The 4 month Regression Rant Crumbs and Crunchy Nut

DISCLAIMER: This post is based on my experiences ONLY.

The darkest bags under my eyes from the lack of sleep, but at least he’s happy with himself.

So my 4 and a half month son doesn’t like sleeping.

He CAN sleep, he just doesn’t. I’m almost sure at 7pm he looks right into my eyes, deep into my eyes and says to himself ‘Just you wait until 3am, I’m going to have you wrapped around my little baby finger. Just. You. Wait’ LOL. Supposedly this is a genuine thing. 4 month regression, a real phenomenon.

He decided at one point to change all his cry cues (Why little man?!) He refused the bottle even though he knows he can take it plain easy. On the odd occasion he has a day off from testing the water, he takes a bottle and has a good 8 hour sleep. He is playing me like a freaking grand piano and judging by his 4am giggles, he’s loving every minute of this.

I will be totally honest and say some nights/days I have found to be pretty  darn challenging. With no family in this country I rely on my mummy peers to vent my frustration with this new baby development stage of which they are all currently enduring too. Basically we are staying above water together (Thanks ladies!).

SO how has this affected me? So far I have found myself thinking this sleep thing is pretty overrated. I could happily go without many hours sleep when Noah was first born and I coped just fine (Well, fine meaning I was still somewhat sane).

Now I have found that some days the sleep deprivation has taken over my ability to physically be a human, or think like a rational grown up adult anymore

Last week I had one terrible night’s sleep. In fact I wouldn’t even call it sleep. Noah had me up several times. I wasn’t only feeling exhausted by 6.30am, I was feeling knocked down physically AND emotionally. I walked into the kitchen to get a morning boost (I was craving the crunchy nut cornflakes I bought two days ago from the supermarket) but first I see crumbs (again) on the kitchen work tops. I’ve only told Jordan a million and one times no toast crumbs on the worktop. He could burn the house down and destroy all my wealthy possessions but at this point I would still be more angered about crumbs on the freaking kitchen work top. ‘GRRRR’ I thought. Sleep deprivation induced a frustration in me that set me off in a mummy cleaning frenzy. Now I wasn’t only cleaning up crumbs but dusting the top of the cupboards, cleaning the oven, mopping the floors of any existing residue. After my best half awake efforts my kitchen was up to my standard again. I fed the baby and put him down for a mid morning nap.

NOW its my time. A ball of crunchy nut cornflakes and almond milk, hmmm.

So I thought..

I go into the cupboard and what do I find? An empty box of crunchy nut cornflakes. This is SERIOUSLY not on. I began to cry like a bitch or a spoilt child, then begin to text Jordan (and I quote)..

‘Crunchy nut was my cereal and all bran was yours and now I’m stuck with f**k all to eat for breakfast and before you say just nip out it’s not that easy to just nip out with a baby. Had a s**t night, cleaned half the house then to sit down to eat some breakfast and all I wanted was crunchy nut Jordan!’

4 months in and I officially had my first mummy meltdown. I Looked at the text I sent and instantly thought PSYCHO BITCH. If anything I was expecting the divorce papers to pop through the post as I speak. Instead I received an apology. An actual fully blown heartfelt apology off Jordan for eating the ‘wrong’ cereal.

How our lives have changed. Before we argued about important factors in our life. Career, finances, the future. Now the closest we get to arguing is Crumbs and crunchy nut cornflakes.

I always thought having a baby would cause us to argue more as a couple but I find we hardly have time to nowadays. When we start to disagree there always seems to be a well timed distraction like tummy time or baby giggles.

But listen people, this is the important part. Even though sometimes as parents we can sound pretty ungrateful when we are losing sleep (we can only cope so far before we lose the ability to function properly!). But there is and always will be something special about getting up in the middle of the night and feeding your baby. Quiet intimate closeness that I know in a few years time I’m going to look back on and miss SO SO much. So for now, I’m happy with a few wake ups, as long as I can safely stay awake with my beautiful son without falling half asleep with him against my chest.

This little 4 month old baby has changed our lives completely. Agreed it is hard. It is challenging, but It has definitely made me and Jordan a stronger unit together.

PS for the record, this regression stage like a miracle seems to be slowly coming to a close (or so it seems). All 3 us are well rested and you will be glad to know there has been no further instances with bread crumbs on the worktops since the text message (WINNING).

Written by Rachel Gregory for her blog, Rach and Noah.

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