5-Month-Old Angel

Jude has been perfectly delightful lately. He smiles, giggles and babbles constantly. Just yesterday he discovered that his toes reach his mouth, and it's the cutest thing in the world to see him with his bum in the air, hands grasping his feet and his toes between his gums. Don't be fooled. If you see a cute photo of a baby, there's a very good chance it isn't a newborn. Most likely that cute, smiling little bundle of joy is at least 5 months old.

He's also taken to sleeping a lot during the day. He doesn't sleep for too long, but he sleeps like clockwork. 1 hour of sleep followed by 2 hours of awake time then back to sleep for another hour. However, this means he has 4 day-time sleeps which is more than other babies his age. It is a bit of problem for trying to organise my day, especially now that I'm going to Mothers Group.

I've introduced him to solid food. So far he's eating breakfast and dinner but I'm going to add in lunch (I guess) tomorrow (I have to buy some more food first). Breakfast and dinner are easy to implement, but lunch will be a bit tricky since (a) I have not (and never will) force Jude onto a strict routine just for my own convenience and (b) I'm not sure how to manage lunch if I am out-and-about. Anyway, I'm sure it will sort itself out, these things have a way of just working.

Lately Jeremy has been taking the night shift. Since Jude decided to wean himself off the boob, Jeremy can bottle feed him as easily as I can, and since Jeremy can get back to sleep after waking up in the middle of the night and I can't, it makes more sense this way.

However, after 8 solid months of no sleep (including the third trimester when I had pelvic displacement and the pain kept me awake), my body clock was completely out of whack and I just can't sleep any more, so I took some sleeping pills for a few nights to reprogram my sleep patterns and it helped. I have since dropped the sleeping pills and I'm now taking natural melatonin. Last night was a bit difficult for some reason, I think because I had a set-back the night before when the neighbours decided to do aerobics in the middle of the night (or something, they probably came home drunk and decided it was a good time for Dance Dance Revolution).

I just have to keep working on it. I know I'm not alone. I know there are other mothers out there who can't get back to sleep after feeding their babies, either (although I am yet to meet one), but I wonder if I'm the only mother who still can't sleep even now I don't have to get up to feed my baby.