Ahh, Saturdays

Well, I can't say it started well, and yet it's off to a good start!

There is something about a Saturday that makes me say to myself, "self, you are excused from doing anything at all all day. You may lay in your bed as late as you wish, you may drink coffee and eat food in bed, you may stay in your pajamas until noon-- or later! if you wish-- and you may put off taking a shower until you go out in the afternoon." It is my credo for weekends. I just need ONE day to sleep in or lay in or whatever and I'll be fresh for a new week.

So... at 4:45am this morning, there I was, sitting on the couch in the dark downstairs doling out breastmilk to an electric pump, half asleep and rather irritable, wanting to be like my husband who was out cold in bed happily sleeping, non-engorged, stretched out and even snoring.

Breastfeeding is so wonderful and not so wonderful. I wouldn't trade it for anything else (or else I would have already, since Annika is old enough, technically, to be eating more table food) and yet, the responsibility of it is unrelenting! Annika still eats seven times a day, SEVEN, people. That is seven times that we sit down together in a quiet place (she won't eat with the slightest distraction... including the turning pages of a book or mag, so I can't even read while we "do lunch".. or dinner or snack or breakfast!) every single day. Now, even as I write that, I realize that I am lucky to still get seven opportunities to snuggle with her and cuddle her and gaze lovingly at all those amazing details of her features, but just once in a while I wish for a reprieve!

Right now, Annika gets four out of about fifty feedings per week from a bottle. And those are while I'm at work. I could ask Jeremy to give her a bottle more often, but at this point there is no point... because I have to pump anyway if I don't feed her; I need to empty and I have to have milk to give her if she's going to have more feedings from a bottle per week. So I really don't get out of anything by letting her take a bottle. I absolutely refuse to give her one drop of formula because I don't need to, so... there I was this morning at 4:45 pumping in my half-asleep confused state of early morningness once again. I am thankful that my milk is in no short supply, but... it doesn't seem to understand the concept of taking a break from production. My milk elves work around the clock!

Early morning pumping is good and bad. It's great because you get a lot of milk since it's been building up all night. It's not so great because after collecting, sealing, labelling, and storing the milk and rinsing off the bottles and such, you are more awake than asleep so falling back to sleep is difficult. Early morning pumping must be perfectly timed also. If you wake up too early you'll be up half the night trying to get back to sleep; if you wake up too late, you'll be up the rest of the morning waiting for Annika to wake up and eat because it's too close to her waking time to pump (she'll have no breakfast) and you're too full to sleep.

So, this morning my timing actually was perfect-- but I was having trouble falling back to sleep after I came back to bed. Finally, as I drifted off, Annika started crying in the next room. Curses!

Hoping she would fall back asleep, I just laid there, waiting. To no avail. She was up and wanted me to be up too. And NOW! So, I got up, brought her into bed and fed her, hoping she might decide to fall back asleep. No, no. She was all about playing with my nose, pulling my hair, crawling over me to talk to her daddy, etc! Normally, I absolutely love these time with her, but I was just so tired this morning for some reason.

We put her in her play area and Jeremy (who had been sleeping all night long, lucky!) hopped up to get moving on his busy day while I waited to see if I could get a couple more minutes of sleep, which I did while he was getting ready. However, as he was getting ready to leave to the hardware store, Annika got all cranked up and did not want to be put down. She wanted her mums and wouldn't have it any other way.

Initially, I was annoyed because I was still in some kind of stupor and didn't really feel like playing but soon I realized after her continuous complaining that SHE TOO WAS just TIRED! Aha! So I fed her again and out she went like a light. I put her in her bed and there she has been ever since.

Now I feel like a new woman! I am ready to face the day and my child! It's ten o'clock now and I hear her stirring. While she's been sleeping, I've read my Time magazine, checked in on my school stuff, relaxed in bed, eaten a scone that Jeremy brought home for me-- IN BED! (I love it!) and had a cup of coffee.

Now that is how Saturday is supposed to be. There is gentle and relaxing music flowing from our rec room down the hall, I am happily posting on my blog, and my baby is sleeping in. All of the frustration from earlier is forgotten like melted ice in a river and life has resumed its normal hue of happy contentness.

Having a child is like living in a theme park. There are so many things that give you so much happiness! You are constantly riding these really amazing rides and everything is novel. But once in while, as much as you love being there, the heat and the lines get a little overwhelming. That's when you just need to get a big glass of water (coffee, in my case) and sit down in the shade to take a break. That's all it takes and then you're ready for the next round. And that is my life over and over and over in cycles-- and I love it! I truly do! Even the lines and heat. I just need my Saturday morning, that's all... it's my water in the shade moment.