In the last article called Welcome to the world Shanti Mae, I ended with “Next up, surviving the first week with a newborn!”
Ha. Ha. Ha. How cute I was thinking I’d have all the time in the world to describe (with pictures) the glory of having a new little human in our home. A small adorable creature that is solely dependent on us for every… single… thing except taking her every breath.
Here she is all bundled up (clearly thrilled) with Daddy ready to leave the birthing center and come home with us.
Well, a few weeks later I’m finally sitting down with one eye open, one hand typing (photo bellow is the current situation) and enough energy to throw together this post.
Let’s talk about Sleep (or lack there of) – a well known sacrifice of a new parent. Inexperience had me assuming it’d be the crying that would steal our precious Z’s, however that’s been the least of the causes!
Reasons that new parents look and live in zombie status for the first month:
Breastfeeding– I will start by saying I fully understand that this is a choice. I have chosen to exclusively breastfeed with no bottles to substitute in between. Yes, I pump for future needs or emergencies, but baby only gets the boob… for now. This means no matter what time of day, no matter how many hours or minutes I’ve closed my eyes, when it’s eatin time, I’m awake. For those of you that don’t know, most newborns eat about every 2-3 hours unless of course they’re cluster feeding in which they want to feed several sessions in that span of time.
Getting things done- They say “sleep when they sleep”. What!? You finally have both arms free! House chores, emails, hair clients, food prep, maybe even a shower! You haul tail to get as much done as possible before their sweet little eyes open again.
Time with your partner- I’m not even hinting about sexy time. I’m talking about Netflix, dinner at a table with utensils and plates, a game of cards… fill in the blank with what used to be so easy to do together. So when the baby finally sleeps and it’s you two alone, the last thing you want to do is sleep and miss out on an hour of connection. #Truth- we usually end up falling asleep no matter what we attempt to do.
Visitors– We’ve been so fortunate to be surrounded by friends and family that adore our little one. I’m aware not every person gets to experience this kind of affection and support and for this we are truly grateful. With that said, there hasn’t been a day (literally) since we got home that we didn’t have someone come over or “swing by”. Again, I LOVE the love and would rather have this than the latter, however it still requires our attention, aka to be awake.
Watching their chest move- So your chores are done, nobody is visiting, hubbies at work, baby is fed and sleeping and you’re thinking you can finally rest… so you think. You lay down with them in perfect site and close your eyes with the intention of sleeping. Jokes on you! There’s an involuntary maternal reflex that bounces your eyes open every 8-10 minutes to make sure they’re still bundled and breathing. So although you may be horizontal and not fully awake, you’re far from sleeping.
I’ll give you one guess on who’s getting all the sleep around here…
… with animated dreams included!
I’ll leave you with a short clip of Matts go-to way of calming her down. Oh how I love this man!
Her Happy Trails 