The Midnight Oil

At the hospital, everything was perfect. There were visitors all day that wanted to hold Emmarie. She roomed with us at night, but if I just got too tired, they would take her to the nursery. Like I said, Perfect. Then we had to go home. This was very bitter sweet for me because I had a lot of anxiety about being responsible for keeping her safe. She had a couple of incidents in the hospital where she would stop breathing for a second and act like she was choking. At the hospital even though I was scared, I knew everything would be alright. We were never more than 25 feet from a health care professional. Taking her home would be different; I would have to make sure that I was watching her in these situations.

So we went home. On the way to our house, I sat in the back with Emmarie and watched her like a hawk to make sure she would be okay in the car. This was our routine for the first few months anytime we went anywhere in the car. Someone was always in the backseat with her. On our way home the first day, we stopped and took her picture with the Hoffer's sign.

Since Emmarie was born at night, she had her nights and days mixed up for a while. This left us burning the midnight oil. She spent a lot of time sleeping, but she would only sleep for about two hours at a time and then she was ready to wake up and spend some time with Mommy and Daddy. This turned out to mostly be time with Mommy since Daddy had to go back to work after the first week. Since I was scared to go to sleep because I was afraid she would have one of her choking spells, my mom came and stayed the night with us the first few nights. She and I would sleep in the recliners in the living room and take turns holding Emmarie while the other slept. These brief breaks were the entirety of what I was sleeping. I am not a napper, and I could not fall asleep during the day when Emmy was napping no matter how hard I tried. I could finally get a few hours of sleep because I knew my mom would keep an eye on her and wake me up if anything happened.


After a few nights, We finally started getting the hang of things, and I could sleep a little bit at night without her there. Emmarie would wake up, and I would remind myself that it was okay because I did not have anywhere that I needed to go the next day. I would sit up with her and play and watch T.V. Here is a picture of her that first week around 2:00 A.M. She was wide awake and ready to party! I could not believe how alert she was.

Even during all of the sleepless nights, I was loving everything about Emmarie, and I was so proud that she was here! More posts to come.