Changing routines

Isn't it amazing how routines develop and change so quickly, yet when you're in the thick of them they can seem constant. I was just thinking how, if all goes to exactly to plan, I might not finish this menstrual cycle. Or more correctly, another one might not start for (based on last time) 18 months or so. And that seems odd. I am so used to that cycle governing my life, yet only a little while ago I had 18 months without it. And to have the cycle start up again seemed equally odd. For months I would complete forget about it and be caught unawares when my period came due.

But the same thing happens on a much smaller scale with Liam. When he was only a few weeks old I would find myself recognising a routine, only to have it change the next day. Now we have routines that last for longer periods - he's been having a (roughly) midday nap for five months now, for instance - but still, they feel like permanent fixtures, when in fact they change with startling regularity. Even within what seems like a clear routine there are lots of changes.

For example at the moment, Liam goes to sleep for this nap with me or Chris lying down in bed with him. Sometime he nurses to sleep, sometimes not. It seems like that's how it's always been. But actually, when we first came back from the States, in March, he would fall asleep nursing in the chair in the living room, and I would carry him to bed. If I were at work Chris would sometimes have to take him for a drive, or a walk in the pram, and then carry him into the house asleep. Then there was the phase when Chris could lie down with him and get him to sleep, but it would take 1/2 an hour, whereas I would lie down and nurse him to sleep in five minutes. Now it's different again (and frequently takes a darn sight more than five minutes, but to compensate he slept for over three hours today!).

It's like, we are so set up for adaptation that we don't even realise change happens, as long as it is relatively incremental. And so when it's not, when it's major, it feels like we'll never learn to adjust. But we do, of course.

**This post was orginially published on Ocean View Verandah using Blogger. Please let me know of any down links (especially to photos).**