Unexpected side effects
LB is sleeping *much* better. 7pm until nearly 6am almost every night for the past 3 weeks. This is very, very good (especially for me, who doesn't usually get up with him at 6. Less good for D who does). Everyone getting more sleep has many good side effects, apart from the main not being chronically sleep deprived one. Many of these were (eagerly) anticipated, but some were unexpected:
- I am cleaning my face every morning. I don't really know why I wasn't before. It only takes about 3 minutes, interspersed with cleaning my teeth, which I did always do. But somehow it kept feeling as if there was no time for the luxury of 'cleanse, tone, moisturise', given that I can miss about two days before I start getting spotty. Cleaning my face every morning makes me feel back in control of my life, rather than constantly fire-fighting.
- We are getting through way fewer Paracetamol and Ibuprofen. This is partly an entirely anticipated decrease in the amount D is ill, but is also an unexpected side effect of me losing what I now realise was a tiredness headache every bedtime. I go to bed, and I don't have trouble getting to sleep because my head aches! (I still have trouble getting to sleep because I can't get comfortable or I can't stop thinking, but that's Normal for Norfolk-descended me). I don't have to buy Paracetamol everytime I go past the chemist's.
- D has started cooking more, and cooking creatively, rather than doing our basic staples. I do like cooking, but it's lovely eating delicious, nutritious, lovingly-prepared food that you haven't prepared yourself. We realised ages ago that when I am tired, I can still usually be bothered to cook, but I can't face cleaning, and D is the other way round. This is handy, although it ought to mean that I am now eagerly hoovering and dusting, which I'm just not.
- We can get so much done at weekends! Weekends go on for ever when they're not full of one parent wrangling both kids so the other can sleep. It also helps that we're doing minor chores during the week, rather than leaving everything til the weekend. We started today (a weekend-like holiday day) with a list of jobs three times the length of an A4 sheet (three columns, small writing). We groaned and wished we hadn't listed them all, and reassured ourselves that this was just what we didn't want to forget, rather than what we actually hoped to achieve before Monday. But today we achieved about a third of them, despite everyone being a bit grotty with colds. We may even, possibly, get round to painting the loo tomorrow, which has been test pot stripes of bright green, orange and purple on the original yellow for nearly four years.