Growing Up

I find myself questioning why it is that we are always so eager to see our babies grow up. To do the next thing, to learn the next skill, to gain the next pound. It seems like there is always a milestone waiting in the distance to be achieved, and when it is, there is another. 

As I have wrestled these past few days with trying to get my baby to sleep without me holding him - and desperately trying to break the swaddle - I began to think and wonder why I'm working so hard to push him to that next stage. 

As each day passes he gets heavier and heavier. Holding him all swaddled up and straight is a strain on my back, and he just seems to scream and scream until he finally falls asleep, only to be jarred awake when I put him down. I try so hard to get him to nap so I can get something done - work on event planning, proof read a contract, design a poster, update a website. Running a business and a foundation and being a full time mom is more jobs than one person really can do in 24 hours a day. 

But as I sit here, thinking about night wakings and schedules, errands and meetings, I start to think about how I said I would just put him in the carrier and go about my business. And I think about those days that I did just that and how much happier he had been, and how much better he had slept, and how he barely even fussed. Why am I fighting something that so obviously he needs - just to be with me. 

He just needs me. 

We are so focused on the next - we need to be focused on the now. 

It all brings me back to Saoirse. Now, she was a champion sleeper - through the night at 10 weeks, 12-13 hours a night at 4 months. She took naps when she was supposed to, she slept without being swaddled, she fell asleep on her own. But then there was the hospital - and then coming home from the hospital, and crying in her crib and me not wanting to rush to her side because I wanted her to learn to fall asleep on her own again. And now, all I think of now is how I would give anything to have her crying for me to come snuggle her to sleep, to tell her that everything is ok, and to stroke her head and sing to her. 

And I have the chance to be that for Lochlan. To just hold him, and snuggle him, and stroke his head and sing to him. It's hard to remember that there is no going back to that - there is no rewind when he is 15 and never wants me in his room. That this time when he needs me for everything is so fleeting and so precious, and should be cherished and enjoyed. 

Tomorrow he will be with me. Tomorrow I will just think about the moments, and not about the tomorrows. 

Today

Today has proven to be a trying day. Emotions off the hook. Frustrations high. Anger manifesting. Tears flowing. Mind reeling. No peace at all. This time of year is trying as it is, but this year seems to be taking its toll earlier and more intensely than I remember from last year. Two days of bereavement events probably didn't make it easier. I feel like life has built up this wall of busyness; of things that have to be done; of not having time to deal with feelings and clutter and everyday life; of sleep deprivation. That wall is like a tower of wooden blocks - teetering every so precariously on one another, just waiting for a heavy step, a light wind, a shift in the rug, to topple it over into a mess on the floor. Anticipating when the wall will fall is impossible. The anticipation creates strain of its own. Maybe I need to rethink what needs my focus the most. Too bad the world doesn't seem to want to back me up on that.