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The "on-the-go" parent

In and earlier post I mentioned some of the thoughts I had around my hope "pre-baby" about being what I will refer to as an "on-the-go" parent. Before A arrived I had always noticed and envied the moms and dads that were out and about with their little ones, on walks, hiking, at the grocery store, etc, its hard to not be active here in Colorado. But once my daughter arrived my thoughts changed immensely. Both hubs and I had done some reading on sleep training and healthy sleeping babies(he read Baby Wise, I read Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Baby) and I think this changed many of our opinions (and maybe freaked us out a bit too). We both desperately wanted to have a baby that slept well, not necessarily one that slept through the night, simply one that could fall asleep on her own and could stay asleep. As with many people you hear the horror stories of kids that won't fall asleep at night without sound machines, an hour of rocking or an hour of screaming, I just didnt want to subject A to that. And lets be honest, I like sleep and if I could do something to get myself more (within reason) you bet I was going to do it.

From birth until about 6 weeks I really kept to myself and kept Adelina at home. We had our occasional outing but for the most part we were homebodies. We slept, read stories, rocked and hung out on the front porch... it was fantastic! Now, I will say that this was partially due to the fact that I still wasnt able to be as active as I wanted after the birth and it was still relatively chilly in Denver. I didn't like the idea of taking her out in the cold unless it was necessary. Once 5/6 weeks hit I noticed that Adelina was starting to stay away longer but also having trouble napping. I knew that this was a big development milestone (longer periods of wakefulness) but it was also worrisome that she simply wouldnt nap. After having a couple weeks of visitors and finally some great weather in Denver we started to work on our sleeping all over again. It was at this point that I truly became a slave to A's sleep schedule and the mom-zilla in me really came out. You could say, truthfully, that I was overbearing and over the top about it. But when push came to shove if it meant A (and I) could get a good nap in, it meant we were staying home. I know I had friends wondering what the heck I was doing and why I was being so anal about naps and sleeping but we started to see an improvement in day time sleep and thus nighttime sleep and before I knew it Adelina was sleeping 6 hours a night, what heaven that was! Now that I am back at work the nighttime sleep has changed again but thats another blog post in itself.

While I was relishing in all of the new things Adelina was doing (giggling, smiling, sitting up in her bumpo), a part of me still wondered if my friends and the people I used to spend so much time with understood. Many of my friends don't have children and while sympathetic I wondered if they really understood or if they just thought I was over the top. I know I shouldn't necessarily care but I wanted those that I was close to, to get it and understand what I was going through. As it turns out just the other day, I was chatting with one of my girlfriends and while I dont remember the exact question I know I essentially asked if she thought I was being over the top. She said you know I am one of those non-mom's that thinks wow it has to be hard to be a mom and if something works for you then go with it because thats what you have to do to make everything work for YOU. It truly gave me a little peace to know that someone understood.

 Now at almost 19 weeks of age we are starting to get out more, a walk here, a BBQ there, an overnight trip and our first flight within the next month. Before you know it we might even take that hike I am itching to do!