For at least the last week or more Zachary has been waking up sometime between 1-4 hours after putting him to bed for the night. Im not sure what the cause is exactly, but it is definately exhausting mentally and physically, not to mention emotionally. I have a feeling it may be several things- wet diaper (we put him to bed with a warm bottle of milk), teething pain, bad dreams, stomach ache or some other pain, itching from exema, etc. What would you do, take away the bottle?
When he wakes, and I attend to him he can be up anywhere from 20 minutes to 3 hours or more. After the first hour or more of rocking and being kicked or jabbed in the gut with a knee from the tossing and turning, my compassion wears thin and I start getting uptight. This probably does not add to his likelyhood of falling asleep being that he can probably feel my stress and tenseness building.
At what point do you just put them to bed as lovingly as you can muster and close the door so you can get some sleep too? We've been home 4 months now. Some things have gotten better, other things have gotten worse. Its a process I guess. I just hope Im doing it well enough.
Winter 2013-2014
12 years ago
4 comments:
Motherhood is difficult, even when fully rested. Exhaustion compounds the difficulty to the point where simple tasks can seem impossible. He is your dearest treasure - but that does not mean that you need to sacrifice every part of you. It will be difficult, but I would shut the door...for your sake...and his.
Heather-we went through a period like this for S a few months ago, and it does wear you out! I'm sure you are exhausted! Luckily, like most things that have been hard, it passed. He still does not consistently sleep through the night, but if he doesn't, he usually just wakes up for 10 minutes or less and after we rock him, he returns to sleep. I hope this gets better with Zachary soon! Hang in there.
I would have to agree with your first commentor. I finally shut the door on Daniel one night at 1 am because I was so exhausted I couldn't stand. Guess what - he cried for about 4 minutes, fell asleep and sleep through the night like a champ now.
Yes, I know what you are talking about, I still remember (and live sometimes) those exhausting nights!
So far, we have never shut the door and let him cry for even a second. Sometimes just padding the back has worked, other times I had to rock him or lay with him on the twin bed that is in his room for maximum an hour. Right now his thing is to try to sleep with us, but he moves too much and then you get 3 exhausted people!
As Carrie said, this could be only a phase and you may just have to hang in there and be patient. Diego has been with us for more than 7 months and we are still adjusting things here and there to meet his needs! I hope things will get better soon!
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