I feel as if lately my blog posts have been fairly soppy and reflective. I have shown you all how much I love my children and my family life. So far it has mainly been all sunshines, rainbows and unicorns, metaphorically speaking. Now I feel the need to shed light on something a little less rainbow-y.
Night time.
Without further ado, here are the events that unfold at night time;
1. Late bedtimes. If your child takes a devious late nap, even if it was just for a mere 5 minutes, you are in trouble. Those naps are powerful and can fuel those toddlers for hours. It's the equivalent of an adult drinking 8 red bulls.
2. The night feeds. Surely babies should be sleeping through at 6 weeks? Not to shock you new Mums out there, but my youngest still feeds at least one to two times a night. For the Mums of babies that do sleep through, I need your secrets. Now. No matter how much my Son drinks and eats before bed time, he is still a milk monster in the night.
3. Babies never look cuter than when they are in their milk induced coma.
4. Your bed will feel like bliss after a long hard day parenting. It will feel like heaven after those night feeds.
5. After a feed at night, be sure not to take the bottle out too soon or they will be screaming so hard for at least 10 minutes. Even if the bottle is empty, they like to just suck the air out of the bottle while sucking the sleep out of your night time. If you decide to then refill this empty bottle, you should know, the damage has been done and the screaming fit is irreversible. So you and the neighbours 4 doors down just need to ride this out.
6. You will on several nights feel so tired you want to vomit. You sometimes will actually heave.
7. The husband has the power to sleep through it all. I've tried playing dead as such but he still doesn't budge. He could be playing a really good game of it.
8. Frequently you drop the bottle or your phone. Never the baby though. It's sleep while feeding magic. It is very common to have plenty of milk or calpol spillages through the night. Both are stinky and sticky and makes the night awakenings even worse. The silver lining with any calpol giving is licking the syringe after, mmmm. Why do they protest so much?!
9. Your phone is your friend. It has on many occasions been a welcome companion in an otherwise dimly lit suddenly spooky quiet house. So embrace Facebook at 3am and go forth to look at funny Kanye West and Kim Kardashian memes.
10. Changing a nappy in the middle of the night when sleepy eyed is a dangerous game. The baby will most likely pee everywhere. My favourite night nappy change memory has to be when my eldest was only a few weeks old and whilst I lifted his legs into the air to put a new nappy underneath, he weed all in his face and full head of hair. This resulted in a 4am bath. Now we have nappy changing down to a fine art, its rare accidents happen. Unless, of course, we let our youngest sleep in our bed wearing a full nappy. All it takes is that one wee to make the difference between that heavenly bed and laying in a puddle of wee, which stinks.
11. If you are like us and have 2 children in your bed, you may often wake in the night to 4 feet in your face and a husband on the floor. Children like to sleep in the strangest positions.
12. Sometimes toddlers like to chat to you about random stuff in the middle of the night. Or poke your face until you react.
13. It's true what the internet says, no matter what time your children go to sleep, they still get up at the same ridiculously early time. They are the early birds, we are just struggling worms who need to provide the food. Stat.
14. When the children do wake you up and begin their demands, sometimes its ok to cry. I have. I have mourned the loss of sleep. I've cried, then wiped away the tears because I learnt that all your need is a copious amount of coffee to fuel the day with some music and bright lights to get you moving.
I would like to point out that most of these things have happened. So next time you feel at your wits end about the lack of sleep, find comfort that you're not alone. Find comfort in the fact that they won't always be like this, I'm told they grow out of it. Find comfort that one day revenge will happen when you have teenagers laying once where your wee baby used to stand screaming angrily for their Mum to come hastily with milk, you can whip off that duvet, blare 90's music in to their room and demand they get up and get ready for school.
Have you got any secrets to a successful nights sleep? Or are you a zombie-mum too, what's the worst part of night time for you? Pop a comment below, I'd love to hear from you.
For more daily doses of parenting highs and lows, follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.
Night time.
Without further ado, here are the events that unfold at night time;
1. Late bedtimes. If your child takes a devious late nap, even if it was just for a mere 5 minutes, you are in trouble. Those naps are powerful and can fuel those toddlers for hours. It's the equivalent of an adult drinking 8 red bulls.
2. The night feeds. Surely babies should be sleeping through at 6 weeks? Not to shock you new Mums out there, but my youngest still feeds at least one to two times a night. For the Mums of babies that do sleep through, I need your secrets. Now. No matter how much my Son drinks and eats before bed time, he is still a milk monster in the night.
3. Babies never look cuter than when they are in their milk induced coma.
4. Your bed will feel like bliss after a long hard day parenting. It will feel like heaven after those night feeds.
5. After a feed at night, be sure not to take the bottle out too soon or they will be screaming so hard for at least 10 minutes. Even if the bottle is empty, they like to just suck the air out of the bottle while sucking the sleep out of your night time. If you decide to then refill this empty bottle, you should know, the damage has been done and the screaming fit is irreversible. So you and the neighbours 4 doors down just need to ride this out.
6. You will on several nights feel so tired you want to vomit. You sometimes will actually heave.
7. The husband has the power to sleep through it all. I've tried playing dead as such but he still doesn't budge. He could be playing a really good game of it.
8. Frequently you drop the bottle or your phone. Never the baby though. It's sleep while feeding magic. It is very common to have plenty of milk or calpol spillages through the night. Both are stinky and sticky and makes the night awakenings even worse. The silver lining with any calpol giving is licking the syringe after, mmmm. Why do they protest so much?!
9. Your phone is your friend. It has on many occasions been a welcome companion in an otherwise dimly lit suddenly spooky quiet house. So embrace Facebook at 3am and go forth to look at funny Kanye West and Kim Kardashian memes.
10. Changing a nappy in the middle of the night when sleepy eyed is a dangerous game. The baby will most likely pee everywhere. My favourite night nappy change memory has to be when my eldest was only a few weeks old and whilst I lifted his legs into the air to put a new nappy underneath, he weed all in his face and full head of hair. This resulted in a 4am bath. Now we have nappy changing down to a fine art, its rare accidents happen. Unless, of course, we let our youngest sleep in our bed wearing a full nappy. All it takes is that one wee to make the difference between that heavenly bed and laying in a puddle of wee, which stinks.
11. If you are like us and have 2 children in your bed, you may often wake in the night to 4 feet in your face and a husband on the floor. Children like to sleep in the strangest positions.
12. Sometimes toddlers like to chat to you about random stuff in the middle of the night. Or poke your face until you react.
13. It's true what the internet says, no matter what time your children go to sleep, they still get up at the same ridiculously early time. They are the early birds, we are just struggling worms who need to provide the food. Stat.
14. When the children do wake you up and begin their demands, sometimes its ok to cry. I have. I have mourned the loss of sleep. I've cried, then wiped away the tears because I learnt that all your need is a copious amount of coffee to fuel the day with some music and bright lights to get you moving.
I would like to point out that most of these things have happened. So next time you feel at your wits end about the lack of sleep, find comfort that you're not alone. Find comfort in the fact that they won't always be like this, I'm told they grow out of it. Find comfort that one day revenge will happen when you have teenagers laying once where your wee baby used to stand screaming angrily for their Mum to come hastily with milk, you can whip off that duvet, blare 90's music in to their room and demand they get up and get ready for school.
Have you got any secrets to a successful nights sleep? Or are you a zombie-mum too, what's the worst part of night time for you? Pop a comment below, I'd love to hear from you.
For more daily doses of parenting highs and lows, follow me on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram.
Comments