Seeking some clarity

I've been thinking a lot about community and about sleep (or lack thereof), and last night Doug and I were talking with our very close friends who are also new parents about how much these two issues dominate our lives.

We were talking about how our friends could return to Nova Scotia, where they could afford to buy a house (Vancouver is now the second most expensive place in North America to live), and more importantly, where they would be surrounded by family. Their daughter could grow up as part of a giant clan of cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents and great grandparents, all of whom would help with the difficult business of raising children.

As it stands we only have ourselves. The mummies spend all day and night caring for the babies, and the only relief we have is from the daddies, who are both working full time. Having my mum and aunt here last weekend really emphasized this for me, this aloneness, and the exhausting nature of it just being Doug and I on duty, all of the time. And that's not to say that other friends don't volunteer to watch Olive (or Etta), but other friends aren't around enough to really create a bond with the babes - and we aren't into leaving our babes with people who to them are virtual strangers. We can leave the girls with each other, but that means that we, as already tired-out parents, then take on two babes for awhile to give the other couple a break. And you can't (due to scheduling/exhaustion) do this super regularly. Last weekend my mum took Olive every morning so that Doug and I could both get some sleep, and during the day we both got a bit of a break instead of Olive always being with one or the other. I don't need help everyday, but a regular visit with Nanny or a substitute Nanny would be heaven. Because nannies love their babies, no matter how they cry, and they also love the mamas and papas, no matter how they bitch.

Now, that's not to say that we don't love being with Olive, but I don't believe that babies were meant to be raised within the confines of the nuclear family. Nursing a babe all night and day, and truly nurturing her as she needs (and deserves) to be nurtured takes a huge, vast amount of energy and patience. This plague of cry it out, and babies sleeping alone in cribs in their own rooms is a product of this isolation of families, and when you try to avoid that, to nurture your family, you realize just how much nurturing mum and dad need as well as babe. It's so hard to treat yourself and your partner well when you're both pouring all of your energy into the baby and taking care of basics.

So, we need to ask, what do we really want for our family? Do we want to be able to buy a house? Do we want to be near my family, no matter the cost (i.e. living in Kamloops)? Is it worth it to live in a place where you would have no tribe, but you would have family? Should we run away to some far away place where we can build a new community? Should we stay here in Vancouver with no family, no stable home, and maybe soon, no best friends? What is best for Doug, Olive & I as a unit?

I do know that we want to be together as much as possible - no Doug working in summers, no mama working full-time. Lots of lazy, rich days together. In a dream, both Doug and I would be 'working' from home as artisans of one kind or another. We didn't have Olive to stick her in daycare. We won't work so much that our family dies, even though that is what it would take to own a home in Vancouver.

And sleeping. Sleeping. We've talked about trying to change her sleep habits a lot. When we have a couple of bad nights and I'm so tired I'm nauseous and brain dead and angry, we say, 'we have to change this.' But then I have to look inside myself and when I do I see this: a happy, thriving baby. A deep, abiding connection, love and sense of safety. I feel like I have something with Olive that I wouldn't have if she didn't night nurse and co-sleep. I'd love it if she'd nurse less at night (say 2 or 3 times instead of God knows how many), but I am not willing, at this point in time, to let her cry. Even if the crying is in her dad's arms. Why would we spend all of this time growing this trust, this attachment, only to break it? I do not want her to sleep in her own room. I don't want her to sleep in a crib. I want her to spend most of the night near us, with our bodies touching, reassuring each other.

So, so. So, we're going to rearrange our bedroom to make it safer for a crawling baby and to give her a little sleeping nook on the floor so that she'll (hopefully) not wake up when mum and dad come to bed at night. And we're in negotiations on whether Doug will take her for some of the wake ups for awhile to get her to maybe stop waking so frequently (this will be a big debate). And if this doesn't work or doesn't happen, I need to make a committment to myself to some self-care. I need to start trying to take naps and to go to bed early once or twice a week. And I need to do some yoga at home and to exercise a bit more.

Self-care. Rearranging. Big talks about the future. Financial reassessment.

Clarity, let's get crackin'.