Monday, December 17, 2012

Night terrors

Oh boy!

Ever since Evan's hernia repair in August, sleep disturbances have been on the rise. It's not too surprising, since the repair marked a big turning point for him in regards to therapy and development. And we all know that when toddlers get busy, sometimes they get so excited to stay busy that they wake up in order to practice some more!
But unfortunately, this is not always the case for Evan. He has been waking up inconsolable more and more often. I thought they were night terrors, but you really can't do much about them, other than waking your kid up slightly before they usually start in order to disrupt the sleep cycle. However, it has begun to take over our lives. Every other night, he is "waking", screaming and inconsolable, sometimes for as long as 25 minutes. He pushes away from me when I try to hold him or soothe him, crawls away when I put him down, and screams and cries until he chokes. I try to hold him without holding him too tight, because he seems to think he's being hurt somehow and trying to hold him tight makes it worse. But in the end, he just stops crying, and acts like he's asleep again. He might wake up fully, which sets off another bout of crying, this time allowing me to comfort him. But I can tell he's crying because he's confused, not because he's afraid or acting like he's being hurt.

It just flat out sucks to have to see your child go through that. We're trying to find ways to manage it... but there are few solutions a parent can try. I'm afraid we'll need to speak with his pediatrician on depth about it soon.

Also, he's developed a bit of a cold over the weekend. However, he hasn't slowed down for it much. Luckily, he already had his first dose of synagis to help him recover from nasty colds quicker.

Other than that, he really is doing fantastic. He's climbing up the stairs on his own, he's cruising around a bit. Before we know it, he'll be walking!
I feel like we're actually getting closer to him catching up with others his age. Or at least having them in sight, instead of miles and miles ahead.

As for me, I'm 19 weeks pregnant now, and I feel like I'm already hitting my third trimester! It doesn't help that I chase after a toddler every day, or that from Thursday night until this Monday morning, I've managed 14 hours of sleep, due to Evan's night terrors and the cold. :-/
One day, I hope to sleep again.

In the meantime, as always, we will manage the best we can. At least we have some really cute pictures to share!
















1 comment:

  1. Nana and Pop are so sorry to hear Evan has been having tight terrors...and are praying they leave and never return! Yes...he is making remarkable progress and those first steps are just around the corner!! He's growing and getting so big now. Nana and Pop are looking forward to our first ever "sleep-over" with Evan next week. We are planning on having big fun with our little man!

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