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Exhausted

I feel like every mom could write a post about being exhausted. Never enough sleep, constant worrying, always on alert, etc. Being a mom of a kiddo with special needs, seems to have a whole new layer of exhaustion. I am by no means discrediting the exhaustion of every parent. Being a parent is flat out exhausting. But because the only lens of being a parent I have is being the parent of a special needs kiddo, that's what I have to go on.

In a "normal" week, Bren has at least two appointments. He either has speech and a weight check or speech and PT. Sometimes, all three of those line up on the same week. Thankfully those are just in a neighboring town and we don't have to drive the hour to Madison. Some weeks you have to throw Madison appointments on to those already standing appointments. Some weeks we have to throw an extra appointment on if Bren becomes sick. Some weeks he has his WCC. Those are just the appointments for Bren. That doesn't include any of my own appointments I might need(which appointments for me don't happen much because there isn't space in the week). 

In between all of his appointments, we work on therapy stuff at home too. There is not a day that goes by that we are not working on eating or something related to PT. If you walked into our house, you would see balls and other toys scattered around the living room to try and get Bren to sit on his own and want to scoot to reach for toys. You would walk into the kitchen and see two drying racks full of bottles, syringes, tubes, and other eating supplies. You would also see medications that Bren needs. Trying to keep track of when he gets which medicine and how much it he gets is exhausting. It use to be all written down, but they change so frequently that it's hard to keep my list up to date on paper. And the amount of calories per ounce and the amount of ounces we are suppose to feed him often changes as well.

When I try and plan for a sitter(which rarely happens), I get exhausted just thinking about what I need to tell them in relation to feeding Bren and doing activities with him that are beneficial. Then writing those things out and explaining/teaching them to a sitter is something else that's completely exhausting. We usually have to sit with sitters two or three times before we are all comfortable with the feeding/giving meds process.

Because of the requirements it takes to get a sitter, Drew and I rarely go out and if we do, it's even more rare that it is together. We are pretty good at giving each other breaks out of the house but it would be really nice to be able to take breaks together.

Drew and I knew becoming parents would lead to a level of exhaustion we hadn't experienced before. But this. We did not expect this. I've only shared the physical demands of our days that are exhausting. I haven't even touched on the mental and emotional part of the exhaustion. We are tired. We are prepared to be tired for the rest of our lives. So when you ask us how we are, don't be surprised if we say we are exhausted. And if we don't say we are exhausted, it's likely because it's just become such a way of life that we don't even notice it anymore, so just assume we are. :)

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