Parenting at 3 am
Before you ask, the answer is “No, Ephraim isn’t sleeping through the night yet.” That’s the number one question I hear about him these days. It doesn’t matter though; I do miss sleeping more than four hour stretches, but I don’t mind waking up to hang out with my sweet baby a couple times a night. For a while, Burke and I had a “system” wherein I’d wake up and feed Ephraim, and then Burke would burp him and put him back to bed. In theory, this method works, but on some of the sleepier nights, communication got the best of us.
Here’s how it went one night…
Me: Burke can you please burp the baby?…. Burke, please can you burp Ephraim?… Burke, Ephraim is ready to be burped.
Burke: What do you want?
Me: For you to burp the baby.
Burke: Well, you didn’t say that!
And another time, it was more like this…
Me: Tap, tap. Burke, can you please burp the baby?
Burke: ::sleeping::
Me: Tap, tap, pat. Burke, can you please wake up and burp the baby?
Burke: uhhhhh.
Me: ::Rubs shoulder:: Burke, can you please burp Ephraim?…. Burke, can you burp the baby?…. Ephraim’s ready, Burke, can you burp him now?
Burke: Get to the point already!
And yet on another occasion…
Me: Burke, can you please burp the baby?
Burke: What’s the first thing?
Me: It’s the only thing!
So, at this point you might wonder why I don’t put more effort into actually waking him up the first time. Well, primarily because he accuses me of waking him up harshly; however, I promise I always say please for just that reason. And secondly, it’s so funny when Burke gives me silly responses!
Me: Burke, can you please burp the baby?
Burke: It seems like you’re trying to give him something everyone already has.
Another time, it went like this…
Me: Burke, can you please burp Ephraim?
Burke: You can’t put him in coffee grounds cause he’s got no space for any.
Fun times, right? It may seem like I’m picking on Burke, but I’m not. I’m just better at writing down memories. To his credit, he likes to bring up the “Phantom burp” incident(s) occasionally. I’ve been known to randomly wake up, tap Burke and ask him to burp Ephraim. Then he wakes up and gets settled only to find that both Ephraim and I are asleep in our respective beds and that no feeding has even occurred. Oops. He also gives me a hard time for the “Phantom diaper” scenarios, but I think we have to share the blame on those. In the early days, I would ask Burke to wake up, burp Ephraim and change his diaper. On multiple occasions Burke found himself taking off and replacing a completely dry diaper. After a handful of times, I changed my language to “and check his diaper.”