Babies are a lot of work. Naively, I thought that since babies generally sleep for about 16 hours a day that I would actually have time to do non-baby related things while staying at home with Carson. It hasn't worked out that way at all. If I find time to do a load of laundry and take a shower before Chris gets home from work I call it a productive day!
Having a caring, supportive husband is a life-saver! I don't know how anyone could do this on their own. Chris has been wonderful and often takes on the worst of Carson's fussy times (which horribly for Chris starts about the time when he gets home from work and continues until Carson falls alseep around 9pm).
Never wake a sleeping baby! Babies have only 5 states: sleeping, eating, pooping, crying and happy. At least so far, Carson spends most of day sleeping and eating, followed closely by fussy. While I cherish the moments when Carson is happy and content...these moments are short lived. Sleeping baby means quiet baby and just maybe I can catch some ZZZZs too! One of the hardest part of my day comes when Carson falls alseep in my arms. I am faced with a VERY difficult decision: do I let him continue to sleep in my arms or do I attempt the sleeping baby arm to bed transfer. It's an extremely tricky maneuver that if executed correctly has the awesome benefit of giving me time to nap, catch up on a few household chores, or dare I say it, use the bathroom?! But if I fail and Carson wakes up when I attempt the transfer, instead of having quiet sleeping baby there is good chance I will be left with fussy Carson who may or may not go back to sleep again. Which brings me to my next lesson...
10 minutes naps are totally worth it!
A gassy baby is not a happy baby. There are apparently many foods that I eat that can give Carson gas. I no longer eat broccoli (or garlic, onion, cabbage or anything too spicy). Trust me it's just not worth it.
Diapers aren't as bad as I thought...at least not yet. Okay those first few meconium diapers sucked, but one of the few advantages of having a C-section was that Chris took care of all the non-feeding baby care tasks at the hospital, so those black tarry diapers were all his! There are a lot of diapers 8-15 diaper changes a day, but they aren't as stinky or gross as I had thought they would be.
Breastfeeding hurts. And it takes forever. Okay not forever, but Carson insists on eating every 2 hours and it takes a good 30 minutes to feed him, which means I have a baby attached to me 6 hours a day! That's a part time job just on it's own! I had no idea. It also means that absolutely best case scenario I only get 1.5 hours of sleep at any given time (and it's usually less because with every feeding there is at least one diaper change and there's that little thing of getting him to fall back asleep).
It's hard to type with a baby in your arms. Checking email and surfing is do-able, but posting to my blog or responding to an email is nearly impossible.
And the first time Carson looked up at me and smiled...it made it all worth while.
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The sleep thing, it does get better, but then it shifts back to very little again. Sarah still does all the feeding at night, except for the rare time I am warming up some pumped milk (that hasn't happened for quite some time now).
I feel for both of you (you and my wife). I sleep through most of the feedings and yet I still feel like I haven't gotten any sleep and I walk into work like a zombie.
Sarah took 12 weeks off, but after that she was back to school teaching 8th graders English after being up all night. I don't know how she did it. Fortunately she is off for the summer now, but again, he is wanting to eat every 2 hours after sleeping for 4-6 at a stretch for a few months.
Women are amazing creatures.
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