The sleep monster, junior + senior March 27, 2008

Unsurprisingly, Number One Son has been having sleep troubles. And, also not surprisingly for a newborn baby, he’s taken to crying as if it’s a national sport.

After spending 10 months in a nice, warm dark place with meals on tap, being rocked gently to sleep when one feels like it, I’m not surprised, really, but what I am is really fucking exhausted. Beyond exhausted, actually.

Number One Son has fooled us on a couple of occasions wherein he’s slept for five hours straight (five fucking hours! The luxury of it!).

But more often, nights follow this sequence:

11pm: feed Number One Son. Burp Number One Son thoroughly, knowing that if not burped thoroughly, Number One Son will wake up about 10 minutes after going to sleep. Get Number One Son to sleep.

2-3am: Number One Son awakes for night feeding. Repeat burping procedure. Gently nudge son towards sleep.

3.30am: Son awakes again. Repeat nudging procedure.

4.15am: Son awake. Repeat nudging procedure again, praying for divine intervention, or for social services to magically step in and work some sleeping mojo.

5am: Repeat.

5.45am: Feed son. Burp son. Nudge son towards sleep.

6.15am: Son, WHY ARE YOU AWAKE AGAIN?

And then it’s daylight and The Beloved is away to work and I am alone in the house with a son who will not sleep for any length of time but seems quite happy to cry non-stop until ten minutes before his father gets home.

Until yesterday we have been getting Nelson to sleep by comforting him on either of our chests, until we fall asleep. But according to every single expert this is dangerous practice that will come back to haunt us in times to come. Son needs to learn to fall asleep in his own bed, by himself.

So last night we read over ‘The Baby Whisperer’, by Tracey Hogg, in an effort to try and get this kid to sleep for more than 45 minutes at a time in his own bed, by himself.

Step one was to swaddle the kid, then do this shush-patting business, then stick the kid in bed, and continue to shush-pat as required, etc etc until kid falls asleep.

I thought we were on a winner, I really did. And we may yet be, but at the moment it feels like I’m out in some very cold and lonely wilderness with no map, no guides and no end in sight.

Son slept for about four hours (oh, thank goodness! I thought, rashly giving thanks for a decent block of sleep that SURELY was about to be followed up with another, thanks to this marvellous swaddling-shushing-patting procedure) then after feeding at 2.45am, awoke at 3.30am, 4.20am, 5am and 5.30am, by which time I was gritting my teeth with frustration and probably not behaving in a very soothing manner. Bless The Beloved, who took over and let me sleep from 6-7.30am. Wow. A whole, uninterrupted hour and a half.

“There you go,” he said, just before departing for work. “Son is in basket, relaxed but not sleepy.”

“Relaxed” lasted about two minutes after Number One Son heard his father leave the building, and has since made his displeasure known by yowling pretty much constantly.

Listening to your baby cry can be soul-destroying. Knowing that you’ve tried everything to get it to stop, and it doesn’t stop, makes you want to slit your wrists, but not before shouting “JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP!” at the kid, which is about as effective as yelling “KICK A FUCKING GOAL, YOU DIMWIT!” to Richmond’s Matty Richardson, standing ten metres directly in front.

And then you sit on the couch and burst into self-pitying tears yourself, as loudly as the kid, there you are together, crying on the couch, one soggy, adult mess and one arched back, red-faced junior who can’t tell you what’s wrong so you can fix it.

These are the bits the parenting books do not tell you about: some parts of motherhood really are quite shit.

And often one shit bit will pile on top of another, until you get six or seven shitty bits cascading over each other until all you can do is fall over in a heap and cry. Or get on the lash. Or both.

For example, this morning: kid won’t sleep, try feeding, kid throws up, continues wailing, change clothes, kid throws up again, starts crying again, change nappy, kid wees all over you, continues crying, leave the house for mother & baby group, forget Bag of Baby Stuff, return home to get Stuff, re-leave house for group, get to group only to discover it’s not on this week, which upsets you more than you anticipated, because you were looking forward to talking to some other mums with young babies, even if they’re strangers at least you’d be out of the house and with some company, decide instead to attend baby-friendly cafe for a cup of tea, wait in queue, get to front of queue, person in front of you takes last available seat, which upsets you profoundly as it means you have nowhere to sit and must return home to four walls and screaming child as it is raining outside and not a good time for a walk, besides which, you don’t want a walk, you want the kid to shut the fuck up, immediately, or you will go insane, and you’re thirsting for a nice cup of tea and a hug from a friendly face who will say “you poor thing, here, have some chocolate”, which won’t happen because you don’t really know anyone in the town where you live, so home it is, and you really do feel ready to disown your child, because you are clearly so utterly incapable of looking after him yourself and you are a total, useless failure at this parenting gig.

That’s the thing about sleep deprivation. It sneaks up on you in a multitude of ways, and it’s not like where you’ve had too much to drink and next door’s party wakes you up a few times in the night. It’s sometimes every 15 minutes, sometimes every 45, sometimes it might be every four hours, so the second you close your eyes there’s this immediate pressure to soak up the available seconds with sleep ASAP, while simultaneously listening out for Number One Son stirring to the point of being awake again.

And when you’ve had even two hours sleep, and then you’re being woken every hour or 45 minutes or whatever, I cannot really describe how dizzy with sleep deprivation you become. Every last fibre of your body is dragged kicking and screaming into being awake, because you can’t just ignore what’s waking you up. It must be attended to. You stagger awake and to the baby and seriously resent what it’s doing to your own sleep schedule, and worse than that, you get really, really jealous of your partner, who snoozes away as per your agreement, and you know that you’ve both chosen to take on these particular roles, but it doesn’t stop you being extremely fucking jealous of the fact that they are asleep and you are most definitely not.

On top of that is the knowledge that it will be months before you will get proper sleep again. Number One Son is still waking for night feeds and probably will do so for some time yet, a responsibility that is yours.

People urge you to sleep when the baby sleeps but two things: one, I can’t switch my sleep on and off that easily; and two, sometimes it’s more torturous to have an hour sleep while Junior naps than it is to just stay awake and get shit done.

They don’t tell you that in those ‘What to expect’ books, do they?

That whole birth thing March 25, 2008

Number One Son doesn’t leave me much time for luxuries like writing, eating, or sleeping these days, so I won’t be banging on in great detail about how the kid eventually got born. I will bang on a bit about some of it, though, thoughtfully organised into procedure, followed by commentary.

1. Membrane sweep: did not work for me.

2. Cervix-softening gel (X 3 applications): involves midwife sticking fingers up your jacksie to load your cervix up with this gel stuff, designed to make your cervix all gooey and to trick it into starting labour. The first application did nothing, the second – a double dose – did work. A bit. Not much, but a bit.

3. TENS machine: involves sticking little pads to the small of your back and then giving you this little remote control console, whereby when a contraction hits you, you pump electrical current down into the pads in an effort to convince your body that there is no pain. This does not work. You only convince your mind that you are playing novelty with electricity. It’s a dinky little piece of kit, and probably would have amused me more if I wasn’t trying to squeeze a small elephant out of my vagina at the time.

4. Artificial rupture of the membranes: this procedure is not complete without a ginormous, very long crochet hook (nope, not kidding), brandished by the midwife and inserted fully up your jacksie and way, way up the back of your uterus. You feel a teeny, tiny little tug, and then you panic a little, because the midwife starts leaning very hard against the top of your belly, and then suddenly there is a f l o o d of liquid gushing out all over the bed and the floor. This is very disconcerting. Part of your mind thinks that you must be wetting your pants, and another part of your brain just doesn’t know what to make of it all.

If you’re a normal person, this procedure will bring on very strong contractions. If you are a freak, like moi, it’ll actually stop your contractions altogether, much to the bemusement of the hospital staff. It is at this point you lose any hope of having a normal delivery and resign yourself to not having a waterbirth as planned. Then the midwife and the registrar come in to your room looking very solemn and advise you to get used to the idea of having an epidural, because they are about to hook you up to fake oxytocin to really get the party started.

5. Epidural and related IV drugs: the epidural was the one thing I did not want to have, along with a caesarian, but to be honest it hurt less than having a blood test done. More painful was the canula they inserted into my left wrist, which is kind of like an IV double adaptor that they use to get more than one kind of liquid into your veins at once. That was excruciating; it took weeks for my vein to recover. The epidural involved me crying a lot about the idea of someone sticking a big needle into my spine, a five minute chat with the loveliest anaesthetist you are ever likely to meet and then about 20 seconds curled over a pillow trying not to move at all. One tiny pin prick and it was all over. And the relief it brought me – fantastic. What they don’t tell you is that not only is an epidural a kind of local anaesthetic, it’s also loaded with opiates to relax you, so you pretty much doze off here and there and get entertained by the room going all woozy. Then you ask the midwife to top you up, as it were, and your brain goes all nice and fuzzy. After 24 hours of labour, an epidural was quite definitely the best idea I’d had in a long time. Contractions? What contractions?

6. The dreaded C-section: I really, really didn’t want to have one, but after 10 hours of contracting and pushing the kid just wasn’t coming out. Because I’d already had an epidural, I didn’t need to have another spinal block, they just turbo-loaded me with more local, then wheeled me into surgery. And guess what happened then? Yep. MASSIVE panic attack. MASSIVE. The screen was up around my neck and I had to have my arms resting up around there too, so I felt like I couldn’t breathe and didn’t really know what was going on. I was shaking and trembling and went completely dry in the mouth and then couldn’t talk, which freaked me out even more. Poor old Beloved couldn’t calm me, nothing could calm me and nobody could hear me calling out for a sip of water because my mouth was too dry to talk. And then I threw up all over myself. Did I feel anything? Yes. I didn’t feel Nelson actually coming out, but I felt lots of tugging and pressure as I was being sewn up and that was a fine line between pressure and pain.

And then before I knew what was going on, the doctor was there urging The Beloved to yell out the sex of the baby and one of the midwives was showing me this wrapped up bundle with a red, squishy face at one end. My son. It was all very surreal, in part because you don’t get to connect with the baby until you get back to your room, while they finish sewing you up, and then when you get back to your room you are just drugged out of your mind on morphine and everybody wants to come and stick more needles in you and check the baby over.

It wasn’t really until I got on to the ward and The Beloved had gone home that I was able to take a look over the kid, and marvel at what the fuck I’d done.

Something I still do, that marvelling thing, quite often. Nelson is just so perfect, and so much a product of us both, without either of us really doing much other than having sex in the first place.

The aftermath March 22, 2008

The danger of expectations …

What I was expecting, part 1:

A earth mothery, waterbirth with minimal pain relief, definitely no epidurals or surgery, lasting under 24 hours.

What I got, part 1:

A 36 hour labour that never progressed past 4 centimetre dilation, a membrane sweep, three applications of cervix-softening gel, artificial rupture of my membranes, followed by 10 hours of fake oxytocin through an IV, and an epidural, all of which were followed by an emergency caesarian, during which I suffered a massive panic attack and lost over a litre of blood.

What I was expecting, part 2:

To breastfeed until the cows came home, or at least until Number One Son didn’t want the bosom any longer. That breastfeeding would be a deeply bonding and satisfying experience for both parties.

What I got, part 2 (a):

I hated breastfeeding. Excruciating pain in both bosoms throughout. One nipple suffered deep bruising from where The Wee Champ was incorrectly attached directly after birth; the other bore a crack the length of it that meant feeding was like having someone poke white hot sewing needles directly into said bosom repeatedly.

What I got, part 2 (b):

An unhappy baby that was never fully satisfied at any feed and the guilts that I wasn’t nourishing my child well enough; and that I should be happier and more proficient at breastfeeding.

What I expected, part 3:

Was to never have the need to use formula or bottles, because there was plenty of good food on tap for Number One Son.

What I got, part 3:

Industrial sized box of organic baby formula, several bottles and a steam steriliser now in regular use for Nelson. Result: a happy, satisfied baby and a more relaxed me with the freedom to now get back on the sauce. IT TAKES THE EDGES OFF.

What I expected: part 4:

That my kidlet would never, ever use a dummy.

What I got, part 4:

A dummy. Works a treat, and has saved our sanity on several occasions. JUDGE YE NOT.

What I expected: part 5:

Kidlet would sleep in his own cot, in his own room, in decent 3-4 hour blocks, from day one.

What I got, part 5:

A baby that has yet to sleep in his own room and occasionally spends nights sleeping in 45 minute chunks.

What I expected: part 6:

That I’d be GIFUCKENNORMOUS for months after the birth and that I’d never fit into my pre-pregnancy clothes again.

What I am got, part 6:

My favourite pre-England jeans a l m o s t do up, already! And yesterday I tried some new jeans on and managed to fit into a size 14. For someone who has spent the past nine months feeling like a very grey, dull heffalump, this (usually) superficial experience transcended ordinary joy. I’ll be a yummy mummy yet!

A letter to Nelson: month 1 March 16, 2008

Dear son,

This Wednesday you turn a month old, a fact that amazes me given that I’ve read *this* many manuals about parenting, but I am still hopeless inept at the job. I am getting much better as the days pass, however, at blaming my farts on you.

In the past month we have weathered many storms already, mostly involving your not sleeping, and not fully appreciating that when you arch your back a certain way you are not performing a complicated yoga pose but in fact have wind, but sometimes it means you are showing off how strong your neck and back muscles are, and sometimes it means wind AND showing off, and then you go and do something cute and a switch gets triggered in our brains and somehow we think your weeing all over your father is cute.

One of your favourite things to do at the moment is to lie on your back on the bathroom floor, and stare at god only knows what, and listen to the water pump in the cupboard bringing the blessed relief of hot water to your poor mother’s bosoms. And then throw in a wee vomit on the carpet for good measure.

Another of your favourite things to do is not sleep, which makes me wonder where those experts who say babies sleep 16 hours a day get their babies from. Because they sure didn’t take you into account. A little while ago you spent two nights sleeping in 45 minute chunks, and then taking your naps during the day like a damn angel. After the first night I assumed that you would tire yourself out by the second, but no, you were impatient to set the world record for minimum number of minutes spent fooling parents into thinking you were asleep, and by gee by jingo did you surpass that record. GUINNESS HAS BEEN CALLING.

I now understand why sleep deprivation is used as a method of torture because you have proven that you are way, way better than George Bush in this respect. In fact, I wouldn’t even vote for you in case you made it part of the constitution. The thing about you is that once you wake up and realise that there’s no bosom in your mouth, which means you’re not eating, you are determined to let the world know about it so someone will come along and fix it for you. Because hey, the squeaky wheel gets the oil, right?

Your father and I have discovered a method that slides you towards sleep without you actually thinking that you’re sliding towards sleep, because according to you, if you’re sleeping you’re not eating, and that’s a really tragic state of affairs, one that everyone needs to know about, even the neighbours we haven’t met yet in the next street.

You like to lie on your dad’s chest because that’s male bonding time and you like to lie on my chest because there’s bosoms involved, and if there’s bosoms involved then there is even a slight chance more food will pass your lips. The other night as I tried to convince you that 3am wasn’t the ideal time to be staring at my face or discussing life and the universe, you dropped your head between my bosoms and began to do that cute, ‘I’m really comfortable, so comfortable I might be heading towards that S word’ snuffle, and I began to pat your back. And I thought to myself, take advantage of this, kid, because the next time you’re face down between some female’s tits and she’s rubbing your back you’re probably going to have to pay for it and you might just get arrested.

But it’s hard to convey that to a 4-week-old baby, so I’ll just write about it here and you can read it later.

This month you and I have been to our first mother and baby group. You are the biggest kid there, and that takes some doing, given one of the kids is nearly eight months old. We turned up a little early, me nearly crying for the effort of getting out of the house, dressed in a puke-covered hoodie and you in a harness on my chest with a muslin square over your head to protect you from the rain. The other mothers showed up immaculately dressed, with make-up on (MAKE UP! HOW DO THEY *DO* THAT?) with their kids in new prams with rain covers.

As we all sat there pretending not to eye up each other’s children, and comparing everyone else’s kid to our own, one of the mothers began to change her kid’s nappy. I glanced over and I’m proud to say this, son, you have WAY bigger balls than that 4-month-old Charlie. WAY bigger.

In the past week your constant desire for food has taken its toll on my bosoms, so much so that we are now in the process of making you a formula-fed baby, something that, weirdly, bothers you much less than when you were breastfed, but has the breastfeeding police up-in-arms because I haven’t tried hard enough to keep you latched to my bosoms for 27 hours a day. In your first two weeks of life it felt like you were constantly at my chest looking to suck my bosoms dry. You are some optimist because you also tried suckling your father’s nose, arm and chest, as well as your hands and – let’s face it – virtually anything that passed within ten millimetres of your mouth. And while the current size of my bazoombas pleases both you and your father for different reasons my current thinking is that no one is allowed near them for the next 25 years.

You have been weighed three times now since you were born at 9lbs 12oz. A week later you were 10lbs 2oz, then five days after that you were 10lbs 9oz, and the other day at the baby clinic the weirdo nursery nurse weighed you in at 100kgs. Not really, it was actually 11lbs 2oz, but it means that you are putting on weight faster than average (one ounce per day), which in my book makes you ADVANCED. And heavier than that 6-month-old Archie from group. GET IN.

Although you are officially putting on weight, we are at a loss as to where you put it. Because you are definitely not fat – you’re long limbed and dare I say it, BIG BONED.

You have my big man hands and ballerina feet, just like I thought you would, and your dad’s cute nose and cheeks and face, and we’re not sure who to blame the flat arse on just yet. But probably me, because kids like to blame their mothers for all kinds of stuff, right, so why not start now?

Before you were born other parents warned us that kids grow up really fast and suddenly we’ll turn around and we’ll be embarrassing you at your 21st birthday with nudie pictures of you taking your first bath. It is really only in the past week that I have come to appreciate these words of advice. Each day I marvel at how your face changes shape, how you are able to recognise sounds more easily and how you are coming to smile when your dad or I come into a room. And at your incredible capacity to do a giant shit in a nappy I’ve *just* changed.

You may not yet be able to talk, my chubby cheeked, adorable son, but already I have learned so much from you, mostly about how difficult it is to put someone else first, all the time, after a lifetime of tending only to numero uno and enjoying the luxury of eight or nine hours uninterrupted sleep every night. I have your dad to thank for showing me the way, and you to thank for rewarding me with a completely new level of love that I never really knew existed or wanted to know about until now. You somehow have used a key to open up my heart even further than your father did when I met him all those years ago, and bring me peace.

One of the cute things you like to do is sit up and stare at me, something that on occasion alarms me because all manner of expressions cross your face as you’re staring. The other morning as you stared and I wondered how I could manage to turn the staring competition into a nap, or at least try and get some sleep sitting up with my eyes open, you raised one eyebrow quizzically at me and viewed me with suspicion, as if to say, ‘Hey … you were here yesterday. Are you my mother?’

Yes son, I am.

Love,

Mum.