Reality Check!

Another week has come and gone. Somehow life post-Mckenna goes faster. It's like days are shorter now! Mckenna is now 12 weeks old...and I have NO clue where these 12 weeks went - one week and a day and she'll be 3 months old already. CRAZY!

This week was my first week back at work. Back to reality for this momma. Luckily I'm only back at work 20 hours a week. That helps big time. I'm able to get in 2 hours during her morning nap (what's funny is she only takes a long nap (longer than an hour or so) when napping in her swing next to daddy doing his treatments. Ronnie's morning treatments are LONG now because he just continually restarts his vest so we both can get in a long stretch of work. Treatments may be my new favorite things on earth.) Anyway, so I do a 2 hour stretch in the morning, and then another 2 hours or so while Ronnie plays Mr. Mom. All in all it was an easier transition than I thought. But I am glad I'm part-time and that I'm still at home because I think I would die going 8 hours without seeing Mckenna and I still get jealous when I hear them playing and I can tell she's being cute...so I run in to see what she's doing. Maybe one day she'll get boring and I'll be less obsessed?

And come to think of it, Reality is slowly creeping back in in other ways too...one real world first at a time. First, work. Now we're discussing hospital stays. Ronnie won't be going in anytime too too soon, but he's getting closer, as he's been out since September, and he's pretty consistent on how long he can stay out. So as we started talking about a possible tune-up in the next month or so, I started putting together what the reality of a tune-up would be. And it's not pretty. As you may remember, we live in Phoenix and he gets treated in Tucson (2 hours away). I have an office in Tucson that I enjoy working from. We have family in both places. These are all of factors that play into the "where do Mckenna and I stay during a tune-up?" debate. Right now I'm thinking we'll spend 4 days a week at home, and 3 days a week down there - sleeping at his mom's or grandma's. I obviously want to be with him as much as possible. But I also don't want to inconvenience his family (read: keep them up all night with a crying baby) and I don't want to get her all out of wack by sleeping in a different place, etc. We knew that hospital stays would be a bit tricky, but I don't think I really knew just how tricky they'd be until she got here. Needless to say I'm a bit nervous about this new reality, but we'll get it all sorted out once we fumble through our first one. I will say that the biggest blessing is that my office is walking distance from the hospital AND they are ok with me bringing Mckenna to the office with me. Man I love my work - they're awesome! So that will provide some flexibility.

And the last reality that has crept in in the last few weeks is the realization that this is forever. Some of you I'm sure just let out a laugh. I'm sure many of your blurted out a "DUHHH!!". And I know, this statement sounds really dumb. It's so obvious. Yes, a baby is forever. I, of course, knew that. However, I didn't quite know the REALITY of it. What I mean, for example, is I knew that I'd have less sleep with a baby...I didn't grasp that I'd never have the chance to catch up on sleep...because a kid creating sleepless nights is (what feels like) forever. It's not like a little blip where you don't get sleep for a week, and then you can catch up. Or I knew I'd be tethered to her day and night because I'm breastfeeding, but I didn't realize what that looked like in terms of my days. I didn't realize what it means to only have 2 hours away from the house on my own, max..."forever" (I get this isn't forever, but right now, it kinda feels like it! ha!). The permanent-ness (yes, I didn't just say permanent-ness) of having a baby is a no-brainer, but the reality of the permanent-ness didn't quite sink in until the last couple of weeks.

The theme of life the last couple of weeks has been "reality check" for me. It has been both fun and scary to come back to real life after 11 weeks of "baby bliss" on maternity leave. It's been fun and scary to realize what our new life looks like - certainly not bad, just different and a little scary trying to navigate through it all. But man, when I see her smile or feel her little hand on my skin, it makes me so thrilled to be in this reality!!

Have you ever had this happen to you though? Where you know something, but you don't quite grasp it until you're in the thick of things?