"Wizened" mom

Being a mom over 40, I smugly believed I knew it all, and had done it all. I was prepared and in charge of the new arrival. Shocker! Mieka is a different baby, and apparently she did not read the same manual as me. (Sic) The sleeping has been a challenge since the beginning. Arnia, now 16, slept through the night very early on. We still haven’t mastered the same with Mieka. In the first few weeks it felt more like she was awake the whole time, as she was in a one and half hour cycle. Some nights we are lucky, for example last night, when I put her down to sleep before eight. But then she woke again after nine and me and Dries had to take turns trying to get her to bed again. She slept from ten until half past two, and that was great. I was struggling with the baby monitor at four, wondering why it was not registering the screaming, when we realized it was the neighbours’ baby across the road. That kept us awake until Mieka woke up again at five. Not a bad night, but night after night the same waking schedule is busy taking its toll…
Also I am still worried about her development. I thought I would be more relaxed about the whole idea of children developing differently, but now I worry because she is not rolling or crawling yet.
I realize I am not “wiser” being older or doing it again and that I have to tackle the challenge, Mieka (smile), in a different way. My resolution not to feel guilty for the things I can’t change is helping, especially since I have put it in black and white.
Luckily we have the Internet nowadays for researching, I am on mailing lists and we have wonderful gadgets to help with the baby. I thought at first that the gadgets are a waste of money, but now I am a big supporter of every little help we can get. For example, I know now with clarity that we should have bought a swing/vibrator thing to help with the sleeping…
Being older has humbled me – about the joy and miracle of having a baby, but also the realization that I do not know everything!