I don't even know where to begin. I can't believe she'll be two weeks old tomorrow.

I've never been so out of touch with the world as I am right now. The current song I have in my head isn't on any Billboard chart, but a Mozart piece from a Baby Einstein Discovery Gym. I probably watch 1/2 hour of TV a day and haven't even missed it. And the sad thing is, when I turn on the TV to escape, it seems like the majority of news being reported on is baby-related. Tom and Katie. Brooke. Brad and Angelina. With a little dash of bird flu, Moussaoui, and Earl Woods (RIP) mixed in.

Speaking of Tom, when I was in the hospital, I had a very annoying nurse named Betty Jo who tried to encourage me all throughout labor. She ended every sentence with, "I'm just saying it out loud."

"Once the baby comes, you'll forget about the pain. Just saying it out loud."

And worse, after every push, she would exclaim, "Hooray!" and she would enunciate the 'Hoo' part of it. I really wished she would shut up, and it was then that I thought of Tom, and how maybe silent births aren't such a bad thing. But I kept my mouth shut and figured that I'd let a more feisty woman going through labor set Betty Jo straight.

Ken went back to work yesterday and so I am taking the night shift whenever Steph needs to be fed or changed, which is every 3-4 hours or so. Before she was born, I promised myself that I would try to nap when she naps, but it's more difficult to do than I realized since something inside me is wrongfully convincing my brain that I'm not that tired, and that sure, I can survive on no more than 5 hours of sleep a day. No problem.

But maybe that's the mother-in-training in me. The one who will bake cookies at the last minute because my daughter forgot to tell me until the night before about the bake sale at school the next day. The one who will stay up with her finishing an assignment for class. The one who will wait up for her to return from nights out with friends, or the dreaded first date (even though that won't be until she's 30.) The one who will drop everything on a dime because she needs me to be there for her.

I drive as if I have a baby in the car, even when I don't. And I wonder now why more people don't have that mindset. It's amazing how quickly your life goes from being all about you to being all about somebody else.