The Brain of Sleep Deprivation

Mal's been waking very frequently lately, and when he wakes up, he doesn't just nurse back to sleep. He sits up. He starts to crawl away. Sometimes, he just looks around the room before head-butting my neck or wherever he hits as he decides it's time to lie back down.

Usually, by the time we wake up wake up in the morning, I'm longing for two hours' more sleep, uninterrupted by a baby. But I get up, and we make it through until night time somehow.

Still, I know this must be doing something to my brain. By the time Daphne was Mal's age, we were one month past my weaning her of her last nighttime feeding (2 AM) because I couldn't handle it anymore, and here we are, still waking 6 or more times per night. The difference, of course, is that we co-sleep with Mal so I don't have to get out of bed. And he's always, with two nights' exceptions, slept "through" the night without my having to get up in order to resettle him. That's been incredible.

But still.

Nine hours' uninterrupted sleep.

What I fool I was not to enjoy and appreciate it more. (And I did appreciate and enjoy it... very much. Especially after the back thing. I wasn't back to taking it for granted, but I would take it less for granted now!)

Anyway, with that in mind, you can just ponder my mental state as the next few things have passed through my brain recently:

1) Hummingbird eggs. They must be tiny. I told James I was picturing the lychee boba I had last week, and he said, "They're probably not that big." Then I pictured Nerds. And I decided that Nerds ARE hummingbird eggs. Hummingbirds just eat nectar and/or sugar water, right? So it makes sense that their eggs would be pure sugar instead of calcium or whatever. I hope you Nerds lovers aren't vegan. I wonder how many nests they have to harvest to make one of the non-"fun"-sized boxes of Nerds.

Okay, I just looked it up. They're about the size of peas or jellybeans - I KNEW IT - and there are typically two eggs laid on different days. I'm going to post a video here; it's out of focus when the second bird hatches, and you can kind of skip around until about 7.5 minutes, then you can watch a momma hummingbird feed her babies! SO PRECIOUS.




2) I know a lot of people have theological issues they are all poised to ask God about in the afterlife, but today as James and I propped ourselves up against the bar in the kitchen, eating tortilla chips with bacon horseradish dip because no one had the heart to make dinner, I could only think of one think of one thing as I watched Mal happily pulling every. single. thing. out of the kitchen cabinets: There are two of us and only one of him. How are we so tired when he's full of energy? (He only had a 45 minute nap today.)

(Yes, I realize I made an error in that up there, but I'm illustrating something here. Where has my mind gone?!)

3) For whatever reason, I'm in a very "the days are long" season. BUT there is light at the end of the tunnel, as MOPS will start in about a month (pray that Mal will make it through the couple of hours without me!) and then the Over 40s Moms group that I asked about just after Mal was born is finally planning a meeting!

Last night was interesting, though. Mal woke up as much as usual, but after about midnight, he didn't feed again until probably 5 this morning. So, basically, he went half the night without feeding. When he woke up, he'd move around, climb over me, sometimes I'd put him on my opposite side, but even when I offered it to him, he wasn't interested in nursing; he just fell back to sleep.

4) 4 TEETH BROKE THROUGH MAL'S GUMS DURING THE PAST WEEK. This brings him up to 10 teeth. (Though you still can't see the four new ones.)

5) I have liked my new camera except for when the flash is needed. It's super slow, and the flash is "blotchy" instead of evenly lighting the photo area. My old camera did that on close-ups (like macros) and I hated it. Yesterday, I realized that every picture I've taken with a flash... I had my hand over the sensor AND the flash, and that's why they've looked like crap. Heh. It's a tiny camera. I just need to get my hand out of the way.

6) When do you consider your baby "walking"? Last week in the cry room at church, a man was telling me that his three-year-old took her first steps at 10 months, but then didn't walk until she was a year old. That got me to thinking about the phrase "started walking." Mal takes steps. He has the ability to walk. But I told James I won't count him as "walking" until it's his favorite source of mobility. James said it's not *his* favorite way to get around, so for clarity's sake, I mean once he chooses walking instead of crawling the majority of the time.

Anyway, who cares? Daphne didn't walk until after her first birthday party; that much I know.

Daphne, on her first birthday. Not walking. Barely eating cake. She wasn't interested.
Sad how she looks nothing like her little brother, right?
(And for those of you who aren't their mom, they have the exact same hands!)

At 13, bless her, she's still walking just fine. So I'm not too fussed about dates and stuff, I guess is what I'm saying.

Whatever number I'm on) I am supposed to be making a grocery list for tomorrow morning (it's HOT out there, and early AM is the only time to get out! Wish our library opened before 10 because we need to go there first) and you're distracting me!