Sleep Deprivation at it's Finest

Before our Monkey was born, I once wrote about the Dude's crazy night time shenanigans and wondered whether or not I should be concerned with what he would say and/or do in his sleep after our baby was born.

Well, guess what?

He's not the one we need to worry about.

I am.

As it turns out, sleep deprivation and I make for a humorous combination.

Over the past few weeks, I have been compiling some of the better conversations and experiences that I have had during the wee hours of the night.

Of course, the Dude is not entirely innocent himself. There have been a number of times he has woken me up in the night just to ask me what I'm doing, to double check that I have not hidden Eva somewhere under the blankets while frantically searching for her, or to ask me if that is my leg or the baby. But, overall, I am the one guilty of strange nocturnal behavior.

The first evidence of my insanity occurred on the fifth night of my sweet baby's life. It was Sunday, we had taken her to church, had company all afternoon, and my milk had come in that day. I was an emotional wreck. My mom was still here, so around 8:30, she sent me to bed and said she would stay out in the living room with Evalyn and bring her to me when she was ready to eat. A few hours later, she opened the door to my room and woke me. I had been dreaming about my milk (I guess it was heavily on my mind) and I was also very sweaty. I sat up and said to my mom, "I can feel all the milk under my chin! Can you feel it under yours, too?" My mom then questioned whether or not she should leave the child in my care.

The next incident occurred exactly a week later. It was Sunday night again and Eva and I were in bed on our own for a few hours. The Dude plays hockey from 10:30-11:30 on Sunday nights and sometimes goes out for beer and pizza afterward. That day had been a particularly rough and fussy day for Eva so I asked him to please come home straight after, just in case it ended up being a long night for me. I went to bed as early as possible, woke up to feed her once and then woke again a while later. The clock is on his side of the bed, so I reached across, over top of him, to tip the clock towards me to see the time, and upon realizing that it was 1:40 am, thought to myself, "What a stupid jerkface. He went out even though I asked him not to". I angrily rolled back over to go to sleep. I moved my leg and felt something ... his leg. It took me a few minutes to realize that I had not even heard him come in, but yes, in fact, he was in bed and was not out at the Pizza Co.

A few nights ago, I woke in the night "feeding my baby", although I didn't quite remember getting up to get her out of her bed. A few seconds later, I realized that the object at my breast was not Evalyn, but was actually my husband's pillow. And Evalyn was crying in her bassinet. Oops.

And finally, last night we had a fussy evening which involved her either eating or screaming at all times from 6:30-9:30 pm. This made for an exhausting evening for me. The Dude was home to help most of it, but at about 8:30 he had to run out and do a few quick errands for work. Around 9 pm, the exhaustion got the best of me, so I climbed in bed with Eva, fed her again and finally she fell asleep! When the Dude got home about a half hour later, he took her out into the living room so I could get some solid sleep and said he'd bring her back in around 11:30 when she'd eat again. It wasn't until he brought her in to me for the late evening feeding that I realized I had gone to bed fully clothed. Wearing jeans. Normally, this would make me so uncomfortable that I wouldn't be able to sleep but I am pretty certain I can sleep in any situation now. In fact, when I fed her at 11:30, I was so tired that I almost considered staying the way I was and not changing into PJs. But I did.

So, looks to me like the Dude is no the one we need to worry about and it should be me wearing the security bracelet to set off an alarm if I try to take her out of the house in my sleep :)