Out of sync

For some bizarre reason it still takes me a while to realise how big an impact small little changes can have.  As I’ve already gone on and on about, Alby is not sleeping at all well at the moment.  The change to his bedtime routine is obviously having an impact but even before I started messing about with his feed the past week has been one of constant night wakings. 

Whilst I quickly see the link between that an increase in general tiredness, I have always been useless at seeing how such fits in with the bigger picture.  Normally Alby will fall asleep around 8pm and not wake until midnight.  In that time I’ve managed to chill out for an hour before doing an hour of errands and then heading to bed.  The hourly waking means my chill out time is disrupted, as are my chores and within a day or two everything seems to have fallen out of sync.  If you had seen me on Saturday morning you would have met with a lady who had no idea which way to turn. 

Whilst it all sounds like a dire and dramatic state to be in, I actually need these lows every now and then.  Don’t get me wrong they are a horrible state to be in when you experience them but they rarely last longer than 24hours and the aftermath is like a fresh breath.  You see they force me to pause, to step back and review and to work out how to proceed.  Above all, they force me to chill out. 

This evening Alby has fallen asleep in his pushchair.  Was that part of my plan?  Absolutely not.  And I have no idea how he is going to respond to bedtime when he eventually wakes up.  But rather than freaking out, I’m actually grateful for yet another disruption in our usual routine.  He’s been asleep in his pushchair now for an hour and a half – had I settled him in his cot he would likely have already woken once.  In the meantime I’ve managed to do a load of laundry, change the sheets on the beds, clear some emails and write my blog posts for the evening.  And whilst a rested baby is a happy baby, a mama who is able to do a few errands undisturbed is happy mama.  Eventually we will get back into some sort of rhythm, but for the moment the focus is just on getting the basics right – a clean, well-fed and well-rested baby.  And as I’ve got all that plus a few giggles I end today with a smile on my face.