I am tired after three nights of constant nursing (my daughter’s working on two teeth and on walking), but tired can be a mellow easy place of snuggles and warmth and not just frustration.

I can hover at the edge of sleep with a warm limp child in my arms, and relax into the moment. I cannot change this. I cannot make it move faster. She needs me now. In the night. Often.

I’m here in this moment. Almost fourteen months through our journey of unknown length. I do not know how much longer it will be until she sleeps through the night every night without needing me. Back at the beginning fourteen months would sound impossible. But here we are, and the nights that have passed are insignificant in my memories.

It’s each coming night that is hard. But each night is one night at a time. Each night becomes insignificant once it passes. I haven’t “been sleep deprived for fourteen months”, rather I’ve passed through it one night at a time. Manageable nights of manageable size, not the number that encompasses the whole.

I can let the moments roll past peacefully. Fighting just makes them hard.

I do not remember the sleep deprivation of my older two as intensely as I remember the moments of surrender and bliss.

When this has all passed I will recall that things were rough, but the memories will be full of sweetness as well.

Kisses to sweaty foreheads with fluffy hair laced with sand that will not wash out.

Sweet warm limpness with a twitchy sleep-nursing smile in the darkness at my side.

The curve of you, tiny and rapidly growing, snuggled up together in a nest of soft white sheets.

This is how you and I fit together for this moment and this moment alone. Tomorrow will be different. And one day you will have grown too big to want to share space this way.

One night at a time, passing slowly by. Oh how I love it when I can surrender without expectations and simply enjoy the passage of time.