It goes with the newborn territory doesn’t it? You need to expect to be tired for at least the first year of having a child but there’s tired and then there is TIRED.
Remember that almost haze you lived in for the first few weeks after your child was born? The hourly feeds/ numerous nappy changes .. at a time when your baby was just getting used to life on the outside and found it hard to settle. It’s to be expected in that fourth trimester.
We are still in that haze. 10 months on. We aren’t tired anymore, we are barely functioning. I look like a zombie or as a homeless man in my local city centre told me .. I look absolutely knackered – and this was from someone who sleeps on the actual street.
With Izzy we were tired a lot of the time but that was normal waking up to 2-3 times a night and having early mornings type of tired. This is on another level. These are actual sleepless nights and it’s a different kind of exhaustion I can tell you. It seeps into your bones ( bone tired) it can make you incredibly grumpy and hard to live with ( sorry friends and family) and it makes every day seem so very long and difficult. It makes things like anxiety harder, depression is more depressing and minor ailments such as a simple cold feel like the full blown flu.
I’m still breastfeeding but I think those days are certainly numbered now. It’s not the feeding that is the problem but being awake so much of the time means that those 3 night feeds completely drain me. I wake feeling hungover. Feeling angry. Feeling tired. Why won’t she just sleep?
Today we are trying some final adjustments to her bedroom – a new mattress ..a new sleeping bag maybe. Tomorrow she is booked in for Cranial Osteopathy – I will keep you posted on how that goes.
For now I just needed to vent. Sorry for the ramble. Send all the chocolate please.
Nicola says
I have just read your post after returning from holiday and just had to reply. My kids are 2.5 years and 10 months and we are STILL at that newborn sleep stage also. My oldest slept through properly from 15 months and I am crossing my fingers that her little brother sorts himself out earlier!! I am not breastfeeding, I gave that up at 12 weeks as I just could not take it anymore due to sleep issues.Admittedly though putting him on to bottles didn’t change his habits at all. Sleep deprivation has caused so many issues and I have been put on anti anxiety meds, fun! I so get where you are coming from with the bone tiredness, you really can’t appreciate the this level of sleep deprivation until you are going through it. I am YorkshshireLass_ on twitter if you want to chat.
Tattooed Mummy says
oh wow. When the homeless are pitying you, you know you are tired. I have no cunning plan, we had a sleeper from (almost) day one. But I hope you get some rest soon. xxx
munchiesandmunchkins says
Thanks lovely xx