it's really all you huh?

"It's really all you isn't it?  You have to be ready at any moment?"

This is Doc's realization yesterday, and yes this is our second child. 

It came about when I was trying to get things done so I could have a few moments to do what I wanted after TC went to bed.  I had Little A on the boppy nursing and I was using my free hands to stuff the inserts into TC's cloth diapers.  (I felt like quite the crunchy mom at that moment too.)  I looked at him, exhausted and said "yea, but I wouldn't have it any other way".

Much like most of my first pregnancy Doc missed this a good portion of the newborn phase with TC.  He was home for the first 2 weeks, you know the eat- poop- sleep-repeat-every-three-hours time.  By the time she was a newborn who was having awake time and cranky time he was in WLC.  He was gone for about 19 hours a day and when he was home he was sleeping.  He was also just starting to show signs of his TBI so he doesn't remember much of this time.  He doesn't remember much at all about TC as a baby, it breaks my heart.  So this is the first time he's really seeing what it's like to have a newborn who is transitioning to an infant.  Little A's colic or whatever is going on with her is making it kind of a nightmare. 

Doc has been good about trying to let me get sleep, taking the baby in the morning so I can sleep in, the problem is that once I've done the 7AM feeding I'm kind of up and if I'm not I wake up to the sounds of TC playing.  Dealing with the past week of super fussiness and the past few nights of screaming from 9PM-1 (2...3)AM it's been all me.  Last night when she started up again it was all me, he took her for a bit but couldn't give her the attention she needed (burping, soothing, etc) because he was playing on his computer.  I grew more and more frustrated because I had things I needed to do before bed. I think he finally put two and two together (perhaps remembering what he said earlier) and told me to go to bed and he would deal with the baby and bring her in when she needed to eat.

It worked pretty well, I went to sleep for real around 1, he brought her in to me around 4 (they were in the living room), she ate and after about 45 minutes I was back to sleep.  She woke up around 7 to eat  as TC was waking up in her room.  So I fed the baby while listening to TC over the monitor talk to her stuffed animal.  I put the baby back down and went and started my day with TC.  Doc got a little extra sleep which is nice because he really needs it. 

I know this might all sound like regular husband/daddy stuff  but a TBI requires a lot of sleep and him sacrificing sleep really messes with him.  I think he is seeing the tipping point in our very near future, I can't keep going on 3 hours of sleep a night. 

He has his faults but he's a great dad, he loves all 3 of his girls and we really are blessed to have him.

Daddy and his "on leave" beard with TC, they were both so excited to have their picture taken :)