I have an announcement.
Isaac? He sleeps better than Amy does. He is 11 weeks old.
Do you have any idea how tired that makes me? Because seriously, he is sleeping 6-8 hours overnight* and yet, I’m somehow managing to have to get up for Amy 3-4 times a night. Sometimes all she needs is a drink. Sometimes she needs a cuddle. Sometimes she needs to scream at me to ‘GO WAY MUMMY!’ Sometimes? She needs all three.
It’s exhausting.
So when I was woken up at godawful o’clock this morning to feed Isaac, I was looking forward to going back to sleep. I was not ready to be woken up by a toddler who had decided it was morning time. I was NOT ready for Isaac to decide it was morning time too.
Even worse? I wasn’t ready to look at the clock and realise that today? The clocks need to go back an hour.
It was bad enough that the clock said 6.30am when I stumbled out to the lounge room. Everything started to look infinitely worse when I had to change it back to 5.30am.
[For the record, Amy sleeps badly, so generally she makes up for this by sleeping in a little. Normally, I don’t have to start my day until 7.45 ish.]
Today is not a good day.
***
Dear Amy,
I could happily live out the rest of my life without ever hearing you yell ‘I’m still HUNGRY! Need FOOD!’ when there is still a full bowl of cereal in front of you. You are NOT still hungry, you are trying to see what else in the house might be better to eat than cereal. I’m not giving you sweets, or biscuits, even less so at breakfast time. SUCK IT UP and eat the dammed cereal already.
I will swap your cereal for an apple if you like. Even for toast. But if you specifically request rice bubbles and then after one bite start yelling ‘still hungry’ while the cereal sits there going soggy? I might get a little grumpy.
Maybe even more than a little grumpy. In fact, it is the one statement that is almost guaranteed to make my head explode.
Eat the food that you specifically requested already.
Love Mummy [who is so incredibly fucking sick of hearing ‘I’m still HUNGRY!! Need FOOD!!’ when there is still a shitload of food on your plate. So much so that I am having to restrain myself from swearing more. And if you read this when you are 15 and angsty, you can blame me for all your problems. That’s okay, I have broad shoulders. But you read this when you have a toddler? You will get where I am coming from. Eat the dammed food.]
***
Dear Isaac,
I love that you are sleeping for 8 hours overnight.
I don’t love that you are refusing to nap for longer than 10 minutes the other 16 hours in the day. Cat naps only work for cats. Stop it. By the time bedtime rocks around you are so tired all you can do is scream. I’m getting a little strung out here baby boy.
Love Mummy [who is exhausted, but at least a 10pm bedtime is better than last week when it was a midnight bedtime.]
***
Apparently dairy free also means chocolate free. And caffeine free. And chocolate biscuit free.
No cheese. No chocolate. No milk. No coffee. No cream. No ice-cream.
Hey, at least the rest of breastfeeding [for me] is easy.
Sigh.
Mum bought me some soy milk, so at least I can have a cup of tea.
Still. Sucks.
***
In conclusion. Daylight savings can go get fucked. Amy’s behaviour at the moment SUCKS. Isaac sleeps amazingly overnight, at the expense of day naps. I can’t eat chocolate or cheese, which almost makes eating not worth it at all and my house is covered in brains from the numerous head explosions I have been having.
Oh and I have buttons and Amy knows how to press them.
On the upside, Nathan managed to get himself into a standing position and hobble around for a bit yesterday. Yay for Advil.
Sigh.
*Okay, so once he has had his 8 hours in bed, he wants to get back up and party, so really, I’m having 16 hours of awake time from him, but WHATEVER. He is sleeping 8 hours IN A ROW, overnight. Something Amy can’t seem to manage.
my sis in law had the same problem. Bub was great at night, but horrid during the day – she ended up at sleep school for a few days teaching bub how to settle herself and now bub is a dream.
Have no idea about your non sleeping toddler. Hope it resolves itself soon……… and your head manages to stay in one piece for a while.
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I’m not sure what I feel worse for…the “No cheese. No chocolate. No milk. No coffee. No cream. No ice-cream,” or how Amy sleeps.
At least the no dairy is temporary, and fingers crossed that Amy grows out of her sleeping habits.
My older daughter (who just turned four) is the same kind of sleeper. She was at her worst during the last three months of my second pregnancy to when her sister turned about 4 months old. It’s gotten progressively better since. They still can’t share a room but we now go several nights in a row with uninteruppted sleep.
Take what you can, right?
CKs last blog post..lady in white
Isaac sounds a bit like my M, who would sleep all night from 6:30pm until 6am, and stay awake all day. Unfortunately there the similarity ends. M was quite happy lying on the floor, in his cot, in the bouncer, anywhere really, just playing and looking around, until he got hungry. Then it was feed, burp, change and put him down again. Big sister T would play with his hands and feet, kiss him, show him toys for some of the time, but he was happy enough on his own too. Could you perhaps put Isaac in his bouncer with bright toys to look at?
With Amy could you perhaps give her the cereal without milk? Picking out and crunching the dry cereal might distract her enough that she is eating it without realising. Slice a banana into it. As for her sleeping? Hmmm. There is a powdered milk product called Horlicks which has been known to help. Stir it into warm milk and give it to her about an hour before bedtime. You could notice a difference in a few days. The only other thing I can suggest (the harder option) is that you tell her very firmly that mummy is not coming to her room until it’s daytime outside again. If she calls out just call back it’s night time, go back to sleep. And let her scream it out for a night or three. The downside is you have to hear her……and it might disturb Isaac, but if he’s already sleeping through her calling for you that’s not such a worry.
Pretty shitty Veronica. Is Amy still having a daytime nap? If yes, maybe stopping that will help with the night time sleeping pattern. Other than that you may have to tough it out a bit and be less accessible overnight. You managed to get rid of her dummy so I’m sure you can both get over this stage too, hard though it may be 😉
hang in there you only have about oooooooooooo 17 more eyars of this to go. Welcome to parenthood.
I would be annoyed too, and I would also swear. No matter how little sleep my baby has (in 50 days or so, come on already!) at least the 6 year old sleeps all night, even though he gets up around 7am. It also helps that he can dress and amuse himself too. Amy will get there, and then Isaac will follow and you will be tucking them into bed at night and heading off for a relaxing snooze yourself…
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….*tiptoes in and nervously looks around, notices that other commenters have managed to safely leave a comment. Phew. Kisses Daughter and leaves*
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@Sharon – No, she doesn’t have a day sleep anymore (unfortunately). She gave that up when I was about 7 weeks pregnant with Isaac.
You know, I’m so freakin jealous that he’s sleeping through the night… 11 weeks!! Lucky git!
I hear ya on pushing the buttons – Zack is at the stage it’s like he enjoys seeing me pissed off. I have ended up using timeouts.
There’s such satisfaction putting him there for his 3 minutes and hearing him hate every second… serves him right for being naughty all the time! 😉
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Woohoo to Issac sleeping well.. Cai goes 12 hours most nights.. and has just started on solids..
my cousin had to stop dairy to.. since then her baby is more settled..
i really wish Amy would sleep better for you.. Maddi is starting her tantrums already.. grr..
hoping you get a good nights rest soon..
glad to hear Nathans back is getting better.. 🙂
Yikes. You definitely sound stretched.
Xbox4NappyRashs last blog post..Mother nature & Dr. DooALittleTooMuch
I HATE daylight saving. Who is responsible for it? Not a farmer, I bet. Not a mother, I bet.
Have you heard of the three day habit breaker. I read somewhere when I needed to break some of my daughter’s (bad) habits that if you can stand it for three days, tanty’s, screaming, whatever, is all it takes to break habits. It worked for me getting rid of my daughter’s dummy, which seemed like a miracle at the time. But she then went on to bone chilling screaming. And believe me, she was a terror. I had to smack that out of her, which was terrible at the time, but if I did not smack her (only on the bum, and with warning her first) I then may have ended up hurting her the wrong way out of sheer frustration and endless nights of broken sleep. Being a mum is very hard. My boys were angel babies in comparison, but my girl has been a challenge. Thankfully she is more the angel now. I don’t have to smack her for anything, she understands when mummy means business. Sorry if this is upsetting for some of your readers or yourself, it is not easy to talk about, especially as smacking is taboo for some. If I need to smack (on the bum) as she grows up from time to time, I will, unless of course that discretion is taken away from parents by law.
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Well, I’m not sure how your daylight savings *ahem* suggestion can happen, but I’m sure one day Amy and Isaac will have some interesting things to write back to you on your blog. You just wait! :]
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Vanilla Rice milk is so much tastier. Trust me. And never, ever even thing about eating soy cheese. It tastes worse than ass. And I wasted $3 buying ass fake cheese that immediately went into the garbage.
Fuck I miss chocolate chip cookies.
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Soy cheese, carob, and stuffs for dairy-free.
Or play Sleeping Beauty until the kids are 21 yrs old and can leave home.
Jaynes last blog post..I bless the trivial rains down in history Africa, gonna take some April 6 time to do the things we never had…
It’s great that Isaac is sleeping-at least for night anyway. You all are still adjusting to the new baby in the house, especially Amy. I think she probably wants reassurance you still love her and won’t be replaced by her brother. Good luck–it’s a tough line to walk. I did it with my older two children–not an easy task.
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I want you to know, I am reading I am just a slack commenter at the moment. I laughed over the last post and I empathise with this one. It’s still funny though, the way you write it and thanks for still commenting over at the circus, even though I’ve been a slacker.
Higs, send Amy here, she can party with Ivy, who is four in November and still doesn’t sleepthrough the night.
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hmmm, higs… meant to be hugs.
tiffs last blog post..Tangalooma – a review.
oh my, I remember my kids going through that stage. My oldest was the worst – she would fuss and catnap all day and all night. If she fell asleep, I had 5 seconds to decide if I would use that 15 minutes to a)go to the bathroom, b)have a shower, c)get some sleep, d)have something to eat. Thank god I didn’t have the toddler at the same time, or I would be flipping out worse than you. Hope the dairy free diet works for all of you, it helped with my family for sure. Hang in there, hope your guy feels better soon and can help again.
I am convinced that whoever decided Daylight savings time was a good idea, did NOT have children.
So sorry to hear you’re juggling this all on so little sleep. I’m sure it’s enough to make you want to pull every hair out.
But I will admit that I am glad to hear that my child is not the ONLY kid who constantly screams “still hungry!”
*head explodes*
Momisodess last blog post..Fly Me To The Moon
Oh, wow! I feel for ya, Veronica! I just have one Little One at the moment, so juggling TWO would be quite the balancing act, I imagine! You are doing an awesome job and hopefully someday you will sleep 🙂
BTW, I tagged you in a Motherhood Meme. xo
There’s nothing I can say but ((((hugs)))). It will get better, I promise. And you can come and beat me up (when you’ve got some energy and your head has stopped exploding) if it doesn’t.
Barbaras last blog post..96/365 – Ready or Not, Here I Come
I HATE daylight savings. Ours was several weeks ago and it took up until 3 days ago for my kids to adjust.
When I rule the world, daylight savings will DIE!
Hyphen Mamas last blog post..Because I’m 3 rolls short of a picnic. Oh, who am I kidding? I’m not 3 rolls short of ANYTHING!
Oooohh, this post overwhelms me just a little bit, so here’s a *hug* and another, larger *HUG* to get you through it.
Sarah @ BecomingSarah.coms last blog post..26 weeks: Growing a baby. Please do not disturb.
Also, when you’re done breastfeeding, or when you no longer have to worry about maintaining a dairy-free existence? You definitely deserve chocolate. Lots and lots of chocolate. That would drive me up the wall!
Sarah @ BecomingSarah.coms last blog post..26 weeks: Growing a baby. Please do not disturb.
Benjamin Franklin is the chap that we all have to “thank” for daylight savings. I’m not convinced that inventing the lightning rod, and being one of the founding fathers of the USA, compensates us for that horror.
All my sympathies are with you. This, too, shall pass (or that’s what we’ll keep telling ourselves, right?)
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So many hugs – it makes me cry a little in sympathy just reading about it.
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You give me hope that if we ever decide to have another one, he or she won’t be a terrible sleeper. But, then you just HAD to go and remind me that it won’t matter. I’ll be up with Alexis anyway. GAH!
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