Oh, beautiful morning! (<- singular "morning," not plural)

Wednesday, August 1

This morning I woke up at 5:30. Half asleep, I reached over and turned off my alarm. Wait a minute - I turned off my alarm? I should have been turning off the monitor. Because after I go to bed I'm always woken up by the monitor next. Did I already wake up? Did I just forget that I fed Rose? What was going on?!?

Then it dawned on me:   Rose had slept through the night!!!

That's right, through the entire night. I don't define "sleeping through the night" as sleeping a five-hour stretch, as some crappy non-parent sleep researchers seem wont to do. "Sleeping through the night" means she goes to sleep, then I go to sleep, then I get a full night's rest before she wakes up again. And last night it finally happened! The feat I'd been dreaming of (ha!) for the past many months. (Maybe the past nine months total? A year? I was constantly waking to use the bathroom throughout most of my pregnancy, so let's just say it's been a looooong time since I last had 7+ hours of uninterrupted sleep.)

It was amazing - I felt so rested!!!

Then, of course, it quickly spiraled into panic: was she okay? Did she not wake me because she had stopped breathing? Was she trying to punish me because she hates me and never wants to lay eyes on me ever again? Am I a terrible mother?!?

I took an agonizingly anxiety-ridden shower, choked down my breakfast while trying not to vomit from worry, then finally broke down and asked Mike to go in and check on her.

She was, of course, just fine. Silly mommy needs to worry less!

So there it is! I know this might not happen again for quite some time (although it would be beyond amazing if this is the start of a new trend), but I'm reveling in feeling rested for one day, and cherishing the fact that if she can sleep through the night once, she can certainly do it again.

Three cheers for our great little sleeper!!!


Thursday, August 2

What happened?! Last night she went to bed around 7:30pm, which is her typically bedtime. She then woke up crying so I went in to feed her. Half asleep, I didn't look at the clock until after I was back in bed myself: 10:40. What?!? And then to make matters worse she stayed awake talking to herself for over an hour. (Mike and I let her "chat" since she wasn't sounding upset. But an hour of that? So tiring!) Finally at almost midnight she started sounding fussy so I went in to feed her again, in the hopes that a "milk coma" would convince her to fall asleep. When I turned the nightlight on she lit up with a HUGE smile and started laughing and "talking" even more. It's hard to be upset with the little darling when she does things like that! Thankfully she ate and then slept from midnight until 6:15am. But what a weird thing! Let's hope she doesn't start to have more of these wide awake stretches at night...