I'm getting two kinds of help today. One is practical and the other theoretical and while I am enjoying the former right now, I hope the latter will bear fruit...
As I write, my friend Paula who is 22 weeks pregnant has taken Hugo for a walk giving me a little bit of time off. It's a wonderful gesture and I only wish I knew how to make the most of this precious hour. I should nap but instead, all I want to do is tidy up the house. As a compromise, I decided to write a blog entry. My rule for 'me-time' being that I should at least use this time to do something that is just too hard to do when Hugo is awake but I find that with an imminent return, I am not able to switch off enough to sleep. Still, I am putting the laundry, cooking and folding on hold and enjoying this moment.
The other help I sought out today was through a phone conversation with a nurse from Tresillian, an Australian association which specialises in baby sleep. Amongst other things, they run sleep clinics where mothers and babies can come to learn how to sleep. Some parents who are in favour of 'gentle' parenting find them a little hard lined but it doesn't hurt to hear what they have to say.
The reason I called was because for the last few days, Hugo has been waking up only once during the night but unfortunately, he then stays awake for as long as two hours and rarely less than one and a half hours. At 2am, this is quite difficult to cope with. The nurse made some suggestions which we will try and follow although they will no doubt involve quite a bit of crying... We'll try and give it a good week and if we see no improvements, we'll have to assume we need to go down a different route or try again in a few weeks. She also made some recommendations to make nap time a little easier on all of us. We shall see...
And just for fun, I am adding this series of photos for the sole reason that they are adorable.
As I write, my friend Paula who is 22 weeks pregnant has taken Hugo for a walk giving me a little bit of time off. It's a wonderful gesture and I only wish I knew how to make the most of this precious hour. I should nap but instead, all I want to do is tidy up the house. As a compromise, I decided to write a blog entry. My rule for 'me-time' being that I should at least use this time to do something that is just too hard to do when Hugo is awake but I find that with an imminent return, I am not able to switch off enough to sleep. Still, I am putting the laundry, cooking and folding on hold and enjoying this moment.
The other help I sought out today was through a phone conversation with a nurse from Tresillian, an Australian association which specialises in baby sleep. Amongst other things, they run sleep clinics where mothers and babies can come to learn how to sleep. Some parents who are in favour of 'gentle' parenting find them a little hard lined but it doesn't hurt to hear what they have to say.
The reason I called was because for the last few days, Hugo has been waking up only once during the night but unfortunately, he then stays awake for as long as two hours and rarely less than one and a half hours. At 2am, this is quite difficult to cope with. The nurse made some suggestions which we will try and follow although they will no doubt involve quite a bit of crying... We'll try and give it a good week and if we see no improvements, we'll have to assume we need to go down a different route or try again in a few weeks. She also made some recommendations to make nap time a little easier on all of us. We shall see...
And just for fun, I am adding this series of photos for the sole reason that they are adorable.
These hands and feet were made for swimming! Look who inherited his Dad's built-in flippers. Of course it's still too soon for Hugo to come home exhausted from a day of athletics but if we play your "fast forward" game for a second, just imagine your despair 15 years from now when he's still asleep at noon!
ReplyDeleteJokes aside, I commend your efforts to research and implement a variety of strategies. You'll get through this, we all do, but I still advise even brief "power naps" to avoid walking into walls. Until then, I know how very grateful you are for help from your "village" both tangible and cyber.