Friday, January 10, 2014

Visitors and Lack of Sleep

Since my last post, we have had a great time with Jeremy, Elisheva and her mother, Merle. The day we arrived back in Singapore from Perth, Jeremy came in. As I have blogged about before, Jeremy is the best guest ever. He clearly outlines his trip expectations, they're usually things that appeal to me, he leaves lots of "what's best for you guys" space, and he goes away everyday to get some work done. He also spends a lot of time and energy playing with Samara (which is fun, but it's also exhausting, and I love having a break, and she LOVES playing with him). He sent his document of expectations before his arrival, we discussed what was possible when, we had a plan and we went about it. We ate lots of hawker food, we visited different parts of Singapore, swam...not too much new but it was fun. We had a low-key new years, with Susie coming for dinner and all of us in bed by 11 (though Elie made sure we didn't miss the exact moment of new year...and 1am...and 2am...).

I'm for a low-key new years - or anything - anyways, but as I have probably mentioned, my younger brother, Kenny died on New Years in 2003/4, so this was TEN years since, which was a bit remarkable. Always a killer of plans to do anything fun for the occasion.

Jer left on the 1st, and on the 2nd, one of my best friends since I was about ten, Elisheva, and her mother came to visit. Eli lives in New York and her mom in Toronto, and I was lucky enough to see Eli the night I arrived in New York last January, so we have recently caught up, but it's been a very intense year for her as her father unexpectedly passed away, and it was special to have more time with her and also to see her mother, whom I haven't seen since Shana's wedding in 2002, I believe. Elie started sleeping particularly badly the week they arrived, so I was only about 30% present for their visit, but what I had of it was lovely. They did a full bus tour of Singapore one of the days, then we had a nice dinner at Blue Ginger and walked to the train through Chinatown, and the second day we went to Tekka Market, walked through Little India and swam and took it easy at home. I feel so lucky to have had them come visit - it's amazing to share our life, which feels a bit like a bubble since so many important people in our lives have no idea what it's like, and we have been here for nearly seven years already.

Other than our visitors, the thing that has taken all of my energy and time is Elie's sleeping (or lack of sleeping). He was sleeping from about 7 until somewhere between 1 and 3, and then he would wake up again at between 5 and 7. He has never been a good napper, but I was shlepping him and he was sleeping in the ergo. Then he started waking up between 9 and 11 and won't be settled without eating (though he eats for a good half hour, so I believe he might be hungry...). He then wakes again around 1 or 2, then around 4 or 5 and eats each time and won't be put back to bed easily (i.e. lots of crying in the middle of the night). During the day he is going to sleep easier, but he only sleeps for 30-40 minutes. ONCE he slept for nearly two hours, and that's only once. I want to sleep train him, as we did with Samara, where we will leave him to cry and learn how to sooth himself, but he can't stay asleep for more than five minutes if he's not swaddled, and I can't leave him crying swaddled (and he will break out of it in a minute anyway). I literally don't know what to do, and since it doesn't seem to be getting better (though it got WAAAY worse for a few days and now we're back to normal badness), I don't see an end, which makes me stressed. It's hard to go for WEEKS/MONTHS with no sleep. Last night I went to bed at 8, sleeping by 8:15, but then was woken up at 10. I will continue to go to bed super early to catch as much as I can, but I'm not sure how much longer I can take...and he's nearly five months, so he shouldn't be this bad!!

I was going to throw some photos on this post, but most likely I won't get to that in days, so I will post this and hopefully get the photos soon.

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