Sleepless In the ‘Hood

The past few nights we have not had much sleep at all. Chris sleeps less than me since he tends to get up quicker when Isabelle sounds the alarm. For some reason, either Izzie or Adeline have had issues with sleeping this week. I am exhausted. I can see that my patience is worn away by the lack of sleep. I am starting to worry that Isabelle is waking up and is relying on us to get her back to sleep instead of soothing herself because she is in our room. But what’s the alternative? The Room of the hyperactive one. Not a good combination and I was hoping both would be ready by now but between Addie not wanting to go to bed at all and Izzie’s need for a bottle at 1am, it does not look like it will happen anytime soon.

I need sleep. My personality is such that I take everything personally when I am overtired. I beat myself up more when I am tired. I doubt myself and everything I stand for when I am tired. For example, I found out that I didn’t get the job I was hoping for today. My client sent me changes for some work I have using the phrase ‘we want it to look as professional as possible.’ Did I use the chalkboard font on the piece or something? I didn’t use enough bullet points. Right. My favorite part of the day came when the recruiter tried to make not being selected sound better by telling me that the company I interviewed with thought I was very talented. Right now, it feels like no one thinks I am talented. Not my relatives, not my peers and most of all – myself. I feel like a full time job is escaping my grasp more and more every day and there is nothing I can do about it. What makes it even worse is that where I am contracting now, the office is right around the corner from Eaton Vance. I ran into a former colleague at a salad place yesterday. He didn’t even know I was gone. Don’t even get me started about that. It hurts to look at the building.

My exhaustion tells me that I deserve what I get, that I am not a nice person and that no one wants to hire me. I would love to say that I know better, and I know much of this is in my head, but it doesn’t lighten the feelings in my heart or give me a sense of comfort. It tells me I have so much work to do inside to feel better. It tells me that some things will need to change in order for my situation to improve, and that I need a nap.

Isabelle may have a cold. What is normal for every other baby out there can wreak havoc on an HLHS baby. I am praying this passes and she stops vomiting after coughing too much. Two days in a row we have had to wash her up in the tub. Not pretty. And I am sure she is exhausted too, which doesn’t help either. I don’t get as scared as I did last year, but it still unnerves me a bit because I have no control over a virus. A year ago we were inpatient. I celebrated my birthday with Chris, Isabelle, our nurse, and our awesome roommates. Chris did everything to make me feel special in spite of how nervous we were about Izzie, and how separated we were from our family. It was a hard time, and I keep trying to remind myself that this year is better because we are out of the hospital. And then I hear that voice that says “At least you had a job to go back to then.” I hope that voice quiets into silence someday. I am tired of hearing it.