The past two nights, Paul and I were in San Diego. Also, the past two nights, Paul and I were forced to use the bathroom in the hotel lobby starting at 8pm. Whose fault is that? You’re looking at her. See, Piper has a routine. It starts at 6, when she eats dinner. Usually that goes to about 6:45 or so, depending on how many little “snacks” come after her actual dinner- she likes to pick things up and practice putting them in her mouth. After dinner, we play a bit. On bath nights we get the tub ready at 7, then comes the bedtime routine- the same every.single.night: triple paste, diaper, Aveeno’s calming lotion, jammies and into the nursery we go to be nursed and rocked with the baby crack machine (white noise) playing “rain”. Then, I become a sleep sheriff, and demand there be no loud noises, no barks, no peeking in, no use of Paul’s bathroom which shares a wall with her nursery, no lights on… I’m terrible.

The thing with traveling is having to disrupt the schedule. Or, in our recent trip, having to cordon off the bathroom/closet/dressing table/sink/coffee maker area to use as Piper’s “room”. Piper has never slept in her pack n play as an older baby. Well, one night she slept in it for three hours- but never has she slept an entire night in it. Since I knew that would be hard enough for her to get used to, the idea of having to keep her in the room with us while we read, talked and watched tv gave me hives. Piper would refuse to go down and would get increasingly fussy as she got more and more exhausted. So Paul and I agreed: the best place for her and the pack n play would be the bathroom area that was completely dark, had more than enough room, and two doors we could close. Of course, this meant… not going to the bathroom in our own room past eight o’clock. Luckily we were pretty close to the lobby and we managed to only go once each while on our two night vacation. The first night Piper went down and didn’t wake until 3:30, which was awesome. Of course, Paul had then awakened just in time for me to have put her back down again. Since I’m crazy, and would rather have him pee in front of our room than wake a recently back to sleep baby, he got dressed and walked down to the lobby at four am. Lucky for him it was empty, it wasn’t as lucky for me. I just used the occasion to tell them we needed a “privacy please” door hanger, rather than tell them “Hey, I need to use your bathroom because my baby is sleeping in ours”.

It was a little tricky, as the first night I went out in search of ice and wound up getting the urge. Since having Piper, my bladder control isn’t the best (while I never peed myself while pregnant, at least I have that), so just the NOTION of having to pee causes me to leak a little. So not joking here. SO I went out with my ice bucket and felt the need to pee. Since I thought it would look weird to have a girl walk into the bathroom holding an empty ice bucket (or full, really, not a big difference in weird), I set the bucket on a rock outside the lobby and did my business. I came outside, looked around for witnesses, seeing none I headed back to the ice maker. I kept telling myself, “If Piper wakes up, just go to the bathroom and let her cry for a bit”. It never happened.

The second night was a nightmare. Not only did I have the MOST insane headache that six tylenol couldn’t remove, but Piper also woke seemingly every hour crying. The first time she had her blanket on her head. Seriously. ON HER HEAD. I’d be crying too, if you woke up like that. Of course, she was sitting up when I found her, but I have no idea how that blanket got on her head. Paul and I were so exhausted from The San Diego Zoo that we both conked out, which was great for the bathroom issue but not so great for being woken up every hour, jumping up in a haze after your husband smacks you on the arm to tell you the baby is crying, stumbling around in the dark.

This morning she woke up before 6, and when I brought her into bed with us (a very RARE occasion) she fell asleep for two hours, thank god.

Parenthood. It means going without a bathroom so your baby can sleep.