Bryan is one of those babies one might consider a sleeper. He only wakes up for certain things, specifically food, diaper change and sometimes some affection. I continue to be amazed how precise this little wakes up right on the dot. His daily rituals are almost identical — and that’s a good thing; it’s comforting and reassuring for newborns, infants and babies to have repetitive, consistent and predictable patterns in their daily routine. But instead of us imposing that onto Bryan, he’s actually teaching us on how it’s done…
Since I am on this topic, I’d like to demystify this — that most people “think” parents of newborns get 2-3 hours of sleep between feeding at night. Try cutting that down to hour between waking moments.
Here’s my logic from personal experience:
1. Baby wakes at 12AM for food.
2. Takes about 20 minutes for him to consume 2 oz of milk. Takes the clock to 12:20AM.
3. Takes about 10 minutes to pat his back to make sure he burps to get all that air out of his tummy. 12:30Am now.
4. Takes about 10 minutes to actually get the little one to completely fall asleep (sometimes not necessary; but sometimes longer). It’s now 12:40AM.
5. Baby sleeps for an hour; wakes up for diaper change. 1:40AM.
6. Takes about 5 minutes to get him back to sleep. 1:45AM.
7. Baby wakes up for food 1 1/2 hour later. 3:15AM.
8. Repeat steps 2 through 7.
That’s my routine on a daily basis. Sometimes he’s extra playful and won’t go back to sleep for an hour or two. So on some days I miss out the entire “break” time in between. Running purely on adrenaline for a week straight is a strange feeling. I am thankful that men don’t have to give birth though, or else the entire species of mankind would have been wiped out millions of years ago…
The upside is Grace has been getting plenty of sleep at the hospital (more than I can say for myself). But she does get woken up every four hours or so by the hospital staff to take her vitals. But she gets out of the hospital today. Hopefully she won’t have anymore fevers.