It is hard being tired - I'm not going to complain about it, because that's a given. And I'm not so bad, because if I don't have something on, I'll sleep on and off until midday or so.
But it's kind of lose/lose.
I worry that by sleeping half the day, I'm depriving the baby of learning time. Don't get me wrong, after feeding/changing/feeding, we do often lay in bed and chat, or I read to her, or play with toys with her if she's still awake - but as the room is warm and quiet, and I feed her laying down, she'll more often than not go back to sleep too. So I feel bad that I'm kind of encouraging her to be lazy so I can sleep.
If I wake up earlier, I'm less patient. I try to get her to hurry back to sleep after feeds so that I have time to get stuff done - like the dishes, another load of washing, vaccuming, groceries etc. So I feel bad that I'm kind of encouraging her to be lazy so I can do other things.
We spend a LOT of time together. But how much of it is quality, like REAL quality, time?
What SHOULD I be doing?
My 2c? go for the sleep every time. She'll be fine, and she's still so little she needs a lot of sleep. Most babies spend very little time awake at that age. Mine didn't settle into a regular daytime sleep pattern until they were around 6 months, and #1 never really slept for more than about 10-20 mins at a time until then...
ReplyDeletedo what feels right to you (and that may change from day to day).
of course the other answer is along the lines of "no 'shoulds' in child rearing" :-) That way lies madness and guilt.
ReplyDeleteMummy/Crit - I remember the community nurse telling us when she came to see us when baby was a week old - baby was crying 2 hours after her last feed started, and we were going to feed her again, but the nurse told us she could go longer in between, it's more important she get the sleep so she can grow. I guess it's important that she sleeps and grows.
ReplyDeleteI'm trying to work on getting her to smile ;o) We don't do the dim lights/no eye contact thing until after about 8pm at the earliest, so there is still a good 8 hours of active attention time... once she starts interacting, it will be clearer, I think!