The Tag Team

It would be an understatement to say that I need more sleep.  There seem to be too many mornings when I wake up groggy and cranky feeling like the previous night was a tag team wrestling match.  My kids are the mighty wrestlers and I am the one being flung around the ring by my ankles.

Newbie O is not the greatest sleeper.  At her best, she wakes up three times a night to nurse.  At her worst....well, it's not good.  By four or five in the morning, I'm exhausted, give up and she eventually falls asleep between Daddy O and myself.

Baby O has gone from being a fabulous sleeper to regularly getting up at least once a night for any silly, inane reason.  It started when we moved with all the unfamiliar sounds of the new house.  Then it was onto needing to go to the bathroom.  Then it was just needing a hug.  Then it was because his toe hurt or he needed to blow his nose...and now it's most often because a stuffed animal has fallen off the bed.

Boy O is awesome-he rarely has a moment in the middle of the night...

...until...

MONDAY NIGHT-THE PERFECT STORM
It started out pretty normal.  Newbie O and the boys went down at their normal bedtime. Newbie O woke up for her normal late night feeding around 11:00 pm.  I remember waking up a couple hours later thinking, Wow! She's doing great, I haven't heard a peep....

Boy O nudged me awake around 2:00 am saying he didn't feel well.  His temperature was a whopping 104.3 degrees.  Normally I panic when the kids go into high temperature mode, but after having two expensive ER visits in the previous year for a simple dose of Tylenol, I managed to stay calm and Daddy O stayed with him for the next hour waiting for his fever to come down. And down it came.  Whew.

Second feeding at 2:30 am.  3:36 am-Baby O ran into our room screaming that his dream lite had fallen off the bed.   4:02 am-Newbie O got up again. 4:42 am-Baby O's dream lite fell off the bed again (followed by an intense screaming session).  The screaming woke up Newbie O so I gave up putting her back in her crib and tried to catch some shuteye before our morning officially started.  Baby O woke up at 6:00 am bright eyed and bushy tailed.  Newbie O stayed sound asleep with a faint smile smudged on her face in the warmth of our bed and I only wish I could say the same for everyone else.

KID # 1
Boy O's fever was kept in check on Tuesday with more Tylenol and rest.  Daddy O came home to spend some time with him while I took Newbie O and Baby O to the doctor for previously scheduled wellness checks.  A couple of minor issues, but everyone was deemed happy and healthy.

Boy O was not able to shake the fever and after a couple hours of medicine, his fever would shoot right back up to 104 degrees.  He got into see his pediatrician on Wednesday who discovered that he had pneumonia.   And I'm happy to report that after a couple more nights of a high fever and some antibiotics, he is doing much better. Other than developing a sudden aversion to taking liquid medication, Boy O has been an ideal patient.  So quiet and stoic.  I know I would have been a whiny mess at that age.

Lots of rest in front of the television.  Lots of cajoling him to eat and drink anything at all...not even a strawberry smoothie made with ice cream worked.  In the last four days he has had a total of 4 clementines, 2 fruit roll-ups, 1 animal cracker, 3 slices of salami, a bit of homemade chicken-pot-pie and a sip of hot chocolate (didn't even try to eat one of the marshmallows).

As of now, the doctor has given him a clean bill of health and I have many plans to fatten him up over the next few days.

KID # 2
I don't know how to resolve his sleep issues.  We've tried pretty much everything we can think of and are hoping this is just another phase.  Is it just his age?  When will the screaming stop?  He screams at every little thing.  It's hard to know when something is really wrong.  Baby O screams just as loud when a piece of his pancake doesn't make it on the fork as he does if he falls off the monkey bars and splits his lip.  We try to remain calm and instruct him to use words instead of  howling screams, but gee whiz it's hard to maintain the peace inside my brain when I'm woken up by blood curdling screams in the middle of the night.  I sprint to his bedroom, thinking the worst....only to discover that his dream light fell off the bed or his toe nail is catching on the sheet.  Year three is turning out to be very loud.

This was one of those times where the food didn't make it onto the fork and the camera happened to be at the ready.  Unfortunately and not surprisingly, the sound of the flash didn't do anything to improve the mood.

KID # 3
Up until the perfect storm, Newbie O was still sleeping in our room.  In her crib, but still in our room.  I don't really see any way around that-it was incredibly convenient when she was a newborn to have her at our bedside for hourly feedings.  Four months later,  I don't think anyone was sleeping particularly well with the said sleeping arrangements and on Tuesday morning, I half-hazardly stated that Newbie O should start to sleep in her own bedroom.  About 40 minutes later (around 6 am), wondering where my husband had gotten  off to,  I saw that the crib had been quietly dismantled and placed into the baby room.  Hmmm....was he trying to tell me something?

In her own room!

AND EXHALE...
I think sometimes, things have to get worse before they can get better.  I had to let myself get beaten up in the wrestling ring to make some changes.  Having my bedroom back was and is a huge step towards getting more sleep and more space.  Newbie O is handling it just fine and even though I have to get up to nurse her a couple times a night,  the quality of slumber in both bedrooms is much improved.

There's something to be said about having some breathing room.  After four months of tiptoeing around my bedroom, kicking Daddy O each time he began to snore and sleeping with the bathroom light on,  I can finally take a relaxing bath, watch television in bed or heck, I can even flush the toilet without having to worry about waking the 'sleeping bear'.

I'm still in need of a full night's sleep, but this was a giant step in the right direction.  I can breathe again.  Now if I can just get Baby O to stop the screaming....