11/23/21

Had One Glorious, Uninterrupted Night of Sleep since Hunter was born over two months ago, it was last Saturday night. I saved a lot of pumped milk and mom took him for the night. But I saw her yesterday and she had a red spot in her eye- she said it was a popped blood vessel from being so tired from not sleeping that night. she said she didn’t know how I did it every night. I was hoping maybe we could make it a once-weekly thing, but I’m not going to let her do it anymore.

also interesting: i got a lot of milk when I pumped the day after i had a whole night’s sleep- like double (8 oz) the usual (4 oz).

sometimes I’m so tired from waking up to nurse all night, and that when i open my eyes and see baby I’m not sure if he just finished eating and I should pick him up to burp, or if he was about to eat and i should give him boob. still feeling confused, disoriented, anxious, and physically losing my balance a lot, and I think this won’t end until I finally get to return to normal sleep.

11/24/21

Past week or so, seems he’s regressed a little and instead of waking in 3 to 4 hour stretches, wakes every 2 to 3 hours at night.

11/26/21

it’s weird taking care of someone who won’t remember most of this time together, but you will. Like caring for someone constantly on roofies while you’re sober.

hunter was looking at me today and wriggling as usual and reached out and touched my face for the first time. I don’t know if he meant to or it was just the wrigglies, but it seemed purposeful to me, bc he was looking at me, in my eyes when he did.

11/27/21

R did something cute: last night I found my big hair claw I was looking for, for the past few days. it was clipped onto his bath towel in the bathroom, and I don’t remember why I left it there (also a side effect from no sleep, bc i usually remember where I put everything and why). but I showed him it when I found it and was like, “did you see my clip was on your towel?” and he was like, “yeah, it’s been there for the past few days – I thought you left it there on purpose.” I just think it’s so cute that he would let me do such an absurd thing like obstructing his one bath towel he uses after the shower, and not say anything about it. I would never (in my right mind) store something of mine on something of his that he uses so much! That means he was probably drying himself off for the past few days in that towel with my big clip whacking him everywhere hehe.

I can’t express how much my mom has helped me through this time, with the baby. Driving here every day and staying for hours. Not just with the physical chores, but talking with her, being in her presence, her encouragement and advice and common sense and jokes, at this time of being pretty isolated from everything and everyone, she’s brought great comfort to me, so much that I feel like I can never repay her for it. I owe her so much. She’s the mother of mothers.

kind of cruel how, at this time when we can have unprotected sex pretty safely, there is no time, and there’s no energy for it. It’s just dangling there and we can never reach it, or even feel like reaching it, even, for me, because I’m so tired.

hunter’s eating schedule (and so my sleep schedule) is like: 11:00 pm, then 2:00 am, 4 am, 6 am, 8 am, 10 am, etc. with a long nap (for him) during the day. when he wakes me up to eat, I’m often in the middle of dreaming.

I noticed that 10 am feels like 3 in the morning for me. it feels like i’m waking up in the middle of the night.

i can’t explain the niceness also- there is this beautiful side of sleeping with him, when he’s out like a light and peaceful with his arm or leg (or both) having magnetized toward me under the covers and he leaves them there touching me all night, subconsciously making sure I’m there.

11/17/21

I’ve never made up so many stream-of-consciousness, rhymey songs on the fly before. but it helps to sing something when you’re bouncing him.

11/18/21

I can’t believe something that smiles like this…came out of me.

11/21/21

had the best date yesterday for r’s bday. He planned us going to Longwood Gardens, and didn’t tell me where we were going, so it was a nice surprise. mom watched Hunter at home. and there was a second surprise – when he woke me up at around 11 am, I hadn’t slept all night and was dead tired cause i’d been waking to breastfeed, and told him. So after we’d been walking around all day at the Gardens, he was like, “can’t wait for your second surprise” (he was giving me surprises all day even though it was HIS birthday) and it was that he’d set up lots of blankets and pillows in the back of our van, and said I could take a nap. it was really nice. He drove the hour home in the dark while I was all comfy surrounded by blankets in the back.

11/9/21

something I thought was cute yesterday, we just had daylight savings so it’s one hour later than usual, and our phones changed but our microwave and oven clocks didn’t change, and I was telling R, maybe let’s leave it that way so when we find out the real time  after looking at the oven and thinking it’s later, we’re relieved that we have an extra hour, and he told me he was thinking the same thing lol

when I opened the window today, there were so many dead leaves outside rustling around in the wind that at first I thought it was running water- it made the same sound.

11/12/21

around 10:30 AM: think I just heard his first laugh, it was only 1-2 seconds, in his sleep.

I think it’s cute: when me and R are not watching TV together- we watch the bad stuff. Like I’m watching by myself right now so I picked this romantic movie called The Knight Before Christmas lol. And when I wasn’t there recently, he was watching this bad Keanu Reeves movie about a guy who clones his whole family after they die in an accident. But then when we’re together, we watch stuff we really like that gets us excited: 30 Rock, currently. Before, it was Stranger Things, Glow Up, etc.

I feel like…even though I’m like over the moon about work staying remote (boss announced it recently), I won’t be able to really, fully appreciate all the time I’m going to get to spend with my son – my only child- until he grows up and I look back on it.

last night or the other night, I was thinking about SIDS: like, if all of Medicine can’t explain why some babies just die suddenly, for no apparent reason…I think babies must inhabit a totally different world than us. Like…they must not see anything the way we see it, or experience anything like how we think they do.

R said something so special tonight, it came out of nowhere it seemed like to me. He was holding Hunter, playing/comforting him, and I was just putting all the condiments back in the fridge (we had hot dogs for dinner) and he walked into the kitchen holding Hunter and without any segue was like, “We’re so lucky we get to hold him close like this right now” and I looked at Baby all fat and soft and cuddly in R’s arms. R continued, “When he grows up, like when he’s 15, he probably won’t want us to hold him like this anymore. I know it’s stressful sometimes but…this is a really nice time.”

11/1/21

today I think was kinda the first time I felt really excited to pick up and hold Hunter. We have this automatic baby swing that I just found out a few days ago, will sometimes lull him to sleep for a while if I put it on the highest setting (was so relieved to get another time-buying tool in my belt). But the feeling came today when he had been swinging in there for a while – like an hour or so- while I’d been cleaning up and doing chores. I kept looking at how cute he was whenever I passed him, and what chores I could do on the couch in front of him, I did, just so I could stare at him – he’s getting fat- he has neck rolls and leg rolls and his head had tilted to the left from the swinging so it looked like he was just this curious innocent sleeping fat thing, and I hurried up to finish what I had to do so I could hold him again, imagining how he would feel in my arms (he’s getting heavy too). He’s so warm. He’s warmer than me – he sweats easily. Maybe it’s taken me so long to feel this typical mom feeling of missing baby (he’ll be two months old in 9 days) because I’d been so stuck to him since the day he was born- no time away from him – but then discovering the swing could buy me time – even an hour or two sometimes (but it doesn’t work all the time) – gave me the time and space to finally step back and see him bigger picture, and miss him.

11/2/21

been thinking of something lately that R told me, maybe a few weeks ago, -I’m pretty sure it was after Hunter was born. it seemed like something he’d kind of just realized after thinking about it a lot. He told me he thinks it was his “fault” – the pregnancy. Because we were both, officially in words to each other, trying to NOT get pregnant. But what he told me was he thinks it was him who did it, subconsciously, because he thinks he really wanted to be a dad. I was just like “ok..” when he told me. It would have been easy for him to “accidentally” slip up, because the method we were using was I was tracking my cycles using basal body temp chart (along w other signs) and when I saw I was in fertile period I would just tell him to not cum in me, and trusted him not to. For a while after he told me, with all the hardships of round-the-clock care of Hunter, I would sometimes in my mind “blame” R, saying to myself like, “the reason I am getting up to change a diaper at 3 in the morning right now is only because R wanted a baby and didn’t tell me and now I’m stuck with this life.” But…after a few more weeks of thinking of it…I realized the whole reason I chose to be with R- chose to marry him- was partly because I knew he was the kind of person who pushed me to do things that I was too…scared or lazy or shy to do, but really wanted to. He proved this to me while we were dating, and I realized that…if he does this while we’re married, I shouldn’t fault him for it, because it’s really a characteristic I like/want, and I knew it all along, AND I’m actually…happy we have Hunter. I know that…if 100% left up to me, I’m pretty sure I would never have chosen to get myself pregnant: I was scared of all the work and responsibility. But now that it’s all happened…I can kind of foresee, after this dark period of Not Sleeping is over, I can kind of see that…this baby will change our lives for the better, and is a great blessing.

11/4/21

was thinking today about seasons in the northeast. How the cold, even though we don’t like it and it doesn’t feel good, makes the spring and summer so much more beautiful and relieving, like they are delicious heavenly rests between the peaks of contractions. I think, probably, those living in areas that are warm all the time don’t feel this exhilaration when the warm weather returns. and sometimes, even the cold can be beautiful (snow).

The other night, I felt so bad and sick like I was coming down with a fever, but the next day I woke up and the feeling was gone, I felt normal. Then yesterday I had one of the most stressful days I’ve ever had in my life I think (went to used car dealer to get better deal on a car, it was 1 1/2 hrs away, spent so long there, office was small and smelled like cigarettes, had to pull over on the side of unfamiliar highway at night to nurse crying baby on the way home), and thought I would be feeling tired today, but I actually feel better than usual. Weird.

it was last week or the week before, I fell asleep, a quick nap, while nursing and dreamt that I was apologizing to Baby my cat (passed away) because recently (in real life) I’ve started slipping up and calling Hunter some of the same pet names that I used to call Baby. I felt sad, guilty, and sorry in the dream. like I betrayed Baby a little bit by using the same pet names on both my babies, even if I used some just one time with Hunter.

10/25/21

shooting pain sometimes, briefly, in boobs and vag. I think cause of all the breastfeeding, they’re filling up again and being emptied so often, hour by hour, my body has never gone through something like this before, and I feel it’s just part of the process I guess? how both these parts are connected, in a system.

10/28/21

had company-wide zoom mtg this morning. I was nervous that baby was going to wake up, and want to be fed, and cry (all three DID happen just as the meeting was starting, but it was fine, I’d prepared a bottle, and I saw an attorney have his kid on his lap so I didn’t feel like the only one) but it was really nice to see everyone again; some ppl I hadn’t seen since March 2020. After the meeting, I felt, unexpectedly, a little better. A little more like myself. I realized why: these people I’d just seen—they knew me before my identity got consumed by having a baby. They saw me skateboarding down the street to work in Philly, sitting on my break on my phone in the lunchroom, every morning at morning meeting, little interactions in the hallway and elevator, had seen me at company parties and baseball games and just familiar with the everyday work me that was the old me. And that…they were still like, alive to remember this, and that I got a chance to see them today…just felt good, like it brought back more parts of me that went missing when I entered the world of not sleeping and no time – the world of Baby.

kind of related: the other day, realized I started feeling a little less out of control regarding time. I think it’s a mix of: knowing Baby better, so familiar with when he’ll wake up and sleep and just getting the hang of new routine more, in general, and that he’s sleeping a little longer now (seems like we go to sleep around midnight, then he eats around 4 am, then sleeps and eats again around 7 or 8, so it’s turning into 3-4 hour sleep stretches now instead of 2-3 hours, which kind of makes a difference when you’re sleep deprived). The pacifiers don’t really work anymore (he recognizes they are “fake” I think, and will scream-cry with them in his mouth and won’t accept anything but the boob or bottle when he’s hungry). Sometimes I lug him around in a baby sling if I really need to get stuff done and he won’t stand me being away from him. But that I started to feel this semblance of normal returning was weird, bc when I felt it, it also reminded me/showed me just how far from my old self I’d been removed: the other day when I briefly felt well-rested, I was kind of like, “what is this feeling?” I didn’t recognize it because i hadn’t felt it in so long.

seem to not be eating much lately. I think it’s (again) just not enough sleep, so I don’t feel like major eating. I kind of WANT to eat a lot, but have to stop after a few bites because I feel like my body is so tired it can’t digest a big meal. I’m just like grazing throughout the day.

10/29/21

was just cleaning out a closet and found this old keychain ex gave me. It was from Japan, a little wooden red ball-face with two blank eyes and you are supposed to draw in the pupil of one eye when you start your dream, and the other eye when you feel you’ve completed/reached your dream. And I looked and saw I filled out both eyes already – I forgot about this, it was an old keychain, I think maybe many years ago I filled them both out and remember feeling good/truthful about filling the 2nd eye out, and when I found it today I thought, “I’m really happy that I filled these out before I got married and had a baby.” Like, I’m glad I didn’t let anyone make marriage and having baby my “true” dreams; they’re just really nice things that happened along the way.

10/17/21

last night we were talking for a little on the couch and R said that if he knew how hard having a baby would be, he wouldn’t have done it, but now that it’s done, he’s glad he did it.

10/19/21

God thank you so much for this baby, thank you for trusting this child’s life to me. Give me the wisdom to protect this child. Give me the wisdom to love this child. give me the wisdom to grow this child, give me everything I need mentally, spiritually, emotionally, intellectually for him- for his life. I know I don’t have it now, but I know it’s possible to have, I know you can give it to me, if you gave me him. I know I am not this person now, but I know you can make me become her. please help me.  please help me and my husband, please guide us always, to what’s right. Amen.

10/21/21

when I woke up around 7:20 this morning, I could have sworn he slept through the night..but now that I think of it, I think the (two?) times during the night he woke up to eat, I was so tired I fed him almost in a sleeping state, so I didn’t really remember it.

10/22/21

pacifiers have helped me a lot lately. I think I have like 10 scattered around the house now. before the birth, I kind of vowed not to use them, cause I had read that they can confuse baby regarding the breast/make it harder to breastfeed. But he is as interested as ever, and most importantly, they buy me TIME. When he’s crying to eat, and I need to do some things quick like eat something, go to bathroom, arrange the bed, get water, etc., I can stick one in his mouth and he’ll be quiet sucking while I do these things in preparation to sit and feed him for a while (he usually takes a while to eat—he can lie there breastfeeding for an hour or even two). I would put pacifiers near the top of my mental-health-saving postpartum list.

10/23/21

“there is nowhere we can go that is outside the presence of God.” – audiobook I’m listening to, forgot title

10/12/21

My favorite moment of the day: tonight we were watching a movie on the couch, and Hunter was on my lap with his little hand on my arm, and R moved closer and rested his head on mine and put his arm around me and it was the best moment of the day because we were all three lightly touching each other, together in a quiet moment. It was so nice. It was like that feeling when you’re standing in a circle of people and everyone joins hands.

I love when Hunter falls asleep on my chest. He doesn’t do it often, or for very long; I can count on one hand the number of times. when I put him on my chest, he usually starts rooting around frantically for the boob. But sometimes, he’s so tired that he just falls asleep there for a few minutes. I love his warm, compact little weight on me laying still, our respective body heats in a circular exchange, chest to chest. on these rare occasions, i put away anything I’m doing, like reading on my phone, and just lay back and savor it.

ever since the birth, but actually since late pregnancy I think, have been losing my balance, like tipping over and needing to steady myself on a wall or railing. It actually makes me kind of mad, because I had such control over every little thing about my body before. but I feel like this disorientation will go away, maybe, once I fully heal/get more sleep/get back to normal. I hope it will.

10/14/21

sometimes I think when I am literally on my way to heaven, it will look exactly like the streets to my house in the sun, on my bike. Or it will look how it does biking down long winding Kelly Drive, when it’s deserted in the rain. My favorite part is- when the river’s on your left- that sharp bend that goes around the huge rock – I love…not knowing what or who you’re going to suddenly see around the corner.

so funny how having a baby can bring you together (here is this magical person you two made) and separate you (much less time and energy for each other) at the same time.

last night, R sleeping upstairs but he heard baby crying and fussing around 1 AM and he came down to help me. He took Hunter and walked around downstairs cradling and rocking him and gave him pacifier until he fell asleep – this gave me such (temporary) relief. Then R went to sleep and got up at like 5 am for work. Tonight he told me that when his alarm went off in the morning, he was so tired he was afraid he was going to fall back asleep after shutting it off. …God, thank you so much for my husband, may he be the most blessed man in all the world.

10/4/21

stopped bleeding a few days ago, which was a significant physical and mental relief.

10/6/21

I miss wearing clothes like a normal person. But he wants to eat so much and so often that it doesn’t make sense for me to. I just walk around the house topless all day and night. whenever I try to get dressed, like wear a bra and a shirt, I have to take it all off in the next few minutes because he wants to eat every hour, more or less. I feel like I’ve tried getting dressed every couple days and the same thing happens, so I’m not really getting dressed anymore. just wearing a shirt sometimes, to be decent.

also, tonight when R said good night to me, I actually felt a little angry. I felt angry and jealous just at his simple “good night” because I knew he was going to sleep the whole night, and I wasn’t- that he was in for a full night’s rest, and I was going to get up every two hours, again. I think when R goes to sleep, it may be the saddest time of the day for me, because I go live this other life – this night life that’s really hard to maintain- while he gets to sleep- the thing I want most. Maybe it wasn’t logical for me to feel this way, bc there’s nothing he can do about it, and he was just being nice as usual. But that’s how I felt when he said his innocent “boa noite.” kind of like a resentful, “OK have fun with that – I’ll be down here and awake while you do.”

10/7/21

When friends and relatives come to visit, afterwards I imagine how nice their lives are in the respect of not having the responsibilities that come with a newborn baby. I also noticed that when me and R are watching TV, I daydream how strangers I see in the commercials – thin and obviously non-pregnant girls- how carefree and flexible and weightless they must feel, and I wistfully remember how I felt like that most my life. On top of this, I find myself becoming envious even of non-human living things that are not tethered to a baby. I see squirrels pass by the window, hunting, squirreling, playing… and I’m jealous that they can run so freely, and not have anyone’s life depending on them.

The day after I stop breastfeeding, I want to get so drunk. I want to go somewhere really fun and drink so much that I need a Lyft home. So, like a year from now. So like October 2022. It actually makes me feel more optimistic and hopeful, to count down the days.

10/9/21

sleeping on baby-pee-stained sheets cause i just did two full loads of laundry today, and I refuse to do three loads in one day.

never did so many things one-handed/multitask before: going to bathroom while holding baby; brushing teeth while going bathroom; drinking milk or juice or water in the shower to save time, and from the carton; eating from pots and pans- not wanting to take that extra minute to plate it up and not to mention wash that plate afterwards; talking to R/mom while not looking at them because I’m trying to get something else done…I’ve never been in such a hurry during my daily tasks before, because I’m afraid he’ll wake up any minute and I’ll be chained to one spot nursing for the next hour or two, again.

10/10/21

(4:52 am)

test it on the inside of your wrist: if this is the life you want, if this is the life that’s good for you.

9/27/21

I could watch his face all day…it goes from smile to grimace to eyes rolling back as if dreaming, to almost crying, to peaceful… it spans so many different expressions over the course of like, a minute, when he’s sleeping.

9/29/21

I thought something this morning, and the darkness of it surprised me. I just woke up (well woke up for the 3rd, 4th time all night) and looked at the time and was laying there thinking how my mom would probably be here soon (she comes over every day to help with the baby), and my mind thought of a scene she might find when she let herself in and pushed open my bedroom door. I don’t know why I thought it. I don’t think I ever thought something like this before.  I won’t say what it was; I would never do it – Never. But I thought it, I imagined it- my mind even started imagining the details of it –the “how.” And that my mind was so interested in the technical, real-world details of “how I would do it” at that moment upset me – that’s what made me start crying – not my present state, not waking up all night, not my precious, precious baby – just watching how interested my mind was at the moment, how when the thought occurred, it kind of…enchanted me/swept me away- how I didn’t immediately push the thought away – how in the moment I thought it, it seemed…like a real option, like an escape. “An escape from what?” I asked myself. And I realized I’m just afraid (and not to mention tired/out of it from not sleeping through each night, still). I was afraid…I don’t know. I’m afraid of…being a parent, maybe. I’m afraid of how hard it will be, how hard the future will be. Schools and teachers somehow scare me the most. What will he learn? The wrong thing from school? The wrong thing from friends? How to be fake and tough and macho from friends and only reveal a very narrow side of himself to the world? How to put up emotional walls, from public school? What will happen to him, to fuck him up? Stuff happens to everyone—everyone has some type of trauma, I think. Why would I bring him here, to this world, to go through trauma? Does he even want to be here? Did he even ask to be here? What can I give him? What can I possibly offer him to make his life better? I’m just scared…I won’t be enough. That I won’t be good enough for him…what he needs… or something. I feel like I don’t know enough; that I should know more. I feel unqualified to be such a huge influence on someone’s life. It’s such a responsibility, I think:  guiding and raising a totally innocent mind – a blank slate. What if I do something wrong and it hurts him—then his pain and misfortune is my fault. Again, I think it’s this lack of sleep/messed-up routine I’m currently caught in/plus hormones probably, that’s contributing to the dark thought I had. Again, I didn’t realize how grounding and necessary sleep and routine are, for me, and I don’t think I’ll ever take them for granted after this season passes. Ahh…stretching out in my own bed, all to myself, all the time I want to sleep – what absolute fucking luxuries I never realized, until they were gone.

I just also realized: before I left for the hospital to give birth, I had said Psalm 23 out loud to myself in the mirror, because I thought the birth would be the hardest part of all this—the culmination of difficulty. And maybe in terms of physical intensity, it was. But what I realized is that …mentally and in all other ways, I think that THIS time right now—this like…dark cycle that seems endless sometimes, of: getting woken up by his cries every two hours, wanting so much to go back to sleep but knowing I can’t- that I have this duty, then forcing myself up in bed to feed him, feeding him for an hour or more straight sometimes- trying to keep my head up/awake, legs falling asleep from staying in one position, getting up & changing his diaper, trying to get a moment to eat/go to bathroom, the days and nights passing outside my window, doing this over and over and over every few hours, with just a few hours’ break when my mom comes or R can help—I realized that THIS is “the valley of the shadow” that I have to get through, for me. It’s THIS that I need the most help with: it’s long, slow, drawn out, and in a way, painful. It’s also kind of a mindfuck, because it FEELS so forever. But logically, I know and understand it won’t be forever. That nothing is forever. I will fear no evil. I know you’re with me.

10/2/21

Tonight was signing up Hunter for the tuition rewards program with my health insurance, and commented to R that it’ll be the year 2039 when our son graduates high school. R replied that he didn’t even think he (himself) would live that long, and said “now I have to make sure I stay alive so I can see him graduate.” we laughed 🙂 I never fathomed myself in the year 2039 either, until now. I never planned or saw myself so far into the future, because I didn’t have a reason, before.

Tonight, we got some rare time together bc Hunter fell asleep and we had just finished dinner. I wanted to get more chores done, clean more, but R pulled me down onto the bed. He wanted to cuddle and held me. He said into my ear, “I miss my wife.” And his words paired with our laying there wrapped up together just made me think about how much everything had changed, how we never got moments like this anymore- never got to really choose these moments for ourselves anymore – they just spontaneously came along like this if we were lucky…and I started to cry. I said, “what if it never goes back to the way it was?” And R said that it would, that of course it would. then we did some stuff, but couldn’t go all the way because I haven’t had my postnatal checkup yet (which actually, I’m kind of loving the temporary restriction of this- the “rule” of no penetration- something we CAN’T do forces us to be more creative- but I think R is frustrated by it lol). Anyway afterwards he said, “I love your body.” And he added, “I think you got prettier since the baby. You’re even prettier now than before.” I don’t know why he said this…I’ve been feeling like I’m barely surviving, barely making it through each day- but maybe he really thinks this.  It melted my heart. And I believed him. I believed it like a repeated affirmation that came true.

9/19/21

I like how R is really involved with Hunter and the birth. Like, we discuss things about Hunter’s future and he has opinions and he really seems to care (adjusting my hold during breastfeeding to more like what the lactation specialist showed us, setting up his crib and room and the house and everything, carrying everything, taking good care of us, just doing everything he can…) He was telling me the other day that he read that when you become a dad, your brain changes – like a dad’s brain is different from a single guy’s brain. I can see he’s changing. I know I must be changing too.

Just dropped phone on Hunter’s face by accident while trying to record a cute snore he was making. Felt so bad, kissed his head and apologized and stroked him. He didn’t even wake up though. My second mom fail I think (first one when I tried to clip his nails and clipped one way too short- it bled and he cried.)

9/21/21

Started crying today when I was in bed pumping milk on one side and feeding Hunter at same time on the other side, while R whisked all around me, getting things done, doing chores and activities and stuff for the house. I’m not used to being so still, inert. I wanted to be able to participate in all the same actions R was doing, to be physically able..but I was just “chained” to the bed in one position while Hunter fed for the longest time, and my neck was hurting. And it hurts my back sometimes too.

9/24/21

I never realized what lack of sleep will do to you, until I had the baby and am really suffering from lack of sleep (he wakes up like every 2 hours, to breastfeed- I haven’t slept a full night yet in over two weeks). The worst side effect from lack of sleep, for me, comes when it’s really late at night, and R is asleep upstairs (I’ve moved to the downstairs bedroom while I heal, so don’t have to go up and down the stairs). I think/or am afraid I see a figure standing in the dark open doorway, and that he’ll come and strangle me or kill me and Hunter in the bed or do something scary like that to us, cause we’re so vulnerable. And I think/am afraid some person’s face or a monster or an animal are going to suddenly appear right against the windows beside the bed, from out of the dark, make a huge thumping noise against the window. I also get this fear, while I’m feeding him in the half-dark, that Hunter’s face will suddenly change and he’ll look at me with possessed eyes and try to like, kill me or claw my eyes out or something (he’s really strong for a baby, and his nails are long/grow fast). I never used to get fears like these, or think along these lines at all, until I didn’t sleep enough. Never realized how precious and just essential sleep is, until it’s getting away from me every night now. Sometimes I’m so afraid that I think I’ll get nightmares, but thankfully, haven’t had any nightmares yet, just regular dreams. I don’t like sleeping so far away from R – I like sleeping upstairs in the bedroom closer to him. I miss him. I used to massage him every night and we’d talk before bed, but for the past two weeks, because of baby needing round-the-clock care, we haven’t had time for this ritual. 

9/25/21

i told R how i was scared and missed sleeping closer to him. so tonight he started sleeping on the couch, downstairs with me. i said he didn’t have to, but he still did. it was one of the best moments of the day. and I wasn’t scared anymore, last night, cause I knew he was close by.

I feel like I got more of my sweet tooth back lately, since Hunter’s been born. Been craving fruits like grapes, watermelon, apple juice…any juicy sweet stuff, and want more desserts like ice cream and milkshakes and sweet snacks. Wonder how much is physiological and how much is just trying to comfort myself after a long and exhausting labor, and maybe some of it is also due to lack of sleep- I read if you don’t sleep enough, you crave more sugar.

9/26/21

(4:12 am) i’m pretty sure if you can’t find a metronome, an electric breast pump could work in its place.