3 Weeks

The past two weeks have flown by, but, of course, it's impossible to have stuffed the past two weeks in only 14 days. It feels more like 2 months.

Maddi hit some sort of growth spurt that Sunday after she turned 1 week and nursed around the clock for 3 days, making her nights fussy and sad. Aaron and I became zombies that whole week. We were absolutely exhausted and having deja vu. Happily, though, sometime midweek, I plopped Maddi in bed with me and determined to sleep. The precious girl slept happily snuggling next to Mama. Mama slept in some contorted position that involved a crooked neck, arm and arched back. But I slept.

By the next night, and the next she was realizing that darkness means sleep, or nursing and going back to sleep, and I was praising God each time she woke in the night and peacefully went back to sleep. Everyone prays for relief from suffering, and new mothers pray for sleep. It's impossible not to rejoice and skip for joy when a newborn sleeps.

Maddi didn't exactly get into this night-time pattern on her own. Through trial and error those nights late last week, it became clear that although Maddi was happy to sleep in the swing or your arms, she would not *stay* asleep after you lay her down. That is, unless she fussed to sleep. The strangest thing I've ever seen. She seems to prefer to fuss for 10 minutes or so and will sleep happily for hours. My balanced husband saw me wringing my hands over this business - of me trying to decide to Cry It Out or Attach herself to us - and lovingly said: "Kelly, if I want to pick her up and rock her to sleep, I will. If I think she needs to cry a bit to go to sleep, then that's what we'll do." I think that's called Balance, but I wouldn't know. I call it Sanity, and I'm thankful to have that blessed man around during the middle of the night!

That pattern has mostly continued this past week as well, and she'll usually go 4-5 hours between feedings at night, sleeping on her tummy on her sheepskin in her little bassinet. I feel wonderful.

Last weekend, my mom came to OKC to meet Maddi, and also to help with the children while Aaron and I went to a Bruce Edstrom conference in Norman. Maddi had her first public outing at Santa Fe Steakhouse. She slept through the entire dinner in her carseat. I kept glancing at her, wondering at it. I may sound over the top in my amazement at her sleeping, but it's a 180 degree turn from her sister, and still hard to believe.

We also stopped by the midwives to weigh Maddi girl and at a 2 1/2 weeks she weighed 11 pounds, 2 ounces and measured in at 21 1/2 inches. Excellent work, Madelyn!

She's congested right now, probably due to the fact that Emma, Joseph and I are also congested, with coughs. I hope it passes soon: it's a pitiful sound to hear a snuffly newborn.

I found myself anxious last week. It was a restless - rather than a panicky - anxiety, caused by asking myself over and over, "What am I to do now?". There's no return to life before baby, if for no other reason that it's been well over 10 months since there was a life without preparing for baby. How, then, do I create a life *with* baby? I ask myself this every time a baby comes, and stumble through it each time as well.

It feels strange to navigate life with a new person, and it's hard to get past the fact that my new life will mostly mean a repetition of domestic activities that are self-perpetuating. I will clean so that I can clean later; I will change diapers so that I can change more later. In this stage when the children are young, it's hard for me to see purpose beyond sustaining existence. And then I feel like the poor atheists, who wisely ask themselves, "Why am I working so hard to exist, when there's no point to existing?" Thankfully, my situation is short-lived, with great purpose behind all the mundane, circular tasks. (Not so for the atheists.)

It's helpful that over the last several years I've changed and begun to trust God will my moments and days, giving up control over the seemingly more important and urgent things that I really want to do. I'm willing to wait for big dreams or perfection, so I'm doing a bit better at handling the reality of each day.

I also have come to terms with Me. I love to be busy, love to keep my mind occupied with figuring things out, and so I'm happily taking on projects and planning and those things that are very much NOT repetitive, domestic activities. It feels good to do that, and to do it without being paranoid that others may find fault with that.

I think I'm on my way to growing up. My heart really is full. It's full of gratefulness for God's being tender with me in giving me Maddi. My heart is full of fear that it will get harder. My heart is full of praise for all the newness and promise that comes with our precious new girl. My heart is full of sadness at what our family is going through right now. It's full of confusion when I think about our future and how we don't know what to do now.

But I feel more solid, more secure than I have before. Because there is no searching except for Christ. I will not demand of Aaron to be my ceaseless comfort and wise advisor, or that the children be perfect, or that my emotions obey the truth. I'll ask for grace and ask that Jesus stay with me, because that's all I can hope for, and really all I know I want.