status update

Wow - I skipped a day yesterday for the first time since I started this blog...perhaps now that the sleeping saga has ended I don't have a specific thing to write about every morning! So an update on that: Judith has slept for 8 hours for the past four nights in a row. And for the past three mornings she's woken up at the same time - so my day is a lot more predictable. It makes everything so much easier! Although it's hard not to take that for granted. For example, this afternoon/evening she didn't want to eat at one of the normal times - she just wanted to sleep. And it sent me into a panic - "she's not going to get enough food" "She's not going to sleep tonight" etc. Fortunately, Lance was here to be the voice of reason. (And why does it matter anyway, right? It's not like I have much of a life outside of Judith right now!)

Tomorrow morning is her two month checkup (how did 8 weeks go by so fast!?!). I'll finally have an answer for all those people who ask "how much does she weigh now?" (as if I weigh her every morning!) I also hope that the doctor can reassure me about how much she eats (10 minutes max!), because I still have worries about that, despite reassurance from a number of people. It's so much more official coming from the doctor. On a sadder note, she also has her first shots tomorrow. I've been taking extra Vitamin C to help her fight any reactions to the immunizations, but I'm still a little stressed that she might have issues...so many scary stories!

That's it for the update...more as it happens!

hanging out

Yesterday Lance was home sick with the beginnings of a cold (he went in today, so I'm hoping the extra time off held off the cold - Judith and I don't want to get sick!) and he spent a lot of time hanging out with Judith. For whatever reason she didn't want to sleep more than an hour at a time yesterday, so she was up a lot more than usual. It was quite providential that Lance was home!

I took some pictures of them together...and as I was downloading them this morning, I saw this one and just loved it...just looking at it makes me smile and relax. At the same time, it's also a very clear picture of how yesterday felt - Lance looks as exhausted as we were feeling, and Judith looks wide awake!

storytelling

I just wrote Judith's story in her scrapbook. I wrote it in first person, as if I were telling her the story, so that as she gets older, she can read it. (See my blog on September 15 for the story, if you don't know it.) And it just reminded me (again) about how important it is to tell these things. Her story is such an example of the power of love, faith, prayer, and patience, and I don't want to forget how miraculous it is. Each time I tell the story, I remember. And I hope that whomever I'm telling it to can be encouraged/inspired/whatever by it.

I pray especially that Judith will be encouraged by her story...that whenever she doubts herself or her worth, she can read it and know how much of a gift of God she is.

8 hours again!

It appears that Judith's sleeping pattern has now changed to 8 hours straight at night. I am extremely thankful, and pray that my body adjusts quickly, so that I can get 8 hours too! Last night she ate at 10:30, fell asleep immediately, and woke up at 6:15. Now I'm hoping that we can establish a routine that starts at the same time every day...but we'll see.

And I guess I'll need to find something else to blog about, because the sleep saga seems to have ended.

sleeping - night #6

8 hours again! Well, actually 8 hours between feedings...it took her about an hour to go to sleep last night, so really only 7 hours of sleep. But then she ate for 10 minutes and went back to sleep for another three hours, so I guess it's more like 10 hours of sleep. However you do the math, Judith slept through the night again, and I am grateful. Since we didn't do anything specific to "help her sleep" last night either, I'm (again) waiting to see what tonight brings...I'm thinking three might be the "magic" number to tell us whether this is going to be a pattern or whether the last two nights were a fluke.

sleeping - night #6

Judith slept through the night last night (10:00-5:45)! (Of course she did, because we'd just decided last night to hold off another few weeks on "helping" her learn to sleep through the night.) I was thinking that the last few days had just been to crazy to be getting her on a schedule, and so we probably weren't training her at all, and we might as well wait another couple weeks until she was a little bit bigger and older and more ready. And then she went and did it on her own!

Her evening was pretty normal - she "tanked up" just fine - on her own really, because she's been wanting to eat every two hours for the last day or so. And then she just slept - which is amazing! I only woke up twice during the nights, although at 5:00 a.m. when I woke up for the second time, I had to get up and check to make sure Judith was still breathing! And when she woke up, she only ate for her normal 10 minutes, so it must not have stressed her out too much to go all night.

Now I'm really curious about what tonight will be like!

night #5

We made the decision (yes, Lance actually voiced his opinion!) to let her sleep until she woke up, and just feed her at that point. She slept for 6 1/2 hours (poor, tired girl!) and woke up ravenous...she ate for 20 minutes!...and then slept for another four hours.

And now, after these five nights of "experimentation" I'm starting to think that I should go back to doing what I did last night (which had been my routine up until five days ago) for a few more weeks and then try this again. Yes, I'm tired at the middle of the night feeding, but I don't really mind losing 1/2 an hour of sleep if I can get five and four hours on either side of it. And it would take away my fear about not feeding her enough. On the other hand, her eating for 20 minutes in the middle of the night is not normal - usually I could hardly get her to eat for 5 minutes - and so I was thinking that she was probably just nursing for comfort to go back to sleep. If that's the case, then I'd just as soon train her out of that as soon as possible.

We'll see what tonight brings.