When No One is Watching

When Isaiah & I got home tonight from his Nana & Papa's house, he was still very sleepy (after taking a nap during the long ride home).  So I put him down in his crib.  I patted his back and rubbed his head and sang to him.  Usually when I do this for awhile, he will relax, I can walk away, and he will go to sleep.  Tonight if I stopped touching him or singing, he wailed.  The tired tormented kind of wails.  I knew he would go to sleep eventually, but I didn't want to leave him.  So while his head was turned the other way, I stopped mommying him and ducked down onto the floor next to his crib.  I listened to his cries as they got lighter.  Then I pulled up a little portion of his bumper and peeked inside.  He was so cute.  He cried a little then sniffled then cried.  Every once in awhile he would open his eyes & then close them again.  What an amazing thing to be able to sneak a glimpse into his world without his knowing...  Everyone is different when no one is watching.  Even babies. 

Sixteen Days

I think I shafted a part of the mothering process in my last post.  I talked about losing sleep, but I don’t think I gave this difficult part justice.  Because the next few days after that post were much worse.  I guess it wasn’t really the sleep deprivation.  It was just everything.

Isaiah cried much more after we got him circumcised.  Understandably, poor little thing!  So I was sad every time I changed his diaper.  And afterwards.  And before. 

Marcus worked that night, and he always works really late, getting home around 2am.  And the next night for some reason he decided he would go have some drinks with his work friends & again came home after 2am.  Right after I talked about how helpful he had been!  And then the next night he took his 5 year old to his parents’ house so he could go fishing with them the next day, and he ended up staying the night.  The days weren’t difficult because my mom was there.  But three nights in a row, I was by myself with his painful incessant cries.  When I tried to talk to Marcus about it, he said he understood but acted annoyed that I was talking.  I realize that it only felt worse because these three events just happened to occur back to back.  But it still felt like I was being abandoned.

I was exhausted and sad.  I don’t remember anyone talking about how difficult the first few weeks were.  Maybe they told me, and I didn’t listen?  I called my sister to see how things were for her.  They were a blur, she said.  She remembers crying a lot, dreading falling asleep, knowing she would be woken up in the middle of the night to feed him.  She remembers being mean to my mom, who was there to help her too; she refused to accept her help.  But she assured me that it gets better.  Maybe it was a blur to her because afterwards it was so rewarding. 

For me, it did immediately begin getting better. 

Marcus, Isaiah, his big brother, and I went to brunch Sunday, an old tradition with an old friend that was in town.  And lots of old friends came to see her off & to meet Isaiah.  It was the first time I fixed my hair & put on makeup since before the birth.  It felt good to be out, to see everyone, to be surrounded by loved ones.  I was really nervous about the possibility of having to breastfeed in public, but he slept the whole time! 

We didn’t have any events this week, so Marcus was around mostly during the day.  That helped.  I guess I’m okay when I feel like we’re doing this together. 

My friend Trisha let us borrow The Happiest Baby on the Block, and that has helped significantly at times.  He has healed from the circumcision, so it seems like there is less crying.  And also, I bought a sling.  I am sooo far away from being able to use it properly, but Isaiah & I already love it.  He falls asleep almost immediately after getting in, and I love that he is close to me.  I can feel him breathing as I type now.