The First Month: November

The first few days are really special; I wanted to hold onto those moments forever, with P and baby lying in bed next to me. At first I could not sleep in between the times baby breastfed, although he slept 5 hours the first two nights (12-5am), then woke hourly for a night or so. I thought, what’s this about the hormone that’s supposed to help you get back to sleep?

In fact, I was too excited to sleep. I couldn’t decide which bit of the day I liked best; the mornings, the afternoons, or when darkness fell at 4pm and I closed the curtains. I remained in our bedroom all day, and only the difference in the daylight and the varied skies I saw from our window gave each part of the day a different mood and rhythm.


I was a bit hesitant about the arrival of night, because I never knew how much our baby would sleep and how often he would wake me. Already those early days seem some time ago, as we get used to the new little person who is with us. I’m writing this in bed, and T is now 3 weeks old. Bed and bedroom seems to be the best and calmest place in the house. I love the light; the cosiness; P and I lie in bed listening to music, with baby beside us. It’s the first time we’ve had a CD player in the bedroom and the first few nights we fell asleep to ‘Ulysses Gaze’, somehow a mesmerising, calming piece.

I was in bed for 2 weeks after the birth out of necessity, enabling my postnatal wounds to heal. I was unable to sit down, so I lay propped up by cushions to breastfeed, eat meals and do the very little else I did. The baby remained ‘baby’ for a week or so, and I still call him that. As I hold onto these early memories of him, I am aware that with each day and week that passes, he enters a new phase. In the first few days he seemed calm and contented, and I thought, we have a baby that doesn’t cry, but then he was still getting used to being in the world. He fed well, and latched on calmly to my breast.