Before I Was a Mum…

I got one of those lovey dovey texts messages about being a mum the other day. Or rather, what life was like before one was a mum. It went something like this…

Before I was a mum…I never learned the words to a lullaby. I never thought about immunisations. I had complete control of my mind, my thoughts and my life. I slept all night. I never looked teary eyed. I never got gloriously happy over a simple grin. I never felt my heart break into a million pieces with both hurt and pride…

It went for a bit longer and was completely ahhh and mushy, filled with baby loveliness. It made me smile at first and well up, because…well, everything makes me well up at the moment. (I used to be hard as nails and it was rare I would cry. These days anything can set off the waterworks! I can cry on demand (I think. I haven’t tested it out yet)). Then it occurred to me that the text had missed out a fair few vital points. Granted, it’s probably because it is just a text message and has to be limited in characters. If it was an email, say, it’d probably carry on to include the following…

Before I was a mum…. (the unedited bits)

I never knew how to hold a baby. I used to make babies cry with my stiff nervous arms, frozen into a cradling position. I used to worry about things like “What if I can’t hold my own baby!!!”. Somehow though, you seemed to fit comfortably into my arms like a
Mummy / baby jigsaw and the curse of the “she makes babies cry” was been broken. I am a complete pro at holding other peoples babies now as well.

I never changed a nappy. Ever. The first time you poo’d after you were born was my first nappy change. And it was fine. I don’t regret not having changed a nappy till now though. Some things you’d easily pass onto someone else if you had the chance!

I never had to leap out of the shower mid shower and come running to you because I thought I heard you cry. Turns out you were sleeping so I had to reshampoo my hair because hair with unwashed shampoo in it feels a bit manky

I don’t think I ever used the words “poo” or “puke” as frequently as I do now.

I used to love shopping. In the sales, online, outlets… Anywhere. I still love it but it’s now all about you and I love it even more.

I hardly ever saw the doctor. Now they know me (and you) on first name terms.

It was all about me, myself and my holidays. Now it’s all about you, me and what holidays we can go on as a family. Still haven’t figured out where but we will. Yes we will. I am determined!

I still had sleepless nights but life back then was all about going out on a Friday night or watching movies till 3am. Now it’s meant to be about the night feeds and grabbing sleep where I can!

I hated sleeping face to face with anyone. Anyone! Now I love having naps with you in our bed, cuddling you, face to face, sometimes pretending to sleep so I can watch you watching me. I don’t do it often, honest.

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Tears, Tantrums and The Baby

The last couple of weeks have been slightly strange. Ok, not strange. More like, bloody exhausting. A fresh wave of sleepless nights is visiting our household which I think I owe to the lovely age of “teething” we now seem to have entered. Coupled with the transition of getting the baby to sleep in his cot rather than the (3rd borrowed) basket that he has now grown out of, it has been tiring to say the least. It felt like I had a new-born again and, unfortunately, unlike the first lot of sleepless nights which I got through probably just on sheer baby euphoria, on this second wave I felt like I was starting to lose my patience a bit and go bonkers. Slowly.

Baby boy is now 6 months old and doesn’t sleep through yet. I know this is normal for a lot of babies so I’m not really worried and have become used to 1- 2 wake ups a night. This particular wave of sleepless nights though seemed to come from the depths of sleepless nights hell and meant I was regularly waking up about 4 times a night to provide feeds, cuddles, transfers back to cot, waiting at base of cot, waiting outside baby’s bedroom door, more feeds, cuddles, and so forth.

After about day 3 of sleepless hell, the lack of sleep was causing me to become a grumpy, stomping stroppy 5 year old type mooching about the house, trying hard to hold onto lunch dates / inkling of a social life / seeing other adults before 6pm (when the OH gets home from work). In turn, my moods were swinging from utterly weepy to utterly uber shouty bitch. Of course all of which was being directed to the Dear Husband. (“What do you mean you’re going to football / Do you never think maybe *I* might want to have a social life too??”). The OHs reaction to all of this is usually stunned silence or “don’t cry, calm down”. I’m not sure anyones told him that the only response to that is “What?! Am I not calm!??.  I am calm! Dont tell me to calm down..!!” etc.  On one particularly bad day, post bad night, I was meant to drive to a friend’s house about 15 minutes away and all I could think about was how tired I was.  So after some huffing and puffing I eventually wailed that I was “sooo tired!”

OH: “Why don’t you have a nap then?”

Me: “Because I want to go oooout!”

OH: “Oh, I thought you were tired?”

Me: “I want to do boooooth!”

OH “Shall I drive you?”

Me: “Nooo, its meant to be a girlie day”….[Insert more weepy whining here]

(Yes, there is something about lack of sleep that brings out the whining a bit extremely).

After about Day 8 of sleepless nights hell, the “teething” pain seemed to subside without any kind of visible result. Although i’ve realised that most unknown pains or cause for crankiness are now always classed as “must be teething”. This week Baby Boy is also taking to the cot which is a massive relief.  Not sure where we would have found yet another basket for him to sleep in that was actually big enough and wide enough for his little river-dance-in-his-sleep legs.  We back to the “normal” amount of wake ups a night. This week we (umm.. *I*) have had no tantrums. So far. But its Thursday already. That’s definitely good!

Long live 1 – 2 wake ups a night (for now. Sleeping through is very good too. Just for info).

What Happened Last Night

Last night was a bad night for baby. He had spent the evening throwing up owing to a nice little bug that’s going around. It then took till 9pm to settle him down completely. I dropped into bed by 11pm, tired, hoping we would both have a good night.

What happened next was a bit of a blur, but it goes something like this…

Baby was completely unsettled most of the night and crying on and off. I decided to cradle him in my arms and sleep sitting up. I’d just about dropped off when the OH started sleep talking.

“Let go of my arm.” I ignored it. He sleep talks quite a lot and I’ve learned to filter it out, whilst keeping an ear open for any funny bits. Tonight wasn’t funny and so I ignored it and tried to settle to back to sleep again.

He repeated it, this time tugging at me. He’s also done this before too. Ignoring him again I carried on trying to sleep.

“Let go. Wake up!” Tugging harder now he suddenly shook me out of sleep. I sat up in bed puzzled. I looked over to the basket where baby had been sound asleep all this time. It dawned on me I’d been dreaming but hugging the OHs arm tighter and tighter thinking it was the baby.

I think I need some proper sleep.