Ah, sleep.

I take Mateo to daycare Fridays and my husband picks him up. Normally I either take him and pick him up or just pick him up - it depends on the day.

I usually look forward to my Friday mornings, even though I still get up at the icky hour of 3:50 AM, because I get to spend about 20-30 minutes alone with my dear pal, laptop.

Yesterday was no exception. I was uploading pictures to Mateo's blog while watching Big Brother 10. Each picture was taking a really long time to upload, so at about 5:35 AM I decided to put my head down for a little rest. I was going to wake up Mateo in 10 minutes to start the morning routine...so a nice little 10 minute head lay down sounded really nice.

When I opened my eyes, I realized our bedroom was unusually bright. And that my laptop was blank because it went into standby mode. And that it was 6:30 AM.

I kept staring at the clock, thinking, why is it 6:30? Then...why didn't my husband wake me up before he left? Then...wait, was I asleep when he left? Then...where's Mateo? I heard him murmuring over the baby monitor. Then...was I asleep when my husband left? Why'd he just leave and let me sleep? (I really wanted to blame this on him.) Then...do I really need to go into work? Can't I just stay home and keep sleeping? I remembered it was basically impossible for two reasons: 1. I had a 10 AM meeting and 2. my co-worker (as in, I really only have one co-worker) works at home on Fridays.

I got my butt up and by then had wasted 5 minutes trying to clear the cobwebs from my brain and trying to remember exactly what happened an hour ago and how I found myself sleeping for an hour, causing my hair to go all funky since I was lying on it for that hour.

I got Mateo's milk and went into his room. He was standing in his crib, waiting for someone to come get him (probably thinking, "where momma? where dadda?" like I was thinking "where's Mateo?" earlier). He had pooped, so instead of giving him his milk, I changed his diaper, then changed his clothes, and then figured since I was now in a rush, I slathered his sunblock on him. After putting him down, I handed him his sippy cup and walked out of his room, going into our bedroom to change my clothes.

About 30 seconds later, he whipped around the corner and came into our bedroom, all smiles. For some reason this rush-rush-RUSH business was quite humorous to him. I got dressed, tried to fix my funky hairdo, slapped on some deodorant, told Mateo to come with me, brushed his teeth, put his shoes on, put his hoodie on, put him in the stroller and out the door we went. We left the condo by 6:50 AM. Record time, and thankfully, Mateo was cooperating with me (for once!).

We made it to daycare by 7 AM, and I was on BART in enough time to catch the 7:20 AM train. Which made me late, but not as late as I thought when I first shook off my stupor.

Who needs sleep?

Apparently Mateo doesn't, and because he doesn't, I don't. Which has lead to an impromptu day off for me.

Mateo decided 1:30 AM was the perfect time to wake up. My husband, thank goodness, or so I thought, decided to get up and deal with whatever it was that was making Mateo cry and wail. It seems he's suffering from night terrors or turning things in his room into scary objects, we're not really sure, so it's now a rare night that he sleeps all night without one time waking up full throttle, tears flowing down his cheeks.

I got up to use the bathroom, thinking how lucky I was that I didn't have to get up and take care of Mateo, and then went back to bed. An hour later (confirmed by the clock when I squinted enough to make the numbers clear) my husband came back into the room.

"You need to take over. I've been in there an hour, he's had milk, he's been changed," he told me.

I got up and listened to Mateo's mewings. I didn't want to go in and cause an unnecessary ruckus, and in hopes that he would just put himself back to sleep so I could go back to sleep, I just patiently waited. His mews got louder, louder, and then finally he was crying again.

I went in, and he lost it. Crocodile tears were streaming, he was Dr. Jekyll / Mr. Hyding on me (I want you to pick me up! No! Don't touch me!) and he was on the verge of really losing it.

I tried, unsuccessfully I might add, to get him back to sleep. I even went to so far as to lay on the floor next to his crib and do some intense hand holding (the only way he'd lay down and not freak out). Every so often I'd look up and see his eyes, wide as saucers, staring at something in his room that may or may not be scary to him.

I finally gave up and took him into the living room so I could sit with him on the couch while he watched the Sprout channel. Then I decided maybe he was hungry because he didn't eat dinner very well. I took him over to the fruit bowl and pointed at a banana and asked, "do you want a banana?"

He smiled in glee.

Back to the couch for some banana eating and TV show watching. When he was finished, Mateo decided he wanted to get down, so I let him down, stretched out and tried to not completely fall asleep, but get some sort of rest. I also had to figure out if I was capable of getting dressed for work, going to San Francisco, working all day, picking up Mateo, taking care of him and all that good stuff on about 4 hours of sleep.

At about 4 AM my husband came into the living room (this is our normal waking time).

"You've got to be kidding me," he said. Mateo was wandering around the living room, looking at toys and talking to Zoe.

I shook my head "no."

"Did he ever go to sleep?" he asked me.

I shook my head "no."

"Are you going to work?"

I shook my head "no."

That was pretty much the extent of my communication abilities at the time.

I decided to try getting Mateo down again, this time with some more milk. I told him to go to his room, so off he went with this woobie enveloping him (blanket around shoulders, capping head), and after drinking most of the milk, he passed out with his eyes and mouth open.

I was back to sleep at 5 AM to be woken at 7:20 AM by a very grumpy little boy.

And it makes me wonder: How did I do it when I was getting up every two hours, three hours, four hours, etc. to feed him? I know the simple answer is: Because you just do it. But why is it harder now, when I am getting a good 6 hours of sleep straight most nights (although every night I am woken up by a certain fuzzy cat who wants some company, and her one way of ensuring this happens is by trying to run off with my glasses), to run on barely any steam? Not even the thought of caffeine being pumped into my body all day seems a feasible solution.

All I know is I love my little grumpasaurus, clingy as he may be. And I hope tonight is better for him because it's barely noon and my brain has fuzzed over again.

Now I realize why having another baby now would not be a good idea.

Besides the fact that we simply can't afford one.

Mateo got sick yesterday. We weren't sure how bad it was, if it was a real cold or if it was from teething (which I'm no longer convinced is happening), and how his night was going to go. We had plans to go out to dinner, so we cancelled those, and brought the dinner to us via take-out, which is the only way to go for us these days. Despite his huffy puffy belly breathing, we got him to sleep okay. But then, an hour later, he woke up all upset. Got him back to sleep again.

This is when I should have just went to bed myself.

He woke up at 10ish, and it took forever to get him back to sleep. I took on mommy duty of taking care of her huffy puffy coughy whining little boy. He and I got little sleep last night.

Some of last night's highlights include: him almost puking on my head (I was on the floor, next to his crib, so I could monitor him - good job I did), realizing he had already puked in another spot in his crib, having to clean up said puke and child (I did crib, dad did child, I almost tossed my cookies a bazillion times -- why does throw up have to smell soooo bad???), moving into the living room, sleeping on his play mat, ripping a hole in my PJ bottoms somehow - I remembering hearing it, but not how it happened (husband informs me this morning, when he came into the room to ask me to watch Mateo, that I need to throw my PJ bottoms away - apparently my big rip offended him so), moving Mateo back into his crib and me just...giving....up and heading back to my bed.

My husband took on morning duty so I could sleep more since I think I got about 2 hours of very interrupted sleep before going back to bed.

Now Mateo's in his crib, taking the first of many naps today, all the while coughing (and hopefully not throwing up).

And here I sit, imagining if I did have a baby or had a wee one in the oven and how last night would have gone, especially if I had to nurse my imaginary baby. Yeah....no thanks.

Gifts are nice.

My husband gave me the gift of sleep today.

Mateo was sick Monday and Tuesday, and because of that, I didn't get any sleep. I was up at 2am Monday morning and then 1am on Tuesday morning. I didn't follow my rule of "sleep when the baby sleeps," during the days I was home with him, mostly because I got hooked on some interesting mom blogs (Playgroups are no place for children, 5 Minutes for Mom, some various others), and since I get up between 4am and 4:30am all other days (except for the weekends, and that's usually 5am - 6am), I was pretty darn tuckered out and running on 'E' yesterday. I also caught a bit of Mateo's bug, and it's mostly affecting my head by making it feel like a giant cotton ball and making me feel rather lethargic in general.

Mateo decided he wanted to get up at 4:30am this morning, and since I didn't wake up during the night when Mateo woke up crying and my husband got up and took care of him, I thought I should at least be nice and get up to take care of Mateo in the wee hours of the morning. I got probably a half hour snooze with him before my husband got up and told me to go sleep. I told him to go to the gym and I would sleep when he came home, so off he went like the good little "I love to exercise" husband that he is.

Then I took NyQuil.

And then I slowly removed myself from the living room and went to bed. This was at 12:30pm. The next time I made an appearance was at 6pm.

While I needed the sleep, I don't really feel any better. And since my husband spent his whole day with Mateo and he doesn't really know how to spend a day with Mateo while living a normal life (the "I have a VIP visitor and must attend to his needs every second of the day" syndrome), he now needs a day for himself and I shall be attending to Mr. Mateo all day Sunday. Fair is fair.

Surprise gifts are nice. Especially when I don't end up feeling guilty for taking them willingly.

Sleep

I've had some stupid sleep issues for years now, but since Mateo's arrival and my lack of consistent sleep throughout the night, I haven't had too many issues lately. Generally, I wake up and either start freaking out or start talking about nothing to no one. Sometimes I've been known to get up and wonder around, but not very far. Luckily I've never actually left. But I'm sure some day I will. I just hope I don't try to take Mateo with me.

I've had a slight cold off and on for a couple of weeks now, and last night I took one sleepy Tylenol (that's what I call it) and a half dose of NyQuil. At about 9pm I was having the hardest time keeping my eyes open, so I decided it was time to pass out. And so I did.

My husband had gone to the gym late that evening, so he was awake much later than I was. At some point before he came to bed, I guess I opened my eyes and started staring at the wall / ceiling. This apparently freaked out my husband and he asked me what I was looking at. While I don't remember that, I do remember at some point realizing he was talking to me, and me ignoring him because I was so freaked out at what I was looking at. Which was a big, giant, ugly tarantula. Yes. A tarantula. On our ceiling. And since I can't see worth a darn without my glasses or contacts, I was trying to squint really hard so I could focus on the tarantula and where it was crawling.

Then I realized my husband was asking me what I was looking at and then he was telling me to lay back down and nothing was there.

I closed my eyes, and when I opened them again, he was right nothing was there.

Cue the spooky horror music. I love my brain.

So sad for me.

How come when you survive your first week after having your baby, you can't wait for your baby to fall asleep on his/her own, without crying, without having to be rocked or held, without much fuss what's so ever, and then when it finally happens, you're completely saddened by the fact that your baby doesn't need all of the above anymore?

I might not do much, but boy I am tired.

So yesterday I think all the getting up during the night, getting up super early each day, going to work in SF, taking care of Mateo, myself and husband (oh yeah, and them pesky cats) finally caught up with me. I was extremely tired the whole day, and no matter how much coffee I pumped into my body, I couldn't shake off the tiredness.

When my husband got home, I kept saying how tired I was, that I was super tired, why am I so tired??? After we all ate, I took Mateo into his room to read to him and then put him to sleep. An hour later, my husband came into the room to find me and Mateo passed out in the glider.

My husband told me to put him down and to take my shower. I put Mateo down in the crib, went into our room, saw it was almost 8:45 and promptly put myself to bed -- still clothed, with make-up on and contacts in and teeth sill waiting to be brushed. My husband came in and looked at me and I guess decided it was better to leave me alone than to try to get me up.

At 9:30ish I woke up again and decided I had to at least take out my contacts, wash my face and brush my teeth before really retiring for the night. Usually eating dinner gets left in the wind when I have crazy nights, but last night, I decided I didn't need a shower. It not like I did much to make myself dirty. And since I was working at home the next day, well, I just didn't really care.

So in my super tired zombie state, I got up and took care of the important things and then put myself to bed again. During the time I entered Mateo's room until the time I last put myself to sleep, I kept thinking I didn't get my dessert and how sad that was. No Skinny Cow for me last night. Dessert is mighty important, don't you know?

And what was the first thing my husband asked me this morning when he came back from the gym? "Did you take your shower?" Get off of it! I'm stinky and I don't care!

Sudden increase in "free" time.

So I'm trying to get Mateo more used to sleeping in his crib during the day, something he's never really done without a ton of fuss or by a fluke, in hopes when he goes to Kindercare, he'll be able to adjust to not being held as much and being able to sleep in his crib there. I started this two days ago; sometimes we've been successful and sometimes we haven't been, but one thing it's definitely doing is giving me more "free" time.

I say "free" lightly because it's not like I can just run off and leave the little guy (nor would I), and I do have to have the two baby monitors on at all times even though our walls are kinda thin and I can hear him crying regardless of where I am, but I can actually sit in front of the computer and mess around with things without having to stop every 10 seconds to pay attention to Mateo or I can cook dinner without wondering if he's going to start crying or I can actually get ready for the day without trying to get him to sleep first.

I find myself wondering what I should do during this time because I've been on constant baby watch 24 hours a day for the past 3 months. Mateo is also going to sleep earlier at night, around 7:30 pm instead of anywhere between 8 and 10pm, and he's even doing so without much fuss. It used to take us a good hour to get him to the point of sleeping, now it's like 5 minutes. This leaves more "free" time at night for my husband and I to be alone or for me to run off and hide in the bedroom with my laptop while my husband watches boxing or MMA.

He's also sleeping later in the mornings, so I no longer have to take him to bed with me at 4am -- he now continues to sleep in his crib until almost 7am. Which means, ultimately, more consistent sleep for me. Do I love it? Yes! Am I still dead tired by 4pm? Yes!

This sudden change in our routine is odd, but it's also good for all of us. Maybe I'll finish that book now!

Baby 6th sense

My baby has this keen 6th sense of knowing, while he's napping, that I'm just about ready to fall asleep, and that's when he decides to wake up and want to eat.

I love my baby. I love my sleep. What to do, what to do.

Friday night

What does a 30-week pregnant lady do on a Friday night while her husband is off with his friends at some stupid Strikeforce fighting thing? Sleeping. At 7pm. Pregnancy is fun.