me and my crazy, sleepless world
It’s been a busy and sleep-deprived week. With one week left before heading off for our two weeks of sun holidays, Roz has decided that not only will she not co-operate in giving mommy enough time to pack, but also to keep her on her toes by waking up a thousand times at night.
Okay, so she doesn’t really wake up a thousand times at night, I hope it’s not actually possible, but try telling that to my poor addled brain!
Here’s what I think has started this new waking up trend and my downward slide into chronic absentmindedness.
I spent the whole of last Sunday worrying about Monday afternoon. Why? I’ll tell you why. Because Monday afternoon, at 12:30pm, was Roz’s appointment to get her four month vaccine at the GP. After my experience of her two month vaccine appointment, I was dreading this one. Two months ago, I had taken a babbling, smiling two month old Roz to the doctors, both of us oblivious to what was going to happen. We walked into the doctor’s office with Roz babbling away to herself while I signed the consent form for her vaccines, learned about any possible side effects and got the obligatory ‘lovely baby’ comments from the doctor. He then told me to unbutton her babygro to expose both thighs, and took out the longest, sharpest needle I had ever seen! I mean, if he had injected straight down, I swear it would have come out on the other side of her thigh, it was that long!
Well, I immediately started tearing up, which is unusual for me as I’m a regular ice queen, but in my defence, I just thought it was so unfair that Roz had absolutely no idea what was going to happen. There she was sitting on my lap, looking at me with those beautiful doe eyes of hers and the wham! The needle went in and the most awful scream came out of her. The doctor looked at me and said,
“Stay strong mommy”
Before wham! The other thigh and another blood-curdling scream from my poor little girl. She got so scared she actually pooped herself a little and there was me blinking frantically and trying to calm her down with the doctor saying,
“Don’t worry, she’ll have forgotten about it in a few hours and will be right as rain again”
Yeah, and was he going to be with her for the ‘few hours’ till she calmed down? You bet your sweet butt he wasn’t! I ended up changing a still crying Roz in an empty doctor’s office, then walking with a crying baby to the nearest shopping centre to feed her and calm both of us down before getting on the bus to go home.
So you can understand why I was, at ten o’clock last Sunday night, leaning on Kris’ shoulder going’
“Oh Kris, can’t you take her this time? I can’t stand to see those horrible needles and see her poor little face when she cries.”
Alas, it made sense that I take her, since we had an osteopath appointment booked in for ten that morning anyway. Bugger!
Monday morning, first time in ages, we timed the busses right and Roz and I actually arrived on time at the Osteopath office. Gena, my osteopath, should really take a job working with children….oh yeah, she does…oops! Well, she charmed the pants off Roz. The girl, for whom I have to do everything short of cartwheels, was smiling and giving Gena toothless grins within minutes of the treatment. Traitor, I whispered under my breath!
It seemed as though I’d only blinked and it was time to head out to the GP for the vaccines. My stomach was already churning and I rang Kris for some moral support. Oh wimpness, thy name is Mary!
“You’ll be fine, she’ll be fine. She won’t even remember this by the time you get home”, says he who wasn’t standing at the till in Toymaster trying to assuage her guilt by buying a new toy to distract said baby.
I got to the doctor’s office at twelve thirty on the dot, hoping they would see us immediately and get this over and done with. But the fates are cruel, we had to wait nearly half an hour. Why, oh why, do they bother giving me an appointment time if it’s first come first served anyway? I made a mental note to change GPs as soon as possible for reasons of intolerable cruelty.
When they called Roz’s name, we went into the doctor’s office and there they were, two little bottles of vaccine beside two of the biggest syringes on earth. And there was poor little Roz, babbling away in my arms…again!
But it was much better than I had feared. I exposed her thighs again but this time, the doctor gave her the vaccines so quickly I think her brain only processed what had happened about a second after he was through. Well, she cried her little heart out, but a minute later, she was singing away, while mommy’s shaking hands tried to put on her babygro correctly. Had someone offered me a stiff drink at that moment, I’d have kissed them. I put Roz back into the baby wrap and walked to Marks and Spencer for a relaxing hot chocolate. I was halfway up the escalator when I realized I didn’t have Roz’s nappy change bag with me.
I walked back to the GP’s office and asked at Reception if anyone had handed it in and no one had. I tried not to think about the fact that my digital camera and my bus card were in that bag, and failed miserably. I walked to Toymaster and asked there, and got the same answer. Okay! Tried not to think about all Roz’s things that I would need in about ten minutes, that were in the bag. I went out the shop, I walked in circles, and I went back in and asked the guy at the till if I could have a look around the shop. He said no problem so I retraced my steps from the baby soothers that I had been looking at, to the teething toys and cot mobiles and there the stupid bag lay, right in one of the cribs where I had been admiring a mobile. Stooopid!!!
Well after that, I lost my thirst for a hot chocolate and decided to go home. Roz took this opportunity to start crying. She cried all the way home. She was completely inconsolable. She wasn’t screaming the bus down or anything, just really sad face, tears running down her face unhappy. Poor kid. So that night, I gave her an extra long bath and got her to bed at eight. Well, she woke up every ten minutes till eleven at night, and then woke up a bunch more times at night. And it’s been that way all week. And my scatterbrainness has gotten worse as the week went on. I’ve put salt in my coffee, burnt food, lost receipts, left my ATM card in the card reader at two shops. I NEED MY SLEEEEEEPP! Hence no blog last Friday. I was just way too tired to make any sense.
I hope it was the vaccines and I’ll have my little girl back. I managed to get a suitcase for her last week but she’s been so restless and attention seeking that the only thing I’ve managed to do is make a packing list for her. Here’s hoping I get to start tomorrow.
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