There’s never a dull moment in this house. When things seem to settle, here comes the COVID-19 nightmare. And if you think Lavinia is too little to feel it, think again.

Coronavirus is changing our lives forever

I wish I could talk about something else. The COVID-19 virus has changed forever the way we live our lives, worldwide. In our little home, things have drastically changed as well.

I am asthmatic, and my parents found that out when I was 8 months old through a bilateral pneumonia. I don’t want to take any risks with Lavinia, so we went into full self-isolation two weeks before the UK government imposed that to the population.

If you think Lavinia is too little to feel what’s happening around her, think again. For starters, self-isolation at home means saying goodbye to our long relaxing walks. We still don’t know how long we’ll need to stay enclosed at home and keep social distance, but this impacts her behaviour.
Babies are extremely empathetic, and they react to our worries and anxieties, no matter how good at hiding them we can be. Lavinia is not an exception in this, even though she’s still a sweet girl for the majority of the time.

I am grateful that Lavinia got her vaccination shots before the Coronavirus outbreak, at least I have some peace of mind about those other dangerous diseases.

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Sleep and teething regression part 2

Did you remember when I said I needed to figure out her evening sleeping routine, while naps were sorted? Well, Lavinia now sleeps through the night pretty well and needs just a little help to fall asleep in her crib: sometimes she can’t connect sleep cycles or gets thirsty, but that’s nothing a quick nursing section can’t fix. Naps, on the other hand, are a nightmare.

Morning naps are like a Russian roulette: if she falls asleep and manages to connect her sleep cycles, I get a good 90 minutes of freedom. Otherwise, it’s hell on earth.
Afternoon naps are inexistent: she can catnap for 20 minutes after lunch if we’re lucky, and there’s no way she can take another nap after her 3pm feeding. This means she stays cranky until bedtime. I literally tried anything with no success. I thought it was just the way Lavinia sleeps – one long nap in the morning and two short naps in the afternoon before bedtime, however it’s very clear from her cues that she needs to sleep but can’t manage that.

I read around that this is a form of sleep regression, so I hope it will pass. I was also relying on the help of the childminder to fix this once I’d be back at work in a month time, but due to the COVID-19 outbreak I’ll have to sort that out by myself. On top of that, Lavinia’s tooth hasn’t cut the gum yet, even though it’s been about a month now since the first time I noticed it.

In a nutshell, we’re living indoor with an afternoon antichrist. It’s tough for our mental health, but we’ll get through that.

Finally it’s s proper tummy time!

On the good news, Lavinia finally enjoys her tummy time! She can stay that way up to half an hour, often rolling on her back. She can’t roll back to the tummy position yet.

She still needs assistance in a sitting position, and doesn’t stay long that way as she gets tired quickly. I hope that all this tummy time can help strengthen her posterior chain muscles quickly, so to be ready for the 6 months weaning milestone.

She plays more and longer with her toys, gnawing anything and drooling everywhere. As always, she talks a lot. A LOT.

Unfortunately this COVID-19 situation has drowned all my mental energies to write more about Lavinia and her developments. If anything, I’m more concerned about the consequences this self-isolation and social distance will have on her while growing up.

This is the last month of my maternal leave. On Apr 30th I will be back at work full time, with Lavinia turning 6 months and the weaning road to hit as well. I suspect the pandemic will keep us stuck at home, so it will be challenging to juggle everything among our four walls.