consoling her.    

And when she doesn't nap all I do is worry about her not napping and worrying that she's overtired, won't nap again when I try to put her down or will be tough to put down, and keep asleep, at night because of her no naps.  So sleep is always on my mind, not necessarily mine but hers.  Lately I have been thinking,  it has been 5 months of this and she has survived so why worry so much?  But it doesn't stop me, I'm her mom and that's my job.

It's a daily battle and some days we win and some days we lose.  She actually used to nap the best with us, at home, but now she naps the best with other people and her naps at home are pretty bad.  The nap I've come to care the most about is her late afternoon nap because it is the difference between a happy baby and a grumpy overtired baby.  We get home at 4pm to pick Lemon up and even if she's slept 30 minutes right before we get her, I'm happy, because my limited time with her won't be spent worrying and rushing to get her into bed some time between 6:30-7.  If we try to get her to nap when we get home, or in the car on the way, she won't because she's too excited to see us.  Those naps don't seem important during the day but they are extremely important to us as night - they make the difference between a nice, relaxing night with our muffin and an easy bedtime routine. 

No amount of advice or suggestions will help us at this point, when our little lady pops up after 30 minutes from a nap I know she's tired enough to take.  Sometimes when we leave her, it works and she goes back to sleep, sometimes it doesn't.  Sometimes it affects her going to bed at night and sometimes she is so overtired that she falls right to sleep.  It seems like we have tried/read/thought about everything, but nothing works and it is never consistent, no matter what we do.  It is so unpredictable and so nutty that I can't even wrap my head around it and just have to stop worrying about it.  Some babes just sleep, others don't, and some need more/longer naps than others - all babies, just like humans, are different.  I have met parents who have a baby like Lemon and parents who have a baby who can sleep anywhere at any time - our families are all different and it doesn't mean someone is doing something better than someone else.  That's the part that really gets to me (see my next post).

So, here are the thoughts of a mom who is constantly worried about her baby sleeping and whose own lack of sleep (and probably the worrying) is getting to her.  I write this because I know so many can relate and at this point think we should all support each other and commiserate.  Sometimes it makes you feel better just knowing others are in your same boat, and makes you feel less alone and better about your own situation, knowing you share it with others.

Like a mom "friend" on Instagram (hey Jules!) that I've never actually met wrote to me, "Let me row for you honey, we're in the same boat anyway."  I think of her comment often and that we should start rowing for each other as moms, supporting and encouraging as much as we can.  

  A lovely Vine video of our nap-scapade from this weekend.  She tricks us - she lays down for a bit, then pops back up crying again, does it at night too.  Drives me bananas!