Oh what a day. Last night Isabella woke up screaming just before 2 am. We waited to see if she’d go back to sleep on her own, but no dice.
Melanie tried nursing her and changing her. Nope.
She tried bringing her in to sleep in our bed. No way. (Bella has never slept in our bed with us. She just won’t do it for some reason. I suppose I’m grateful that she won’t be climbing in with us keeping me up with her thrashing while asleep, but on the other hand it would be more convenient on occasion.)
Finally, I resigned myself to the situation, got up with her and took her into the other room where we watched video podcasts until she calmed down. (Nothing like discussions of Web 2.0 to calm down my budding geek in training.)
Eventually she was calm enough to begin playing, but 14-month-old babies don’t play all that quietly. Poor Melanie couldn’t get back to sleep, which was the reason for me being up in the first place.
Around 4, Melanie came out nursed Isabella back to sleep and we went back to our respective beds… until my alarm clock went off at the usual time of 5:30 am. Drag myself out of bed, into the shower, eat a piece of cold pizza, pour the coffee into my travel mug (Thank God, I set the thing to auto-brew), make my lunch.
By 6:15, as I’m headed out the door, Isabella started crying again. Melanie is changing her and heading for the nursing chair as I say goodbye.
It’s been a long, long day in a half-stupor punctuated by moments of caffeine-induced lucidity.
If suffering is good for the soul, it’s a wonder there aren’t more parents who are canonized saints.
Once again, I’d like to thank my parents and express my all-too-belated admiration for their sacrifices. And this is the normal sleepless night, not like my mom’s three-nights-a-week trips to the emergency room with my asthmatic brother.
P.S. We think last night’s drama was caused by an incipient tooth. Either that or the coffee ice cream I was sharing with Isabella yesterday. But they must use decaf, right? Right?
It certainly could have been the coffee ice cream. I love coffee ice cream myself, and I have found that certain brands and flavors really get me wired. In particular any of the Starbucks coffee ice cream flavors seem to be quite high in caffeine, *especially* the Java Chip flavor. On the other hand, I have never felt any caffeine effects from eating Breyer’s coffee ice cream, so it is possible that they do use decaf, though I think it’s just that they don’t put as much coffee in, since their ice cream has a weaker coffee flavor (it’s still good though). Ben & Jerry’s coffee ice cream seems to be closer to Starbucks, in having a fairly high caffeine content. And Edy’s / Dreyer’s (same brand, different name, depending on where you live) is probably closer to Breyer’s, with a lower caffeine content.
Also, I should mention that I never actually drink coffee, and I rarely drink anything at all with caffeine in it. So coffee ice cream is virtually my one and only exposure to caffeine, and therefore I am much more sensitive to caffeine than most people. So while you might be able to eat Starbucks Java Chip without noticing any stimulant effects, if I eat anything more than half a container of it I’m guaranteed to be up until 6:00 a.m. the next morning.
Of course, it could be the teeth too. That’s the age where there is a lot of crying over teeth trying to break through the gums.
I was sort of exaggerating. She couldn’t have had more than a tablespoonful altogether. I guess it could still have an effect.
I did get it from the ice cream stand across the street where they make their own so I suppose I could ask next time. Good excuse to go over again.
There aren’t more canonized saints who are parents because suffering only sanctifies when offered up for love. Many people do not do this but grumble the entire way through it.
Well, I really don’t think a tablespoonful of coffee ice cream is going to have an effect.
It was probably the teeth then. We certainly have had our share of sleep problems with our two boys when they have had teeth coming in.
The good news is that it should get better. I used to think that our oldest son (who is three and a half now) would never go to sleep by himself, without either my wife or I lying down with him, and that he would never sleep through the night. But now he does both with no problem, and has for a while. The only problem we have is that if he takes a nap in the middle of the day (which usually only happens if we drive somewhere and the car lulls him to sleep), then we can’t get him to bed at a decent hour.
I don’t know, Dom. It might have been something in the New England air last night. I was awakened around that time last night and never did get back to sleep which is unusual for me. The only good thing about it was I was lucid enough to remember to use the time in prayer.
On the other hand, a tooth pushing through is probably what caused it. We went through an awful lot of nights like that with our two as well. It’s amazing what you can do with your eyes half open…
Oooh, I sympathize. At this point in the game (baby #8) if I have a good suspicion teeth are coming in, I give a pre-emptive dose of baby Advil at bedtime. It generally holds through till morning and usually does the trick…
At the risk of giving unasked for advice, when you are certain that it is not illness or pain driving the crying, you might want to put her in bed and cry it out. If you can withstand the nightmare of waiting her out, the crying will diminish as her “returns” diminish until eventually, she will sleep through the night. She also will get the long “sleeps” that she needs.
Babies learn early that they can control their parents. It’s hard enough now, but when you have a newborn, you are not going to want to have whatever sleep he/she allows you to be interrupted by Bella.
Good luck with all this, I know how hard it is to go through.
Oh we’ve done the crying it out thing and she generally sleeps through the night. And we know the cries that we can ignore and she’ll go back to sleep. But you get used to the cries of your children and know when it’s a cry that you can ignore or one that will only get louder and louder. This was screaming. the kind that lets you know she has no plans of going back to sleep.