Sleep well my Angel

I lived in Luxembourg years ago in the dark ages before the Internet was invented. Or at least in the years before it became publically available and wasn’t just the preserve of members of the Industrial, Military machine and geeky University researchers.

To feed my voracious appetite for news, I subscribed to the Irish Times. This cost an arm and a leg, so I only got the Monday edition, because if I’m really honest, I’m only interested in sport. It was delivered to my work post-box every Monday lunchtime by a man who made his living driving up and down the motorway to Brussels airport. That road bored and fascinated me during my time in Luxembourg. It rolls in a straight line over the Ardennes mountains with nothing to see except the monotonous countryside of Southern Belgium.

In summer, it was a little more interesting as the road would be filled with a never-ending procession of Dutch caravans heading to the South of France. To amuse myself and my travelling companions, we would try to be the first to spot a Dutch caravan coming towards us and you’d accumulate points for correct spotting but lose ten points if the caravan turned out to be Belgian, twenty if it was Danish and elimination from the game if it turned out to be Irish.

The complexities of that game would easily pass the two hours it took to get to the airport and it also spawned the title for my upcoming novel. “Counting Dutch Caravans on the Road to Brussels”. I have the title, now all I have to do is come up with a plot and a narrative.

Having finished the sport, my favourite destination in Monday’s Irish Times was the TV review section. This was strange in that I hadn’t lived in Ireland for eight years at that point and was in country where none of the shows being reviewed would ever be shown. It was like I had a basic need to reconnect with a life I’d previously enjoyed. Or maybe they were just funny.

I find myself in a similar position now as a new Father. I pour over cinema reviews with the intensity of a forensic scientist. And yet I know that I will never get to see these films, unless I can wangle a plane trip to an overseas destination. There are many things you have to sacrifice when you become a parent, sleep being the obvious one, but it’s the little things that strike me most. The cinema, pub and sporting outings will all have to be put on the back burner for a few months, until we get our little angel into some sort of routine that will allow her parents a modicum of a social life.

But it’s a small sacrifice to make for all the pleasure a child brings. It’s hard work for sure, particularly for Mammy who has to do all that breastfeeding and has sole responsibility while Daddy is at work. But when a three week old girl smiles at you for the first time, you would happily gave up all those material things that filled your previous child free life.

Many people have asked me if our baby has changed much since she was born. She has gotten bigger that’s for sure and after some initial weight loss problems is now stacking it on. But really she hasn’t changed much at all. They reckon kids have to adapt to the environment, but actually I think the environment adapts to them. The real change is in the Mother and Father. We start to learn cues, we become comfortable with changing a dirty nappy in darkness so as not to wake a sleeping baby and we change our sleeping patterns. The kid just eats, poohs and sleeps her way through most of this madness.

As an Accountant, I have become fascinated with the numbers involved. She’s gone through approximately 324 nappies so far, at an average of 10 a day. She wants to be fed 8 times per day, which means that her Mother has to produce about a litre of milk every 24 hours. She averages 3 clothing changes per day and throws up or poohs on enough blankets to warrant her own washing machine, which would run on a permanent cycle.

But while her Father is fascinated by numbers and averages, she is proving to be an independently minded baby. Just when we think we have her on a nice three hourly cycle of feed, play and sleep, she can decide to stay awake for 4 hours or to sleep for so long that we have to wake her up (something no parent ever wants to do as a sleeping child is like manna from heaven). The hours of 5pm to 9pm are a particular problem and when you mention this to other new parents, they nod in sympathy and talk about the “witching hour”. She needs more attention that Paris Hilton during this time and her Mother and I have already accepted that we won’t be having dinner together for a long time.

Every day gets easier though and every day she becomes more beautiful and develops her own personality. She doesn’t like socks or mittens and has learned how to remove these herself. That’s something I reckon she inherited from me, as I’ve slept with nothing on but a smile since I was six (which led to a few embarrassing sleep walking incidents when I was teenager and started staying over at friends houses).

She likes clouds and trees and seems fascinated with the world. And she can grip your finger and stare into your eyes in a way that makes me teary just writing these lines. I guess there is a scientific reason for all this. Kids need feeding and nurturing, so they need to develop an emotional bond with their parents. But who cares, it’s just the loveliest, most amazing thing that has ever happened to me. Sleep well my angel. Outside the storm is howling but you’re safe here.