I have been back at work for 2.5 weeks now and things are slowly getting better... It's hard to say that we're falling into a routine yet, but that's mostly because the "routine" is different every day of the week (and varies from week to week)! Depending on Paul's shift schedule, in the mornings I am either: a) getting up with Nathan and taking him to daycare, b) getting up with Nathan and waiting for Paul to get off shift and take over while I go to work, or c) getting up and going to work on the days Paul is at home in the morning.
If it's a Monday or Thursday, going to work for me means working on my couch. However, if it's a daycare day, I do have to at least get him ready and dress myself in something other than my pajamas to drop him off. If it's a Tuesday, Wednesday, or Friday, going to work means the office. Those are definitely the hardest days. If Paul is home on those days, I can more or less just get myself ready and maybe stop to nurse Nathan if he happens to wake up before I leave. If Paul is coming off shift and not home yet, I can sometimes get up with Nathan and wait for Paul to get home before I leave. But if I have an early meeting that doesn't work, so on those days my father-in-law comes over around 6:30 a.m. to watch Nathan so I can finish getting ready and leave.
The worst days are when Paul has just left for his shift (usually around 5:30-5:45 a.m.) and I have to get myself AND Nathan ready by 6:45 a.m. so I can drop him off when daycare opens at 7:00 and then battle the worst of rush hour traffic heading into the city. Today was actually the first time I did that, and I'm rather proud to say that I had him dropped off and was on the road by 7:20 a.m. Not bad! Of course, traffic was HORRID and I was still late for my first meeting of the day. Oh well...
And then there are the random extra days that Paul works each month (usually 2-3 extra shifts) when we have to figure out something else entirely to do with Nathan if it occurs on a weekday. We're only contracted with daycare for Nathan to be there on Paul's regular shift days. This month we have 2 of those days and I think we've got my in-laws lined up to help out both times. It's a lot to keep track of though, so the other night I actually made out a calendar for the entire month of May. I even color-coded it for different people/caretakers! It was kind of overwhelming, but I'm glad I did it because it's really nice to have everything figured out and not have keep playing the "what's the plan for tomorrow" game each night.
As far as Nathan's schedule goes... Right now he's all over the place. Unfortunately, that's probably mostly due to the fact that our routine is different every day. The days he is home with Paul, he does have somewhat of a regular schedule (although the actual times vary). But at daycare he's still getting adjusted and doesn't really follow his "home" schedule much. For instance, at home he usually eats about 3 times while I'm at work (every 3-4 hours) and takes at least a couple of longer naps (1-3 hours each). But at daycare, he seems to want to eat more like every 2 hours and takes several shorter naps (30-45 minutes). I think he'll eventually settle down at daycare more, once he gets used to it and isn't so distracted by everything being new to him there. In the meantime, I'm having a bit of a hard time keeping up my supply to meet his demand on those daycare days!
The other schedule we're having trouble with right now is nighttime sleep. He's kind of a mess right now (as are we!). Everything had been fine and great (averaging 1 wake-up per night to be fed) until he started thinking about rolling back-to-front. He still hasn't quite made it yet, but we've had to stop swaddling him in his sleep-sacks at night just in case. As a result, he flails and thrashes and wakes himself up. My first week back to work, he was waking up every 45 minutes or so ALL NIGHT LONG. Then we got desperate and started putting him in either his swing or his rock 'n play after the second or third wake-up. And miraculously, he slept in those. So then our routine was to put him in his crib after his bedtime feeding and let him sleep in there as long as he could (usually 1-3 hours for the first stretch). Then when he woke up the first time, we would move him into his rock 'n play and he would go back to sleep until it was time for his usual middle-of-the-night feeding (somewhere between 2:00-4:00 a.m.).
But just this week, he's started refusing to go down in his crib. I'm not sure what that's all about, but I have noticed that he's definitely been more awake than usual at bedtime. Before, we would change him, put on his pajamas, feed him, and read a story. And by the end, he'd be at least 50% out and we could lay him in the crib to fall the rest of the way asleep. But this week, when we get to the end of story time, he's still wide awake and looking around. And as soon as we try to lay him in the crib, he starts kicking and thrashing and gets really mad. Like, not just a little fussy but full-on screaming mad. Before this week, he would sometimes lay in his crib partially awake but calm and drowsy, and maybe even fuss a bit (no more than 5 minutes) before falling asleep. Those days are gone... apparently. Now if we try to let him fuss it out in the crib, he just gets madder and madder and works himself up until he is no longer calm and drowsy but WIDE AWAKE AND ANGRY.
So now we are letting him sleep in the rock 'n play pretty much all night long. We still try the crib right at first, but if he's still awake 30-45 minutes later and not calming down, we move him. Except tonight, I will admit that I accepted defeat after only 10-15 minutes. Paul is not home and I just survived my first day of daycare drop-off followed by a horrid commute to the office. I am tired and just didn't feel like battling it out for longer :)
Is it ideal to be regressing back to the rock 'n play after he slept in his crib just fine (swaddled) for the past 2 months? Not really. But is it better than having a super cranky baby and parents because no one is getting any sleep at night for days on end? Yes. And in fact, he's actually sleeping so well in there that last night, he went 7.5 hours straight with NO wake-ups! I actually woke up to Paul's alarm clock this morning (and boobs leaking all over because they're not used to going that long!). So at the end of the day, you gotta do what you gotta do. We'll get back to the crib someday, but for now, he's happy in his rock 'n play. It keeps him snuggled in a little more than the crib, so he can't flail as much. Eventually he'll outgrow the startling and flailing and then maybe he'll be ready for his crib again...
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