Back to work and sleepless nights

1 am as I lay on the couch with TV on the Food Network (ribeye steak special!), Liam asleep in the bouncy chair and Momma in bed. This is just one kind of sleepless night that I've had since he was born. Basically, the plan is (was) for her to nap while he sleeps; the famous last words were that she wanted to get 20 minutes of sleep before he'd want to eat again. Apparently Liam didn't get the message on that timing as he's been out for hours now. I made the executive decision to let him (and Mom) sleep as long as he wants. Though I've got a sleepless night going on, they had a sleepless day so snoozing now is well warranted.

Other sleepless nights:

Nights like the first one where I was filled with excitement and worry. I lay on the pull out couch watching him in the crib and listening to him breathe, grunt and squeak while wondering if he was OK, if I put him in the crib correctly, if his neck was turned too much, if he was supposed to make those noises, and, of course, if my wife was doing OK after the surgery.

Hospital night 2 - rock rock rock in the chair didn't work and we were both way over tired - the nursery is good

Back home while we were both on leave - Meagan would try to feed Liam every 2 hours and more often if he wanted during the day. The hope was that he would get enough to eat through the day and then sleep longer at night. We'd go with that plan but Mom got pretty tired right about the time that Liam would be at his most alert stage, say around 10 pm. I would be up with Liam doing my best to entertain him, walk and rock him while Mom slept for a few hours. Eventually he would tire for a few winks and then wake Mom up to nurse. On good nights, this would be followed by about 4 hours of sleep, another feeding/diaper change, 3 hours of sleep and then we were all up for the day. On bad nights it'd be followed by a fussy baby wanting nothing but to be held, bounced, rocked, bounced, rocked, diaper changed, hungry, bounced, and so it would go; bringing our wits end near as sleep continued to escape us.

Baby knows Dad has meetings in the morning - Fortunate to have the first couple of days back at work running on adequate sleep, I knew it was only a matter of time before I'd have to arrive a zombie after a baby-rough night. Thursday of my first week back I had to be in two meetings that overlapped, both of which required a significant amount of preparation. I called it quits the night before at 12:30 am though I hadn't gotten near enough done. I was anticipating the usual breaks in sleep when Meagan wakes to nurse Liam, but I should have known the previous 2 nights were pushing it for decent ones in a row. I have my wonderful wife to thank for letting me 'sleep' while Liam wanted to do the eating, bouncing, holding, rocking routine but fussy baby and upset Mom kept me restless from 2:30 to 6:30 am. The alarm at 6:45 came quick and hitting snooze left me little time to prepare for my meeting at 9. Liam slept well the rest of that morning into the afternoon... go figure

Well, it's now 2 am and Liam's stirring. Time to change the diaper, insert baby in sleep sack and wake Mom for nursing. Nursing may have a dedicated post; it's a wonder how we ever managed to survive without lactation consultants... Today the nurse at the pediatric clinic told us that she didn't last 24 hours with breastfeeding - way to go Meagan, 3 weeks and counting!
Rachel Ray is making me hungry...grilled smokey artichoke yum