About as Good as an Exploded Whale Carcass…

Phew! So…it’s been a bit since I updated where things stand currently! Truth is, it’s been a sleep-exhaustion-induced haze, these past couple weeks. Goldbug is either toothing or going through his 9mo sleep regression or hitting major brain milestones (he is walking!), or ALL THREE AT ONCE, combined with dropping temperatures at night and uneven heater temperatures, and trying to figure out a functional night feeding schedule that doesn’t involve me being awake 100% of the time…

ZOMG, people, I’m so tired. But-! We’ve figured out the heater issue, and that problem may be solved. I’ve figured out what his actual night feeding schedule is currently, thanks to a clock in the bedroom, so I can tell when he wakes to eat and when he’s just thrashing but isn’t necessarily hungry, so that problem is at least data-driven now and I can start making reasonable adjustments. And the walking-related disruption may finally be fading a bit, because he does seem capable of sleeping for longer lengths of time now, so fingers crossed-! I actually got a halfway decent night of sleep last night, so hopefully tonight we can repeat the process and get another decent night.

I just need to rack up some good sleep hours. Lack of sleep makes me so grouchy and no fun to be around, and with a 6yo bursting at the seams with energy first thing in the morning, you can just imagine how our house quickly devolves into Frustration Station. I haven’t been able to get any decent work done in the past two weeks, because my eyes literally try to glue themselves shut. My mother has taken pity on me and given me a couple naps first thing in the AM before she goes to work, which have been absolute lifesavers. I still live in a hazy fog, but at least I’m 80% less grumpy, especially once I’ve gotten some coffee in the ol’ pipes. Major kudos to those moms out there who have infants in their late 30s/40s. I don’t know how they find the energy.

But like I said, we may have solved a handful of problems, so fingers crossed that those solutions plus Goldbug maybe just passing through whatever disruption/regression/toothing he was hitting will soon lead to reasonable sleep schedules for us all once again. In the meantime, however, I did get a rejection for one story (awwww….) and queried about another I probably should have queried weeks ago about, but you know. Intellectually, I know it doesn’t help to wait, AND I know it doesn’t hurt to make sure nothing got lost, but superstitiously it’s easy to get inside one’s head and doubt everything. But I made myself do that today, and it honestly does feel good to have done so, even if I haven’t heard back yet. We’ll just have to wait and see.

Also, thanks to Andy being the best husband ever, I took the car and parked in a quiet place this AM and wrote for an HOUR AND A HALF, which may not sound like a lot to most people, but good grief, it felt like CHRISTMAS to me. I pounded out 2k of the opening of the novel rewrite, which feels amazing, even if it’s far from perfect, at least it’s on the page! Dude, guys, it felt so good. It was peaceful and silent and there were no interruptions AT ALL, and I could just get into my head and GO and it was…*sigh* It was beautiful. We’re going to try to lock in at least one morning a weekend for me to do that, maybe even twice a weekend so I can really crank (I really need to hit about 3k/weekend (or during the week, too, if the sleep thing calms down) from here on out if I want the 90k rewrite to be done by June, which is when I’ve got some beta readers interested in reading it).

Not doing NANO this year as I’d originally thought about doing, mostly because I just can’t count on any evening quiet time with the way things have been going. I was lucky to be able to attend one of the Clarion West online workshops on Thursday with author Crystal Conner, though Andy took the hit that night with the grumpy baby not wanting to sleep. That was a fun workshop and brought up some fascinating things to consider when writing horror for children (a la Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark).

Otherwise, we’re hanging on by our teeth, but we’re still here. Someday, I know from experience, things will get easier, but sometimes I just have to repeat the mantra It’ll pass, it’ll pass, it’ll pass… And that writing session this weekend was an incredible lifeline. I certainly needed it!

This week, no goals at all during the week (if writing happens, fantastic, but I’m primarily focused on the creative writing class I’m taking via the AWC, and literally nothing else), and just the goal of 3k on the weekend. I’ve got a lot of habits to pick up from where they got dropped these past few weeks, so we’ll start there, clawing our way back to some semblance of a normal schedule.

Here goes nothing…