It Won't Be Like This For Long. Right?

Exhibit A. Loves to sleep...during the day. I want to confess, apologize and repent today. Especially to those whom I have ever given, tips, advice, pointers, etc. regarding the "right" way to get your baby sleeping thru the night consistently. My deepest apologies, I thought I knew what was best for you. Tristan slept 12 hours a night at 7 weeks and never looked back. What worked for me HAD to work for you, right? Here's the thing. I am humbled today. The Lord is humbling me. And I want you all to know it. I don't have it figured out. I don't just mean the sleep thing either, I mean the parenting thing in general. I don't have it figured out. I think the sleep thing is just a little glimpse of what I will not know a thing about in the future. I often feel blogs tend to present themselves in such a way that everyone has a perfect life. Or at least, I often perceive them to be that way. I hope none of you think I have it together all of the time, or even most of the time. Trust me, the Lord is teaching me daily that I have, in fact, not arrived.

My precious little darling mini-me, the laid back one. The polite one. The go-with-the-flow one. The sweet as pie one. The doesn't-sleep-thru-the-night-no-not-even-close-one. You are a stinker. Last night, I think I got about 3 combined hours of sleep. 3. The thing about REW is, she wakes up if her pacifier falls out...which is a lot. When she wakes, she goes back to sleep really easy most of the time, but man, she wakes up a lot! I would venture to say 5-6 times and one of those is to eat (still). There, I confessed it. I still nurse her to sleep at least once. When we were in NYC, we unswaddled her and let her sleep in a pack and play. She slept 8 hours straight! When we got home, we moved her to her own bed without a swaddle, and she happened to get a horrible cough the same night. It was OK, we were getting about 4 hours un-interrupted. Until last night. She was up. all. night. long. Now, sweet Brent, had a gashed out eye with fresh stitches (that is a whole nutha story) is getting up to put the paci back in the mouth. At 9:45, 11, 1, 2:15, 3, 5:45. And on top of that, Mug has 2 nightmares and needs to be "rocked" to sleep. Really? And in the midst of it all, I fed Reese at least twice somewhere in there. I wanted to go out in the backyard in the wee hours of the morning and scream at the top of my lungs. All of this is super magnified by the fact that I am already quite a bit sleep deprived. I do not function well on this amount of shanangans.

So, my dears, those of you who have all had children who never slept. Those who are in my position currently, I relate, I empathize, I understand and most importantly, I will no longer judge anyone else's choices! This morning the Lord kept reminding me that he makes us all special and different. He makes our little gifts that are children each to have their own little ways about them. And He went further to remind me that I am still a woman living in the flesh. A selfish one. I am worried about my sleep, my missing a workout, my schedule. Me, me, me. If this is the biggest problem I have, I seem to have it good right now. Some people would kill to have a non-sleeping baby to hold in the next room. Or to have a HEALTHY child wake up from a nightmare that actually ends. All I can do is pray that God would give me more wisdom, wisdom wisdom! Less of me and more of Him!!

Today I kept Mug home from school so he could catch up on much needed rest. I did things he really wanted to do. I sat and held my Nic Jr. and sang "Single Ladies" to her and she burst into laughter. I remembered why I chose to do this. It is harder to remember with as little sleep as I have had, but I remembered thru the fog! Brent called and said he heard the song "It won't be like this for long" (playing on my playlist) and to cherish the sleepless nights as much as we could. So, here's to many more of those to come....I am sure they will be plenty.