In the swing

Pebble and I are getting the hang of this mum and baby business. I think a lot of the changes in the last week come down to me relaxing more. It’s easy enough to tell someone to relax, take it easy, don’t worry….. I’ve been telling myself that for weeks already! But only in the last week, or even the last few days, have I really been able to do it.
Pebble has become more predictable. There’s not a real routine, but I am more able to know how to respond to her needs, and handle whatever she has to throw at me :)
I am also allowing myself to relax about the fact that she is going to cry in the car. This will not kill her. In fact, it helped clear her little nose of boogers yesterday, the poor little mite was crying so hard. It still breaks my heart a little to hear it, but it doesn’t stop me from going out anymore.
So far this week I have gone to my mum’s for dinner with Paul (an hour away), gone shopping for hours with Paul’s mum, and yesterday I took Pebble to the doctors, the supermarket, and the library ALL BY MYSELF. Tonight Pebble and I are heading to my Dad’s for dinner (an hour away), and we’ll be just fine.
It helps that my milk supply seems a little better, but also I’m just not stressing about that so much anymore either. If she’s crying and I don’t seem able to satisfy her needs with breast milk, I can give her a small top up of formula. There is no need for either of us to be stressed by this situation any more.
Of course, key to all of this is some  predictability around night time and sleep. We almost always do the 7.30 – 8.00ish feed, followed by a nice long bath, then another attempt at feeding and a small bottle at around 9pm. Then a cuddle and Daddy rocks Pebble to sleep while I hit the hay. I usually either get woken, or wake Pebble up, around 1am or 2am for a feed and she usually goes straight back down to sleep.
As long as I get this little bit of sleep, I can cope! After that it’s a little bit more all over the place. Sometimes she’ll wake for a feed one or two hours later and sometimes she’ll even go down for another little two hour sleep after the next feed.
This is our usual right now. I know this will change again as Pebble changes, but right now it’s working and I’ll enjoy it.