Woefully overdue blog update

Well, it's now been three weeks since Mr. Christopher was born, and I feel like I can finally stop to take a breath. Adjusting to life with a newborn has been wonderful, but also probably the hardest thing I've ever done. I mean, it's not like I went into this blind or anything: people told me about the sleepless nights I would have and how I would be tired and how breastfeeding was hard. But whoa. In no particular order, here are the ways my life has changed in the last twenty odd days.

1. Sleep. As in, I am getting a lot less of it these days because C likes to eat. A lot. In the middle of the night. When we were still in the hospital, it was the worst. My milk hadn't come in yet, so C was getting colostrum (a mother's first milk- there's much less than the regular milk, and it's quite thick). C's stomach was tiny tiny when he was born- like the size of a cherry or something I think, so needless to say, it was quick to fill and quick to empty. Which meant he liked to eat probably every hour or so. Nowadays, he sleeps longer. Around 6 pm, he starts eating lots and he'll usually sleep from 8 pm to midnight or one. We're working on getting him to bed later and later each night so his bedtime becomes convenient for the whole family. Then after his long 4-5 hour sleep, he'll usually go in about 2 or 3 hour intervals for the rest of the night. Which means, he wakes around 2 or 3, then 4 or 5, then 6 or 7. At 7ish, he's usually pretty awake for the morning. The two or three hour middle of the night intervals wouldn't be so bad, except that changing him, feeding him, burping him, and soothing him back to sleep take an hourish (give or take), so then there's only hour or two to sleep before he's awake again, and you're going through the whole rigamarole again.

2. Breastfeeding. Is hard. And it hurts. But, like people keep telling me, it gets better. And actually, it is. I am going to keep doing it. At least through tomorrow. This is what I have been telling myself the last two weeks whilst curling my toes in agony each time C latches on. More on this when I have a better attitude on the matter.

3. Laundry. Lots. And more to come now that C is wearing his cloth diapers (which incidentally are very big looking on an eight pound baby). The diapers we got are gonna be great, I think. No leaks thus far. And there's basically as easy as disposables. Since C is exclusively breastfed, his poo is water soluable and just rinses straight away in the washer. Aside from the poopy diapers, there have been several incidents of getting peed on (Sean and me both - and actually C once peed on himself too- poor baby- mommy and daddy stink at changing diapers). And milk residue. And spit up.

4. The flooded living room. Yes, you read that right. That's a story for another post, but suffice it to say the water heater broke, and we've been without use of our living room for a week now. All of our furniture and everything from the closets is now in our kitchen/dining room/family room. It's really awesome. Especially the nasty dirty water/wet carpet smell. Like I said, more on that with pictures next time.

5. Eating (me, not C). Been trying to do less of this and remove the 40ish (yes- you read that right- please don't judge me) pounds I put on while I was pregnant. Happily, twenty of those pounds are gone already, and this big mama is on the Weight Watchers train to get rid of the other twenty plus a little extra.