My Life of Leisure
Did you know that when you have a newborn you get to sleep until noon? It's true. I can also eat whatever I want, and nap every few hours, and sit on the couch most of the time. Of course, this leisurely lifestyle comes with a few strings attached.
I slept til noon today. From 10:30 a.m. 'til noon, that is. But let's back up, oh, twelve hours or so. I tried to nap at 6:00 yesterday, but my loving husband came in from wiring the brake lights of a trailer to get me to stand out in the driveway and tell him whether all the lights were working when he turned on the blinkers. Yeah. He woke me up for that. Woke me up even though he knows we have a 2 week old and I'm sleeping when I can. I had just started to drift off when he barged in, too. When I finally got back into bed, I was too pissed off to sleep. Then at 6:30, Charlie woke up. So scratch the 6:00 p.m. cat nap.
From 6:30 to 8:30, I was feeding, bathing, and entertaining Charlie. At 8:30 he dozed off. I think I ate dinner. I'm sure I ate something at some point, but I can't remember what I ate or when. At 10:50, he woke up hungry. I fed him, changed him, etc., then put him back to bed around 11:30.
I went to bed. By the grace of God, Charlie slept until 4:00 a.m. That's the longest he's ever gone between feedings, and the longest stretch of sleep I've had in 16 days. When I got up to take care of him at 4:00, Tim was still up. He couldn't sleep. I'm thinking maybe it was KARMA for waking me up from my 6:00 nap! HA!
Tim wanted to feed Charlie this time, so I warmed up a bottle of breastmilk and gave it to him. Here's the deal, though. When you're breastfeeding, there are no breaks. Just because my husband is handling a feeding doesn't mean I'm off the hook. I still have two boobs full of milk, and that stuff's got to come out on a regular basis. So while Tim is feeding Charlie the milk I pumped earlier in the day, I'm sitting right there next to them, pumping what Charlie would be eating if I were the one handling the feeding. The only benefit to this is that it's quicker. He'll eat the same amount of breastmilk from a bottle in 15 minutes that it takes him about 30 to get from the breast, and I can pump the same amount out in about 10 minutes. This works out nicely for me, as long as I can finish pumping and get outta dodge before Tim finishes feeding Charlie the bottle, for after the bottle comes diaper changing time! As long as I can get out of sight before diaper time, Tim handles it, and I can go back to bed. He's not a very good swaddler, though, so I usually have to get back up after diaper time to reswaddle Charlie so he'll fall asleep. If he's not swaddled, his arms start flailing and he wakes up in a rage.
Okay, so back to the last 12 hours of my life of leisure. I pumped from 4:00 to about 4:20. My memory is foggy, but I think Tim handled the diaper changing and the swaddling, and I went back to bed. Or maybe I got up and swaddled him and put him to bed-- I can't remember. At some point I did get to bed, and I slept until 7:00 a.m., when Charlie woke up again. Man, this was a rough one. He was in the bassinet two feet from my head, and when he started making noise I sooooooo didn't want to wake up. I had to pry my eyelids apart and hold them open for a few minutes before my brain caught up with the cold reality.
Speaking of cold, IT WAS, but my little man was sweating in his onesie. He can sweat through a shirt quicker than his daddy. It's weird. Sometimes I let him sleep naked-- just in his diaper and swaddled in a light blanket, but it was cold last night, so I dressed him for bed. I guess he's better off naked.
Anyway, he got up at 7:00 a.m. He ate. He pooped. He peed. I changed him. I put him back to bed. He protested. I thought he was gassy, and I put him in bed with me and rubbed his belly for a while. He pooped again. I changed him again. He nodded off. I put him back to bed. He woke up again and started crying and grunting. I rubbed his belly some more. He then did the "rooting" thing where he tries to latch onto anything that sticks out a little. By this time, it was 9:30, so I fed him again. He finally fell back asleep around 10:00, and I followed soon thereafter. I slept until noon, and have been up since then. He stayed asleep until 2:00.
Since then we've had one feeding, which Tim handled because I was out in the driveway having a showdown with the carseat. I came inside just in time to hear Tim in the back room changing Charlie's diaper. I knew he was changing him because he was singing "Senor Poopy Pants" to him. All of a sudden, I heard a loud, wet...well, fart. An explosive one. And productive, too. Tim yelled, "Oohhhhh NNNnooooooo!" I started laughing, and got up to go help. I've been the victim of Charlie's mid-diaper-change-projectile-poop and it's really hard to contain once it gets started unless you've got an extra pair of hands. Just as I was getting up to go help, I heard Tim say, "Guess we'll be washing that blanket!" Then the fireworks started again. Every time we thought we had the disaster contained, Charlie did something else. We were pooped on multiple times, and he did the piss-across-the-room thing that little baby boys are so notorious for. We finally got him cleaned up and in a fresh diaper, and I got everything cleaned up. It must've taken 20 minutes.
Strangely, this was the best part of my day so far. How can you not laugh? Just when I get so exhausted that my sense of humor is starting to wear thin, Charlie blows mud all over his daddy and makes it allllll worthwhile!
After the diaper change from hell, Charlie was up for a couple of hours. During those two hours, his stomach was upset. He puked, which he's never done before. I don't know if I ate something that he didn't like or what, but he didn't have a fever and he seems to be better for now. Since he spewed up his 2:00 meal, he was hungry again at 3:30, so I fed him.
That brings us to now. I started this post at 1:09 and wrote it a little at a time, so if it's less than coherent, that's why. It's 4:05. I'm about to go take a shower and get dressed, though I'm not sure why.
I slept til noon today. From 10:30 a.m. 'til noon, that is. But let's back up, oh, twelve hours or so. I tried to nap at 6:00 yesterday, but my loving husband came in from wiring the brake lights of a trailer to get me to stand out in the driveway and tell him whether all the lights were working when he turned on the blinkers. Yeah. He woke me up for that. Woke me up even though he knows we have a 2 week old and I'm sleeping when I can. I had just started to drift off when he barged in, too. When I finally got back into bed, I was too pissed off to sleep. Then at 6:30, Charlie woke up. So scratch the 6:00 p.m. cat nap.
From 6:30 to 8:30, I was feeding, bathing, and entertaining Charlie. At 8:30 he dozed off. I think I ate dinner. I'm sure I ate something at some point, but I can't remember what I ate or when. At 10:50, he woke up hungry. I fed him, changed him, etc., then put him back to bed around 11:30.
I went to bed. By the grace of God, Charlie slept until 4:00 a.m. That's the longest he's ever gone between feedings, and the longest stretch of sleep I've had in 16 days. When I got up to take care of him at 4:00, Tim was still up. He couldn't sleep. I'm thinking maybe it was KARMA for waking me up from my 6:00 nap! HA!
Tim wanted to feed Charlie this time, so I warmed up a bottle of breastmilk and gave it to him. Here's the deal, though. When you're breastfeeding, there are no breaks. Just because my husband is handling a feeding doesn't mean I'm off the hook. I still have two boobs full of milk, and that stuff's got to come out on a regular basis. So while Tim is feeding Charlie the milk I pumped earlier in the day, I'm sitting right there next to them, pumping what Charlie would be eating if I were the one handling the feeding. The only benefit to this is that it's quicker. He'll eat the same amount of breastmilk from a bottle in 15 minutes that it takes him about 30 to get from the breast, and I can pump the same amount out in about 10 minutes. This works out nicely for me, as long as I can finish pumping and get outta dodge before Tim finishes feeding Charlie the bottle, for after the bottle comes diaper changing time! As long as I can get out of sight before diaper time, Tim handles it, and I can go back to bed. He's not a very good swaddler, though, so I usually have to get back up after diaper time to reswaddle Charlie so he'll fall asleep. If he's not swaddled, his arms start flailing and he wakes up in a rage.
Okay, so back to the last 12 hours of my life of leisure. I pumped from 4:00 to about 4:20. My memory is foggy, but I think Tim handled the diaper changing and the swaddling, and I went back to bed. Or maybe I got up and swaddled him and put him to bed-- I can't remember. At some point I did get to bed, and I slept until 7:00 a.m., when Charlie woke up again. Man, this was a rough one. He was in the bassinet two feet from my head, and when he started making noise I sooooooo didn't want to wake up. I had to pry my eyelids apart and hold them open for a few minutes before my brain caught up with the cold reality.
Speaking of cold, IT WAS, but my little man was sweating in his onesie. He can sweat through a shirt quicker than his daddy. It's weird. Sometimes I let him sleep naked-- just in his diaper and swaddled in a light blanket, but it was cold last night, so I dressed him for bed. I guess he's better off naked.
Anyway, he got up at 7:00 a.m. He ate. He pooped. He peed. I changed him. I put him back to bed. He protested. I thought he was gassy, and I put him in bed with me and rubbed his belly for a while. He pooped again. I changed him again. He nodded off. I put him back to bed. He woke up again and started crying and grunting. I rubbed his belly some more. He then did the "rooting" thing where he tries to latch onto anything that sticks out a little. By this time, it was 9:30, so I fed him again. He finally fell back asleep around 10:00, and I followed soon thereafter. I slept until noon, and have been up since then. He stayed asleep until 2:00.
Since then we've had one feeding, which Tim handled because I was out in the driveway having a showdown with the carseat. I came inside just in time to hear Tim in the back room changing Charlie's diaper. I knew he was changing him because he was singing "Senor Poopy Pants" to him. All of a sudden, I heard a loud, wet...well, fart. An explosive one. And productive, too. Tim yelled, "Oohhhhh NNNnooooooo!" I started laughing, and got up to go help. I've been the victim of Charlie's mid-diaper-change-projectile-poop and it's really hard to contain once it gets started unless you've got an extra pair of hands. Just as I was getting up to go help, I heard Tim say, "Guess we'll be washing that blanket!" Then the fireworks started again. Every time we thought we had the disaster contained, Charlie did something else. We were pooped on multiple times, and he did the piss-across-the-room thing that little baby boys are so notorious for. We finally got him cleaned up and in a fresh diaper, and I got everything cleaned up. It must've taken 20 minutes.
Strangely, this was the best part of my day so far. How can you not laugh? Just when I get so exhausted that my sense of humor is starting to wear thin, Charlie blows mud all over his daddy and makes it allllll worthwhile!
After the diaper change from hell, Charlie was up for a couple of hours. During those two hours, his stomach was upset. He puked, which he's never done before. I don't know if I ate something that he didn't like or what, but he didn't have a fever and he seems to be better for now. Since he spewed up his 2:00 meal, he was hungry again at 3:30, so I fed him.
That brings us to now. I started this post at 1:09 and wrote it a little at a time, so if it's less than coherent, that's why. It's 4:05. I'm about to go take a shower and get dressed, though I'm not sure why.
I'm not sure why, either. After all that, I'd just probably take my shower, and put on a fresh gown or pair of pajamas and that would have to do.
If I didn't fall asleep in the shower............
P.S. Way to go, Charlie! After all you did bringing him into the world, it's only fair he saves his best poopie for Daddy!
Posted by
Anonymous |
6:37 PM
With both my kids I followed the "3 squirts" rule. As in, after the first squirt, there's surely more to follow, so hold off on changing the diaper until the 3rd squirt sounds. Cannot tell you how many times we changed, changed, and then changed again before we learning this rule.
Hope you get some sleep!
Posted by
Anonymous |
9:58 PM
DY-- Yeah, but not getting dressed for days on end kinda gets depressing after a while. At least if I'm dressed, I feel like I'm still a member of the world of the living. If nothing else, I can answer the door if someone knocks. I agree that Charlie did a great job. If he was older I'd give him an ice cream cone for his pooping efforts.
Ellie-- Thanks for the advice. I remembered your 3 squirts rule this morning, and it saved me from getting another poop shower. He only did it twice, but still, at least I wasn't between his legs wiping poop away when he let the second one loose.
Posted by
Mommy Needs a Xanax |
10:55 AM