Hi there readers, today’s post is going to be a bit different. Mama is busy putting Valeria to sleep tonight and she had the great idea that I (her husband) should try writing her post for today.
Lately, Valeria’s night sleep routine has changed. Usually, by around 9, I would pick her up and give her a bottle, she would fall asleep in my arms, and then I would plop her down into her bed with some white noise and she’d sleep through most of the night, only fussing once or twice for some more milk every four hours or so. Easy peasy and mama get can get some well-deserved rest and relaxation from her day with baby by having me take care of the night routine.
Except it suddenly stopped being easy peasy. Now that she’s figured out how to roll and move around in her bed, I’ll lay her down and she will start to wiggle her way around. She is always trying to push herself into the left mesh of the bed, I think to snuggle up to it? We’ll give her some time to self-soothe except she almost always ends up flopping around and eventually startling herself and waking up.
Mama’s solution has been full of gentle patience and love (which I admittedly lack sometimes, the patience part that is, not my best trait, maybe it’s a male thing) where she will lay down next to Valeria and gently sing “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star”. It works like magic. From there, we pick her up and put her in her bed once she’s fallen into a deeper sleep.
So that’s what Mama is up to now and it has worked already because I can hear Valeria snoring behind me while I type. You go Mama!
We’re almost at 5 months now and two things still amaze me. One, how often these little humans change in their preferences. You think you have them completely figured out and suddenly the next week, what always worked suddenly stops working and now you have to get creative again.
And two, the amount of teamwork required to raise these little humans. We joke sometimes that while the baby might be able to outlast and wear one of us out, she can’t take on the both of us! Just when one of us feels burnt out, the other is there to step in. I could never do this alone.
To finish off, I guess I could say a few things about myself, but I’m hesitant to have this post go on for too long. Currently, I’m most excited about preparing for my first kickboxing fight in April. Mama has been doing a great job picking up some of the slack on my end while I devote more time to my training and preparation over these next four weeks. Outside of being a father, it has probably been one of the hardest and most intense things I’ve done to date.
A co-worker of mine recently asked why bother? You have a great job and stability, what do you need that in your life for? To put it simply, this has been something I’ve wanted to do since I was a little boy. But, it’s way too late to turn this into a career, nor do I have any desire for that.
Really, it’s about pushing myself physically and mentally to my limits, to know what I am truly capable of. I believe it is something that makes me both a better husband and father. As cheesy as it sounds, its about the journey and not the destination right now.
That being said, thank you readers for taking the time to try something new with me. I know I’m nowhere near as entertaining of a writer as Mama but I can now see why she enjoys blogging so much, this has been incredibly therapeutic. Have a great night and stay safe!
Mama on the Move 