If someone were to ask how I am doing today and I were to answer honestly I would say, “I am exhausted, I have had a persistent headache that feels like someone slapped me across the eyes with an ice cold rag, and Emma is just starting to feel separation anxiety.” 

I think the fatigue finally hit, I had been congratulating myself on how well I was dealing with the sleep deprivation.  Patting myself on the back, ‘Oh you just get used to running on less sleep.  I’ll just be thankful she’s only getting up twice a night.’  Apparently I am not used to it....

Yesterday I came home from work, Scott was bouncing Emma on his belly, an activity that she usually loves, and she was screaming.  She had been fussing all day.  We had planned to go to a movie that night, I quickly discerned that we weren’t going anywhere.  I offered to take her grocery shopping, the drive and the bjorn always calms her.  As I de-worked my outfit and unpacked my bag from work and re-packed for shopping Emma cried every time I left the room and stopped when I walked back in.  My prescription of mommy time seemed to be just the thing.  I was already tired, I vowed to take it slow and treat my self to an iced latte.

And then it came, the brain fog moved in like a thick Scottish weather front.  I had made it through most of the trip, but right there in front of the chocolate, I couldn’t decide.  The same bars of chocolate that we have been buying for two years proved too monumental of a decision.  The two shots of espresso from my latte were somewhere in my body, and I didn’t know where.  I stood there and foggily looked around, I was tired of what we kept buying but nothing else looked like a viable option.  I grabbed something, just anything and got in line.

Emma started fussing in the line, this is it, this is when I become that mom that has the fussy baby in the line at the grocery store.  This is when I abandon my groceries and run to the car because my baby exploded in line…and then she calmed down.  I made it home okay with no incident.

Emma started sleeping through the night at about two weeks old.  After we had trekked across the world from Kenya to the US.  She gave us six weeks of beautiful night long rest.  When we came back to Kenya she was back to waking up one to four times a night.  It is this that is most galling, we know that she can do it, she can sleep eight to twelve hours.  Last night was epic; 10pm, 11:30pm, 1:30am, 2:00am, and then it’s all a blur.  This morning I looked at Scott and asked how many times she got us up, he leaned back in his chair, painfully closed his eyes, and said:

“I can’t even remember, I don’t even want to think about it.”

This all comes with a deep hopelessness as well.  Before when life would carve off the corners of my sleep I knew that eventually, at some point, I would get a full night’s sleep.  Now I don’t know.  I am at the mercy of my daughter’s growth spurts, teething, spitting up, etc.  I guess I will just to have to wear my dark baggy eyes like battlefield scars, with pride.

How have you dealt with the fatigue that comes from babyhood?  Any tips?  Any hints to keep my sanity?



Lara Davis Barnett blogs at Red Earth Safari.