Sleep: Officially a Thing of the Past

I’ve heard that sleeping becomes futile towards the end of pregnancy, but I was bound and determined to postpone this situation as long as possible. I knew it was coming, but I have proceeded blissfully in denial – that is, until last night. Turns out Mother Nature has more “binding and determination” than we feeble pregnant women can compete with. I’m talking about the joys of upper back pain. This is exacerbated by the “the belly is so big, there’s no place to put it” inconvenience, and accompanied nicely by the “Baby is awake and kicking – again” song and dance that seems to never end (“An active baby is a happy baby,” “an active baby is a happy baby…” I endlessly repeat this mantra to remind myself it’s a good thing). Put these all together over the span of what should be a good night's rest, and you get Dennis coming into the bedroom this morning to find me trying to sleep on all fours, face down in the pillow and surrounded by a dilapidated array of about 17 pillows. His laughing at my situation only made it worse – I wanted relief! So then it was out to the couch for a final three hours of intermittent “sleep” – yet another hopeless endeavor. What’s that? Another SIX weeks of this? Yeah, then the REAL sleep deprivation project begins…