Sleep Screams

Dear Adeline,

Somehow the past month slipped under the radar and all of a sudden you're six weeks old. It's already hard to remember what life was like without you (with the exception of the more than three consecutive hours of sleep I got before you arrived).

Speaking of sleep, let it go on record that you are the noisiest sleeper ever. There's an episode of The Simpsons (your dad's favorite show - I'm sure he'll show you the DVD's someday) that features a creature called the "screamerpillar." Homer squishes the indefatigable screaming bug, which just happens to be a protected species. An undercover EPA officer arrives on the scene and demands to know why the screamerpillar is no longer screaming. Homer claims the screamerpillar is sleeping, to which the officer retorts, "Then why don't I hear any sleep screams?"

All of that was a very long preamble to describe what you sound like when you sleep. At night, your dad and I lie in bed and listen to you start your regular grunting chorus from your adjoining bassinet. As you bellow in a tone and pitch not dissimilar from what I imagine sumo wrestlers to sound like, Daddy often turns to me and asks, "Is Adi awake, or are those just sleep screams?" From the night you were born, it's been difficult to tell if you're awake and disgruntled or just bleating in your sleep.

Even as I write this (at 4 am), you're chuffing away in your bassinet, and I'm waiting for your breathing to slow and your, um, vocalizations to quiet down. Your dad could sleep through a freight train passing six feet from the window. It takes a good, sharp poke to wake him up (I say this from experience). I, on the other hand, am a much lighter sleeper. Which is good for you from the whole needing to eat in the middle of the night standpoint. Not so good for me from the being well-rested enough to remember what I'm doing when I walk from one room to another standpoint. I've already forgotten the main point of this post.

But you're cute, in your sleep screamy way, so I guess I can overlook the mind numbing fatigue you cause.

I seem to have run out of coherent dialog, and you're finally quiet, so I think it's time to wrap this up. And that's going to be about as good as it gets in the way of a conclusion to this letter, because I'm ready to zzzzzzzzzzzz...

Love,

Mama