-written August 9, 2017 in the middle of the night so the featured picture is from about a year ago as well 🙂

Motherhood is not glamorous.  These early years are just downright hard in very primal ways.  Like tonight for example.  I’m awake at 11:11pm not by choice.  In fact I’m almost never awake this late by choice any more.  My chosen bed time is around 9:30pm.  No, tonight, Penny is struggling.  My best guess is that she needs to poop (seeing as she’s as regular as it gets and hasn’t passed her daily poop yet today).  I’ve nursed her, checked her diaper, nursed her again, rocked her, put her in the swing, rubbed tummy oils on her belly and sleep oils on her chest and back of the neck.  I’ve rocked her again, I’ve checked her diaper again, I’ve shoved gripe water down her throat (apparently taking medicine is not her thing right now… confusing since typically she downs the stuff like it’s candy), put her in the swing.  And now I’m here, with her crawling all over me trying to at least be productive until whatever is going on with her passes.

And the truth is, that is nothing compared to the every night with Maisy.  She was up every night until she was over two years old.  Sometimes it was to nurse but most of the time it was just to hang out, sometimes for hours, in the middle of the night.

Honestly, I hate this part of the job – the night time wakings and needs.  It makes me very grumpy and tired.  I know there are moms out there who embrace this time better, relishing in extra snuggles and kisses, but this mama just wants to stay in bed!  Who’s with me?

I could put more of a positive spin or ending to this story because the truth is the positive is always right there too.  Motherhood is more inherently beautiful and wonderful than it is challenging and exhausting but sometimes it’s nice to just commiserate in the rough and tough and not always feel like us moms have to say something like “but man, I wouldn’t trade this job for anything in the world” or “but it’s so worth it” at the end of every hard story.