A strangely neon pink has bedecked the whites of my eyes recently which was quite a shock the first time I noticed it. I even wiped the mirror to check it wasn't down to some residue from an errant cleaning episode- it wasn't. Then the horror that I could have actually contracted Pink eye from all the nappy changing, having only heard of it from comedy films. Its always gone by the morning. It returns intermittently and this evening I realise that it's when there is a growth spurt/ developmental leap or, in this case, THE 4 MONTH SLEEP REGRESSION!
I've been (or rather my baby son has been) waking every 45 minutes to hour and a half for a week or so now, throughout the entire night, from 630pm to 730am. The other night I found myself not wanting to go to sleep even though I was desperately tired, because I knew that I'd be getting out of bed again in 45 minutes.
By 4am we're usually co sleeping, when I feel like I've stocked up enough sleep hours/ minutes to not be so deeply slumbering that I cause a hazard to him.
But this time is sacred, and, do you know what? He won't always wake up needing me in the night, soon enough he will be in his own room and then a teenager and then leaving home and he won't need me in the same way and that makes me in equal parts proud and sad. If i do my job well now I hope that he will be the strong, confident, caring, shining soul that I can see forming before me. A selfish part of me hopes that he will always need me somehow, but mostly I hope that when he is all grown up he will want to come back and say hello from time to time and tell me about his antics in the big exciting world, over a cup of tea.
Who knows, maybe he'll even stay the night occasionally and bring his own family home to see us.