To give you a glimpse into life with Aaron..(Warning - this posting is long and tedious, but that is how my day went and I wrote this to vent my frustrations. I have since edited it down a bit.)
I fed Aaron just before 11pm last night, put him to sleep in his crib and headed for bed. I woke up around 3am to the sound of Aaron stirring. I got up, went down to his room, decided that he was definitely waking up and decided to feed him.
I took him out of his crib, unswaddled him and took him to the bathroom for a diaper change. I have found that changing his diaper after the feeding seems to make him to spit up more so I try to avoid it unless he soils his diaper during the feeding. I changed him quickly, before he could get too upset about the delay in being fed. I fed him and got him back to bed around 3:30am (which was unusually quick since sometimes I'm up over an hour during his late night feedings) and went back to my own bed where I slept soundly until about 5am.
For some reason, Aaron seems to have trouble sleeping after about 5am. Maybe it is because dawn is just starting to break and a faint amount of light is coming through the window shade. On the days he eats just before 5am, he has a hard time going back to bed. But this morning was one of the first times that he was sleeping when 5am approached and I had hoped he would sleep through until the next feeding. But he must have some kind of internal alarm clock set to 5am since almost on the dot, he started to fuss.
I turned off the monitor and went down the hall to his room. But Aaron was asleep. So I crawled into the guest bed and slept a bit more until Aaron woke up crying around 6am. I got him up, unswaddled him, changed his diaper, and fed him. Thom was up at this point, so I had some company and I considered staying up and having some coffee, but doing the math in my head, I realized I had maybe a total of 6 hours of sleep and I would regret not taking the opportunity to get a little more before Thom headed into work. So I went back to bed and slept for another hour. And it was a good thing I did.
When I got up, Thom was holding Aaron in the office, trying to get some work done from home. I stumbled into the kitchen, got a cup of coffee and made something to eat. When I was done, I took over while Thom went to grab a shower. Since Aaron was sleeping, I was able to start dinner in the crockpot. I was about half way done when Aaron woke up around 9am. I turned the crockpot on, planning to finish up after his feeding. During his feeding we said goodbye to Thom who headed off to work.
Now, since Aaron had been up a good chunk of the morning, I expected him to sleep between 9am and next feeding. Not so. He did let me put him down in his bouncy seat though (where he hangs out and sleeps during the day), so I was able to finish preparing dinner. Once I was done, I gave him some attention, still expecting that he would fall asleep shortly. After awhile, though, he started fussing and I had to pick him up.
Pretty much from about 10am until noon, I either held Aaron (who kept falling asleep in my arms) or I had him in the bouncy seat for no more than 15 minute intervals. While I was holding him, I got on the computer and browsed the web, reading other mother's blogs for entertainment.
I knew he'd be hungry again around noon, and since I was getting pretty hungry myself, I wanted to eat lunch before that. I put him down and started making something for lunch when he woke up again. Since it was almost noon, I decided to go ahead and feed him so I could eat lunch afterwards. Again, I figured since he had been awake so much, he would probably fall asleep after eating and I could finish making lunch and eat. Not so.
After feeding him, I put him back in his bouncy seat where he was awake, but content to look at his pictures and "talk" while I responded to him from the kitchen. I finished making lunch and sat next to him to eat so I could talk to him. This was OK for about a minute, but then he started to cry. So I picked him up, thinking I could eat one handed. But he wasn't content to sit still. He wanted me to walk around. So I left my lunch to get cold and walked him around, talking to him. He was still fussy, so I decided to change his diaper (which I had been trying to postpone until after I ate since at this point I was getting light-headed with hunger).
So I went to change him and he quieted down. He had a poopy diaper. With my left hand, I was attempting to hold his feet and cover his penis so he didn't pee on himself. With my right hand, I was trying to clean his bottom. As I was doing so, he started pooping some more. So I did my best to keep it from hitting the walls (not an uncommon event around here) or getting on his clothes. I heard a gurgly noise and looked down to see that he was spitting up, so I held his feet with my right hand (so he wouldn't kick them into his dirty diaper), grabbed the spit cloth with my left hand and wiped the spit up off his face. Then he gave me what looked a little like a smile (something he is still working out how to do) as if he saw the humor in it all. And of course I have to laugh at these moments because it is funny in a way.
Finally he finished expelling fluids from his various orifices and I resumed cleaning him up, only to discover that my attempts to save his jammies from being soiled have been in vain. I tried to position him on the disposable changing pad so that there was a clean spot beneath him so I could get a new diaper under him. Not an easy task by myself (which is why Thom and I usually do diaper changes together when we are both home). Once the new diaper was on, I removed his PJs and took him to the changing table in his room to put on a clean onesie.
OK. Now he was fed, had a clean diaper, clean clothes, surely he would sleep so I could eat my cold lunch. Not so. But this time, he was content to sit still in my arms so I could finish eating.
After lunch, he continued on about the same as he had in the morning - going down for a slightly longer stretch, then needing to be held (at which point he would fall back to sleep). Fortunately, my parents arrived shortly after 3pm and my mom took over holding Aaron so I could get his laundry in the wash and finish this blog entry.
Although most days Aaron sleeps longer stretches and isn't as fussy, this is not an atypical day. This gives you a pretty good idea of what our days are like. So when someone asks me if I "love being a mom", it is hard to answer. I love Aaron and I'm happy to be a mom, but I do look forward to easier, hopefully more predictable, days.
And then it will start all over with number two!
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