15 Weeks Pt. 2

Right now I'm trying to figure out if I'll really be able to pull off at least one post a week like I did for my previous pregnancy. I think not...although I will try my best. Usually I'm so tired by the end of the night all I want to do is put my feet up and enjoy some quiet time before bed. And of course bedtime has changed. It used to be sometime between 11pm and 12am but not anymore. I'm usually in bed and asleep by 9:30 or 10pm.
Yes that's right. Early to bed and early to rise.
In my pre-baby world I though I could manage on 5 hours of sleep a night. And for the most part I did. In my post-baby world I value every single minute of shut eye. Playing, feeding, changing and traveling with a kid is tiring work.

As for my pregnancy, each day is getting better. My nausea is only present when I go more than 2 or 3 hours without eating. So food is constantly on my mind. I've also reached that point where I go from sort of hungry to starving in less than 2 minutes. And of course it's difficult to find healthy snacks while caring for Pauly but I'm sure I'll figure something out.

This week my lil' bean is about the size of an apple with legs that are now longer than the arms. Elbows and knees are able to move more freely and the eyebrows and scalp hair have begun to grow. The eyes can now sense light behind the eyelids even though they are still fused shut, and in a few weeks my lil' bean will be able to hear my voice.

Sleepless Night

Here I sit in front of my computer at 12:38 in the morning. Why? I haven't the slightest idea. For some reason I can't get to sleep. I've been tossing and turning for a few hours and finally gave up. I got out of bed and made my way downstairs. After checking my e-mail, facebook and reading the blogs I follow I decided to write.

There will be nothing of importance in this post but I somehow think it will make me sleepy. Why? I haven't the slightest idea.

I know I'll be up with Pauly in 6 hours and I'm thinking that maybe it won't be so bad, but I know better. Even when I get a full 8 hours of sleep, getting up at 6:30am is soooo hard. I'm usually OK after 15 minutes but I would much rather sleep in to 9 or 10am.

I guess I should make my way back to bed. Hopefully my dear husband isn't snoring and I'll be asleep in 30 minutes of less.

Sigh...I'm also hungry. Maybe a quick bite to eat will help. But what can I have that doesn't involve dishes, heating or loud crunching? I guess I'll have to take a peek in the fridge.

Goodnight.

Winter Blues

It's winter. Blah. The snow has been piling up the last couple of weeks and although it's pretty to look at, I'm waiting impatiently for warmer weather. My in-laws and neighbour, both had the right idea. Mexico. I would have loved to be where it's sunny and warm. Just the thought of a double digit forecast above 0 makes me smile. Oh, well. For now I'll just have to keep the toques and gloves at hand.

On a happier note, Pauly's night wakings have become almost non-existant. After trying everything else, I broke down and tried the Ferber method...sort of. After our night time routine, Pauly usually falls asleep at the breast or sometimes with a bottle. And he always wakes up a little when I put him in his crib but he never had a problem falling asleep. He just didn't want to say sleeping. Well after a rather cranky and frustrating day, and weeks of being sleep deprived, I through in the towel. The fist time he woke up that night, I let him cry for about 2 minutes. Then I put the pacifier back in his mouth and patted him bum until he got quiet again. About 2 minutes after I left his room he started crying again. This time I left him for 5 minutes. Then 10 minutes. At 15 minutes his crying wasn't continuous anymore. He would cry for 5 minutes and then be quiet for 1 or 2 minutes. After 20 minutes of this, he was asleep. And he stayed sleeping for the rest of the night!! The next 4 or 5 days were like heaven to me. Pauly slept all night and I rested peacefully. Then, like everything else, he decides to switch things around. Not for the worse though.

As of today, Pauly sleeps about 10.5 hours a night and wakes up once but rarely twice a night. I let him cry and fuss for about 5-10 minutes and without intervention, he is sleeping again. His daytime routine hasn't changed either. He still clings to me like glue...until daddy wakes up.

What The Heck Is Happening??

I've always been told I was lucky to have a son who started sleeping through the night at 4 weeks old. First it was 5 hours and by the time he was 2 months old, he'd made his snooze last 10 hours. Of course there were the odd nights where he would give me a hard time falling asleep or staying asleep, but they were so few and far between that it wasn't worth mentioning. I think my good luck has just run out. For the last week Paul has been waking up twice a night, like clockwork.
He goes to bed at 9pm.
Wakes up at 12am.
Goes back to sleep at 12:15am.
Wakes up at 4am.
Doesn't want to go back to sleep.
Mommy struggles to either stay awake or rock him to sleep.
Finally at 7am we're up for the day.
He's still napping at 10am and 2pm...or should I say we're napping but, it's just not fair.
I'm soooo tired.
And so over the course of the week, I've been trying different things in order to get Paul sleeping through the night again.

1. Warm up the room a little.
It's getting a little colder at night so I decided to turn the heater on in his room and warm it up by 2 degrees.
It didn't work.

2. Shut off the night light.
I thought that maybe if it was dark in his room, he might fall back asleep.
It didn't work.

3. Put him to bed earlier.
I can't remember which expert said this but sometimes when you put a child to bed earlier, they'll sleep later.
It didn't work.

4. Keep him up later.
Maybe if he was so tired he couldn't stay awake he might sleep through the night.
It didn't work.

5. White Noise.
I turned on his sound machine really low so he could have some background noise while he slept.
It didn't work.

6. Finally...Give him 9oz of milk in a bottle right before bed.
Although Paul always had one last feeding before bed, I guess he would just fall asleep and use my nipple as a souther instead of filling his tummy.
He would even nurse when he woke up during the night but I must be too comfortable for him because it just put him to sleep.
Now he fills up and for the last two nights he hasn't woken up (keep your fingers crossed).

Yippy!!!

Now I don't know how long this will last, and I'm hoping this is just one of those growth spurts because I only have enough frozen milk to do this for 5 more nights. Of course I'm still pumping but, he can drink a bottle faster than I can fill it. So I guess I'm in for a surprise a week from now. Until then, I'm going to get as much shut eye as I can.