Danny is not a morning person. He likes to sleep. When life requires him to be up early, he functions quite well and can manage the early mornings. But those mornings must be pre-planned, with plenty of warning to him. Like work... he knows the days he has to work and is prepared to wake up early for that. Mind you, the shift he is on now doesn't start until 11, so even work doesn't get him out of bed early anymore. His wife gets him out of bed early. Very rarely though. We have an understanding, Danny and I. I don't do late nights, he doesn't do early mornings. This means that when new babies come along, I go to bed at 8:00 and wake up only for feedings, and he sleeps until 9 or 10 in the morning. This works for us, because I am totally a morning person. I jump up, wide awake, and I'm ready to go. I'm friendly, I'm talkative, and most importantly, I'm actually awake.
Danny is a bear in the morning. When I do need him to get up early, I have to warn him a full 24 hours in advance, if possible. I usually remind him once or twice before we go to bed, then in the morning I get up first, make him coffee, set it down beside him, shake him a little, whisper that it's time to get up, and back slowly out of the room. I usually leave the bedroom door open so the noise of the house will keep him awake. Once he's up and moving, it usually stays pretty quiet in our house for a full hour. He doesn't talk much, doesn't interact a whole lot. It's hard for me... cause I like to talk, and I don't understand how you can wake up cranky. He insists he's not cranky, he's just not awake. So I don't understand how you can wake up and not be awake. But that's how we're different! He doesn't understand how, on a Friday night, I'm ready to drop dead by 9:00... "but Sammy, it's Friday!!" he says. I say, "but Danny, it's Friday!!" Our points of view differ on energy levels on Friday nights too! :)
I have to admit, he is much, much better now that we have Gracie. The wake-up process has been slimmed down to 15-30 minutes, tops. About 2 months ago I got bored on Saturday mornings with just Gracie and I playing in the living room, waiting for dad to wake up at 10:00, so we made a deal that he gets up at 8:00 on Saturday mornings with me. It's not a bad deal, since he works shift work and gets 4 days off at a time... it's not like I'm taking away one whole day of his weekend! And we've started getting the grocery shopping and errands finished by 11:00 and we have the rest of the day to relax and play.
I know I've mentioned this before, but it amazes me how much Gracie is like her father. Their personalities are so much alike it's frightening... although I can't complain too much about Danny's personality, I obviously enjoy it enough to have married him! :) The sleeping thing is another way they are very much alike!
I don't know if you've heard, but Gracie has always been a fantastic sleeper. The first night we brought her home from the hospital, she slept for nearly 6 hours straight (and scared the bejeezus out of me at the same time). She continued to sleep for 6-hours stretches that very quickly turned to 8 hours, 10 hours, then 14 hours. She's down to 12-13 hours now at night. 7:00-7:30ish. Except during the week, when I have to leave to work by 7:20 and she needs to get up at 6:45 to get ready so I can drop her off at the sitters on my way to work.
She's a cranky little bugger when I wake her up. She's a lot like her dad. She grunts. She refuses to stand up in her crib so I can pick her up. She throws her toys. She grunts some more. Sometimes she very dramatically throws herself back down on the bed and and growls at me. I'm sure she doesn't really mean to growl, but that's what it sounds like. I eventually get her up, and she cries the whole time I change her. It's not really crying... it's the kind of cry where you know she's faking and she's just pissed at you. When I get her dressed she gets mad if her arm doesn't go into the arm hole perfectly the first time. And she grunts some more. I take her to the kitchen where she has her breakfast (cheerios and milk). And if I don't already have them laid out for her and ready to eat, she grunts and cries some more. If people are visiting, and they try to say good morning to her, she covers her hands with her face and grunts extra loud! And heaven forbid if I try to talk to her... "Gracie, did you sleep well?" "urrrngh." "Are you excited to go to Nancy's this morning?" "URRRRrrngh." "Do you want some more cheerios?" "URRRRRRNGHHHHH."
Unless this next baby is going to turn out more like me, I guess I'll just have to accept that nobody in my household is a morning person like me. I need to just let the sleeping beauties adjust to the daylight and come out of their shells in the morning, and let them sleep in whenever possible. Hmmm... this is not looking too good for my Mother's Day breakfasts-in-bed! Oh well, at least the cat is friendly in the morning! :)
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