Day 21-- Born of Frustration

It would be an understatement to say that last night didn't go as planned. Our sweet little girl took a leaf from her older brother's book, and cried all night. It certainly could be colic, although it would be a much milder case than Edgar. I finally managed a nap on the couch, then took the screamer for a while and let Jen get some sleep. All told, I think I got 3 hours of sleep and Jen got less.

Generally, when I'm tired, I get grumpy. At 3 hours of sleep, the grumpiness escalates into general anger. So, I started off our day pretty angry.

Contrary to what I described in the last post, the grandparents slept in this morning, so we were awake with a fussy baby, more or less ready to go, waiting for the grandparents to arrive.

Upon their arrival, there was some discussion as to whether we should cancel the day at the beach, or have grandma and grandpa watch the kids for a while and let us get some sleep before taking off. Ultimately, the decision we made was probably the wrong one, but it was based on the idea that Jen and I didn't want to drive to the coast only to turn around and drive right back again. So, we pushed on and left for the coast.

So here's where the difference in perspective kicks in: Jen's folks are from landlocked Utah, so to come to Oregon includes a requisite trip to the coast. Since they have no ocean to admire, a simple drive to the ocean is sufficient for their needs. Living here in the northwest, I think we expect something a little more substantial. When we go to the coast, we expect to do something at the coast. Unfortunately, we were far too sleepy to communicate any of this.

So, our trip to the coast today involved a long car ride, punctuated by a long baby-nursing session at the side of the road. Then, we had lunch at a restaurant. Then, we went home via an equally long car ride.

No sand between our toes, no walks on the windswept beach, no shopping, no sightseeing except what's visible out the windows of a minivan with two restless kids driving on Highway 101.

To Jen's folks, that was a decent day at the coast. They had a grand time. To me, that was like sitting in a car for 4 hours to go to a restaurant. I'm trying really hard to reconcile the difference in our perspectives. I'll grant that a lot of my attitude is predicated on sleep deprivation, but I still had a pretty miserable day-- one which I would have rather stayed in bed.

My lunch was fantastic-- cracked dungeness crab!-- but it wasn't 4-hours-in-a-car fantastic.

Home and grumpiness, an improvised dinner, and some quiet time followed. Then, we loaded up the kids into the car and took Edgar swimming at the pool at his grandparents' hotel. That was a bit relaxing, at least.

 Now, the kids are sleeping. I plan to, too, before anything else goes wrong.

Day 14-- Two weeks down

Sabrina is 14 days old today. She had a rough night last night, acting colicky like Edgar did. Fussing and crying for hours. It still wasn't as bad as Edgar was, but it was trying. I caught a little sleep on the couch, and then took Sabrina and she slept on me in the rocking chair. Jen was generous enough to take Edgar first thing this morning. 

Honestly, I'm getting really sick of the sleep deprivation. Intellectually, I realize that we have very little to complain about. We have a relatively easy baby, a toddler who is potty training himself (!), and two parents, staying at home full time with two kids. This should be easy, right?

Then why is it so hard?

I stole Edgar this morning, and ran some errands. With a new Wii, and a leftover birthday gift card, we went video game shopping. We bought a strange assortment of games for SNES, N64, and Game Cube as well as Wii. I even picked out a few classic NES games, but put them back on the shelf when I saw how much I'd picked out.  Edgar played in the store while I looked. We got a little plastic Mario figurine with our purchase that he loves.

After naptime, we had kiddy-chaos at our place for an hour or so. I dearly love our next-door neighbors, but 7 kids in our apartment at once makes me crazy. Fighting a fussy baby and a contrary Edgar all night, I was on the verge of losing it all evening. This is reminding me of the darkest days of having Edgar as a baby. Over-tired, achy-headed, nerve-frazzled, and ready to give into despair at the slightest setback. I can't take much more of this.

Edgar was contrary all night-- doing just about the opposite of what anyone asked, menacing his little sister, but never being bad enough to get in trouble.

He spent HOURS today potty training. Sitting there, getting up, changing position, sitting, peeing, being excited, washing his hands for 15 minutes at a time, refusing to get his diaper back on, asking to get back on the potty, etc. Jen informed me that many guides to potty training say to ask your kid if they need to go potty every 10 minutes! That's 160 times in a typical day! I'm not ready for this. Edgar did manage to extrude the tiniest turd I've ever seen into the toilet, so there was the requisite celebration.

Our neighbor suggests that Edgar is potty training himself to get the one-on-one parental attention that he craves. It's working, he gets our attention, praise, love, etc. time and again all day. I'm not sure how I feel about that. I guess that's a really good way to get the attention he craves, and it certainly could be worse. I'm just so tired from everything else that I don't want to be as patient with him as he needs. blah.

I bought the classic old-school Donkey Kong Country for the SNES today, as well as the new Donkey Kong Country for the Wii (I've heard it's way hard), so I spent a few minutes this evening unwinding over the super nintendo. It was a moment of peace in an otherwise hectic day.

Okay, well that's it for today. Garrett has invited Edgar and I over tomorrow, and I'm ready for the distraction. Bring on the night.