Sunday, November 18, 2007

The hardest job...

You know that saying...that parenting is the hardest job you will ever love? Well, I'm totally getting the hardest part now. As you all know, we are stranded indefinitely in a state that is not our own. Which means several days of hanging out in hotels (so far, very nice hotels, but still), with a very tiny and now demanding baby.

Let me bring you up to speed. Last night (Friday night) was our first night with the baby. At the hospital, although we had unlimited access to her, we did not have a room in the maternity ward. And since taking nursery babies anywhere near the exit doors to the maternity ward will brings alarms and large security men calling, we left her in the care of the night nurses while we went up to our room in the hospital's hospitality house to enjoy nights of relatively peaceful sleep.

Since then, aliens have stolen our peaceful baby and replaced her with franken-baby, who thinks day is night and night is day. Mama is not pleased.

Last night was awful. Truly. Awful. Olivia finally fell asleep at 5:45 a.m. and slept until the glorious hour of 9:00 a.m. And she only fell asleep after I held her and patted her on my chest, her ear to my heart for an hour. After that, she slept on the second queen bed in our hotel room, rather than her pack-and-play because, people. I was NOT GOING TO MOVE THE SLEEPING BABY.

I had a very bad day. I had myself so worked up last night that I made myself sick and had no appetite all day (still don't). The sight of the baby made the anxiety start back up. My saintly husband spent the ENTIRE DAY with the baby while I tried to recover.

And then something miraculous happened. No, not sleep. I haven't had more than two full sleep cycles since Friday. But I started to relax a bit and realize that this wouldn't kill me.

So, after dozing for a few hours (still can't fall asleep well, even without the baby in the room), I have relieved my husband from baby lobby duty, which is where one of us takes the baby to the lobby to pace and intermittently check email while the other tries to recover some sleep. And I am OK. Not great, mind you, but also not rueing the day we started to pursue adoption (I had some truly evil thoughts in the heat of the ever-fussy moment last night). And as our Olivia sleeps peacefully (for a brief moment) in the sling while I type, I can truly say that she is the greatest blessing we have ever had.

That's all for tonight. It is extremely late and I'm going to doze on the lobby couch while the baby has made up her mind to sleep for the moment.

2 comments:

HereWeGoAJen said...

Oh, never move a sleeping baby!

I've always thought that being born must be incredibly traumatic. Just think about how her life was and then all of a sudden she's out in the real world. It must be so different and overwhelming. I'm not surprised that babies take some time to adjust.

Of course, that doesn't help you two get more rest while she fusses. Good luck and remember you can have your revenge when she is a teenager.

Anonymous said...

We spent two days in a hotel with a FOUR month old and it was torture. I can't even imagine a NEWBORN in a hotel for a WEEK! Gah! Soon you will be home and in your own space and establishing your own routines and things will get so much easier. It's so hard to be away from home. Thinking of you!