Tuesday night was the worst night of sleep EVER in my entire life.
After Ryan had been sleeping for about an hour, he woke up screaming for me. He sounded miserable and I could tell something was really bothering him.
When I went in there, besides his crying, everything seemed fine. He reached up to me from the crib wanting me to pick him up. Unfortunately, this didn’t end the crying. Todd and I took him downstairs trying to calm him down with some ice cold water and some Barney. After about 15 minutes of the purple dinosaur, he calmed down.
It’s really hard when your child isn’t old enough to tell you what’s wrong. We asked him if it was his teeth that hurt and he said yes. His stomach – Yes. His head – Yes. He said yes to everything we asked him. We gave him some Tylenol (generic because of the recall) because we weren’t quite sure how to narrow down the problem.
Poor kid didn’t want to go back to bed. I held him and rocked him and then put him in the crib. He finally fell asleep for 30 minutes and woke again. He did this the entire night!! Just when I’d fall asleep, he would start screaming again. We even tried to see if he’d sleep in our bed with us. This always leads to lots of jumping on the bed and “Mama!” and “Papa!” conversation. One sided, of course. For the hundredth time it didn’t work, so back to the crib he went.
Finally, at about 3 in the morning he woke, we put him in our bed, and he fell asleep. He must have been so exhausted at this point that he gave in to sleeping. We all slept peacefully until about 6:45. Needless to say, we probably had about 4 hours of sleep, at the most, that night.
The lack of sleep made yesterday a very difficult day to get through. Fortunately he took a long nap so I was able to rest. Todd had to work so he was extremely tired when he made it home at 6 p.m.
It was also very obvious why Ryan was up crying all night. He had developed a cold and it must have given him a stuffy nose. Apparently he was so stuffy, he wasn’t able to breathe, which ended up keeping him awake all night. By nap time it had turned into a runny nose.
Simple, yet so complicated!
At this point you are probably wondering why I titled this post Thankful Thursday. So far I haven’t said anything very positive.
Well, here it goes…
Last night Ryan slept from 8:15 until 7:45 this morning…11.5 wonderful hours! For that, I am very thankful on this amazing Thursday!
I actually woke up feeling refreshed and ready for the day.
And yes, Ryan is feeling much better today.
I guess good can come from something bad!
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Wow! Your post was written exactly how some nights have gone with my “almost” two year old when she is getting sick! Those are definitely the nights when you don’t know what is wrong only to find out the next day that she is coming down with something. Miserable!! I feel your pain! Glad you found something to be thankful for in the midst of your sleepless haze
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Hi Grechen,
I just hate not knowing what’s wrong and not knowing how to help them. Glad to know I’m not the only one out there who has a hard time figuring it out
oh my!! what a rough night for you all!! I will say that it is great that your husband gets up to help you in those times :O)
I envy you …I get about 4 hrs of sleep every night. Maybe 5 some nights. Even if our little one (one year) sleeps good…I am up and down and wake allot still. He has never been a good sleeper and wakes often crying at night. I am looking forward to the day when he sleeps all night and when my body get used to sleeping! Every day is a struggle because i am so sleep deprived and tired. But, i have God to lean on, Coffee, and i try to remain positive and thankful . Some days are very hard when all you want to do is crawl back into bed. Other days seem easier. I always say ” I love my kids, so it is worth it..and it will pass!”
Hope your little guy gets to feeling better soon! our Toddler just had strep! and it’s not even winter yet :/
Meghan
Hi Meghan,
4 hours of sleep every night?! Wow, I wouldn’t be able to handle that! At one, our little guy woke up a lot when he was teething. Those nights were always bad, but then the next night he would sleep fine.
Sorry to hear your little one just had strep. That must have been awful!
Hi! I was not expecting a reply, how neat
I love reading your posts , btw. I forget how I found out about you but it was about a month ago and I have been following since 
I can relate to most things you say and other’s I learn something from!
Yes, it is a total of about 4 hours most nights. It’s hard to add it up because I am up and down so much, waking, going to the bathroom, checking on our toddler. Then when I finally do fall asleep good, he wakes up crying. I am so used to it now that I just go with it
It used to upset me but not anymore. I figure that it is probably teething. Like you said, some nights he sleeps great and other’s not so great. Some nights, not often , i get 5 or 6 hours. My problem is, I have a hard time falling asleep. I will toss and turn , etc for an hour or more before I fall asleep. If I could just lay down and go to sleep soon after he does (and after I get my oldest who is 8 to bed) then I would probably get more sleep! Oh well, one day this house will rest! haha.
I am home schooling/cyber schooling our oldest son starting in 2 weeks so I have to get us all to bed earlier and I must just try to lay down earlier. I am not a fan of taking things to aid sleep, so i will try to just let my body fall into a routine naturally. If this doesn’t work after a little wile maybe I will try something. We will see. I am very unsure about taking “pills”and medication. I figure, my body has been used to waking up multiple times throughout the night for over a year…it may take a while to calm down and learn to sleep soundly again!
:O)
oh, and thank you for the well wishes for our toddler! Same goes out to your little guy! Actually, Isaac only had one symptom-he spiked a very high fever out of no where. He also did lose his appetite (which he is small to begin with so I was nervous about that!) . I finally gave in and took him to the doctor and sure enough, he had strep! After one day of antibiotics , he is doing much better and starting to want to eat again. Oh the things that we worry about with our children..never ending! I will say, that I do not worry as much with my 8 year old. I worry allot more with Isaac and I remember worrying like that with my oldest (Logan) when he was small. Now that Logan is older, he can tell me what is wrong and I feel like he is able to handle things better. When they are small and cannot tell you…it’s nerve wracking. I don’t know what I would do without my faith and the Lord! He truly is my strength and hope every day!
Did my reply go to your email? I just added that new plug-in feature to my blog, but I wasn’t sure if it worked…
Thanks for the compliment about my blog. I’m glad you decided to comment! I love hearing from my readers
My son doesn’t like to eat a lot either. He does have his moments though!
I just checked out your blog. I think that’s great you’re cyber schooling your son. I am thinking about homeschooling later on. I was an elementary teacher before I had Ryan. What are your reasons for cyber schooling?
Good luck with your sleeping situation. I don’t like to take pills or medication either, so I understand. I would just look to God and try and get through it. Good luck to you!
Hey! Yes, I did get your responses via email!! how fun!
As for our decision to Cyber school….my husband was home schooled as a child up to high school. He really liked it and always wanted to give it a try when he had a family. I also had wanted to try it out one day….because I always thought the concept was neat. Being able to be home with your kids/family and being a more active part in the education process. However, I have to admit that I do not think I am capable of handling the full load and responsibility that comes with home schooling. I admire Matt’s mom, you and other mom’s who are able to do this!! I am not a teacher..haha…as far as lesson plans and things like that- i just am not good at that stuff. So, we found this cyber school! There are quite a few in PA but the one we chose is really great! He has a teacher, I am like the assistant. I worked in pre school and kindergarten for years as an assistant so I can handle that :O)
I am looking forward to it and will be updating our journey on our blog as we go along. He starts on the 7th so our summer is a bit longer which is nice! We are going to the beach next week to celebrate a longer summer and the start of a new adventure together! :O)
Thanks about sleeping…you are so right I have to keep my focus on God. It’s a challenge when the focus tends to be what’s right in front of me. *sigh*