My 10 month old has decided sleep is for the birds. My once decent sleeper has stopped sleeping through the night over the last few months, and the majority of this week has stopped sleeping through the hour. LITERALLY. We have tried everything....supplementing with formula, sleepsack, no sleepsack, feeding, rocking, cry it out, no cry method, better daytime routines. The kid just doesn't want to sleep...unless she's laying on your chest or sleeping in bed with you (thing number 1000 I said I'd never do that I now do regularly....out of desperation honestly).
So, as I lay on the couch tonight with my dog at my feet and my restlessly sleeping babe on my chest, I was grumbling to myself in my head about yet another night with Grant's snores from the bedroom and my sighs of minimal, frequently interrupted, uncomfortable sleep. I was fretting about another sleep deprived day tomorrow, filled with yawns and caffeine, when I have so much to do.
And then the conviction came.
I realized it. This time only a year ago, I was having a different kind of sleepless night. Nights full of restlessness due to worry that I'd never have a baby to sleep on my chest. Worry that I'd never get to lay on the couch with her and cuddle. Sleep interruption because I'd wake multiple times a night panicked, waiting to feel her move, wondering if she'd died inside of me (50% of babies with Trisomy 18 are stillborn - something I just couldn't get past worrying about throughout my entire pregnancy, even after they reversed Eve's diagnosis).
How quickly we are to complain in life. How quickly we forget the blessings we have been given.
I have been in a season of wanting lately. Wanting to work less, wanting a bigger/better house, wanting my family closer to me, wanting more sleep! All this wanting has blinded me from seeing all that I have. A job that I truly enjoy, a day off a week with Eve, a house that we own with adequate space and wonderful neighbors, a "local family" full of friends that would do anything for us with a simple, quick ask. A baby to sleep on my chest in the middle of the night. A baby that wants to be near me so badly, that she wakes throughout the night asking for me to hold her. The healthy child that a year ago I didn't think I'd have.
Every time I think I'm getting over the crazy pregnancy I walked through, the losses before it, they creep back up again and hit me like a hammer on the head. That pain is deep rooted within me. But the wanting I felt then should remind me of the gift I have now. I am thankful beyond words to have Eve and all that we have here in Colorado. I'm almost embarrassed to admit I want more.
Advent is all about wanting. The wanting of Christ's coming. It's about the understanding of the gift He is to us. I am going to try hard this remaining Advent season to not focus on the wanting in my life, but on the gifts I have already been given. I'd encourage you to do the same. (And maybe we will all sleep a little better by doing so!)
