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| Little Man passed out at the dance studio with Paige, about three weeks ago. |
I don’t know if you’ve heard of it before, but it’s a real
thing. It’s that state that babies live in for the first couple months of their
lives - completely unaware of what happens around them. They sleep when they are tired, which is
always. The wake only to eat, which inevitably makes them so tired again that
their eyes roll back into their heads and they pass out, at the breast, with
milk running down their chins – it’s a corresponding phenomena often referred
to as Milk Drunk (a very technical term). They could sleep through a rock concert. My
son slept through the trains that pass only a couple blocks from our house –
several times a night - and lay on their horns like they’re leading a holiday
parade.
But then, I’m finding, something changes. Apparently
somewhere around three months of age they start to become aware: aware of people who come to visit; aware of the hustle and
bustle of their parents; aware of the dogs in their faces; aware of the
jostling of the in and out of the car on errand days; painfully aware of
trains. And so my poor baby boy has become overly tired several times in the
past week because his Momma can’t figure out how to adjust with him. My errand
running plans nearly always interfere with his plans for a good snooze.
My inexperienced, first time Mommy brain thinks that the
answer to this problem is a good schedule -regular naps that are easily planned
around. The thing is, I have no idea how to establish one. I sat down two
nights ago and wrote one out. It looked beautiful on my yellow legal pad: hour
for hour descriptions of a perfectly harmonized Drake and Mommy day. I went to
bed determined that the next day was going to hum along according to my new
plan. I’m sure the veteran mommies out there are laughing at me right about
now. Because that is just not how it works. If there is one thing babies are
good for, it’s reminding their parents that life does not always (read “ever”)
work out the way you had planned.
So for the past two days I’ve just been paying attention to
the clock as Drake did his own thing, and I’m amazed/concerned. Little Man
spends the first half of his day in almost perfect one hour increments: one
hour awake, one hour asleep. Later in the day, he stretches the “awake”
portions to something more like two hours. That’s just not gonna work. There is
no way to run an errand – and be back at the house in time to put him down! –
in one hour. Not gonna happen. Not to mention the crazy amounts of gas I would
waste if I only ever ran one errand at a time.
What do I do? Is there a way to help encourage him to stay
awake longer? He is so sad when he’s tired, it sort of breaks my heart to think
of doing it. I would love any advice or feedback.
