Two Body Problem (orig)

Since Ezra was born, the question I'm asked most is, "Are you getting any sleep?" Usually followed by, "Is the baby sleeping through the night".* I'm not sure why people ask new parents these questions. I think it comes down to schadenfreude. I'm certainly no saint, since I'm sure I asked new parents this as well.

I was recently talking about the lack of sleep with a colleague of mine who is expecting a baby soon. She asked me if the lack of sleep was comparable to when I was working on my dissertation. She had a point, being students for as long as Shanna and I were you would think we would be used to lack of sleep. In my experience, however, the lack of sleep from parenthood feels different than the exhaustion preceding my thesis defense or my qualifying exam in two ways. First, I got my Ph.D. almost three years ago, and my qualifying exam was almost, ahem, seven years ago. That's plenty of time to become a total wimp. It only took me three months of living in California to become a total wimp in regard to weather. Second, Lack of sleep trials in the past had definite end points. I knew that at on such a such a date I would have my exam and one way or another that would be the end of it. Parenthood, in my limited experience, is a way of life that is constantly evolving. At some point Ezra will let us sleep longer, but by then we'll have other worries, like what sort of terror is our toddler inflicting on our home.

*Here's the answer, Yes, I'm getting some sleep, but not enough. Shanna has it worse, but she can sometimes take a nap during the day while my work generally frowns on that. No, the baby is not sleeping through the night, he's six weeks old and they don't to that.