Grinity your description summed up my experience to a T. After my first was like this, my friends would say "Your second will be so easy." They were so wrong! She was even more intense than the first.

My back aches thinking of all the hours using the baby sling. DH and I would joke that DDs had horizontal sensors: as soon as you would try to lay them down, their eyes would pop open and the screaming would begin.

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really really 'awake, alert, and demanding
Sounds like a good title for a book I needed when my daughters were born. It's gotten better now that they're older (4&6). Now it's less physically demanding but more mentally challenging. wink