Advil? Advil?
Jun 16th, 2009 by heidi
Two doses of ibuprofen today (generic, not really Advil) and this nagging headache that I had when I woke up is STILL not gone. I’m wondering if something the chiropractor did yesterday has set off a muscle spasm, or similar. I’ve got a 75-minute-long appointment with a nutritionist today and a tension headache will not be conducive to either being chatty or wanting to do more than just go home right now.
The fact that, for my son, the Land of Nod is once again an unknown country is not helping.
For the fifth or sixth morning in a row we were woken by him at 5:30. He has never been a good sleeper. I know this. I know that this too shall pass…but I go to bed around 10:00. That’s the earliest my body will sleep, not to mention the fact that I come home in the evening and have to spend some time with my son, spend a little time winding down from work, work on class readings, etc. If I’m up at 5:30, or even just dozing off and on from 5:30 – 6, that’s already less than eight hours. Take into consideration the fact that I generally wake up once in the night and can be awake as long as an hour (sometimes more), and I’m getting between six and seven hours of sleep in a night.
Oh, and did I mention that I seem to be one of those people who needs nine hours of sleep per night, and always have? I am, in essence, missing out on a night’s sleep every three to four days.
Until I calculated it for that sentence, I didn’t realize why I’m just so tired.
His room is as dark as we can physically make it. We started using a fan for white noise last night. Something has to work, because if it doesn’t, I may well end up with a nervous breakdown due to sleep deprivation. The only thing staving THAT off is catching an extra couple of hours of sleep on Saturday mornings.
Would anyone like to purchase a slightly scratched/bruised three-year-old? Note: scratches and bruises are due to the item’s own habit of running everywhere full-tilt and then falling over, not to misuse by previous parent. I’ll give you a discount if you come pick up his toys/books too!
Nope, I have one of my own. Along with his two-year-old sidekick. And let me tell you, I’ve been going on crap-I-can’t-even-keep-track-anymore years of sleep deprivation, chronic as in, and there’s no frickin’ wonder I’m half off my rocker.
I joke about not having another one unless it’s guaranteed to be a good sleeper…but it’s actually pretty serious. After waking up every two hours for the first 15 months of his life, I was so sleep-deprived that it was a shock that I wasn’t less functional than I was. I honestly think that having another child to care for AND having to do those newborn high-needs days again (and I mean high-needs in the specific use of the term, not just that all newborns are high-needs) might push me over the edge.
And that wouldn’t be any kind of joke :/
I’d love another child…but it would probably be a really bad idea for us to have another one.
You have all my sympathy. I hated how I felt when I didn’t get enough sleep and I wasnt’ a very good mom. Short tempered, frazzled and easily distracted was me. Fortunately Gabe started sleeping through the night at 4 months so I was able to go back to work on a full night’s sleep.
I’ll take one! Can you ship it and the mentioned supplies? I seem not to be able to cross the border, a the moment. :-/
Do you offer any sort of timed payment plan?
I’ve had difficulty getting and staying asleep for decades. Of the things I’ve tried valerian tea worked for about three months very well. Lunesta left me logy in the morning, plus an awful taste in the mouth; zolpidam got me to sleep, but didn’t help with waking and taking a while to get to sleep. Right now I’m experimenting with melatonin and it seems to be the best so far. I’ve been on it almost two months now, and the effectiveness is still very high. I really really like being able to sleep through the night.
My youngest is near five. He doesn’t need much sleep either. One thing we tried that worked pretty well for sleep was to have me go to bed while he was awake and let my husband put him to bed, then I’d get up with him in the morning. Hard on our relationship, but it let us get some sleep until he was old enough to entertain himself for an hour or so in the morning. The bribe of a cup of cocoa if he lets us and his sibs sleep until 6:30 was effective when he turned four or so.
I remember the infant days though. It was amazing how wonderful six solid hours of sleep felt when they finally slept that long.
Oh, honey, I (yaaawn) hear you!
Our 2-year old has slept six consecutive hours only five times in her young life.
We’re starting to let her cry for three minutes, just to see if she’s really awake or will drift back off by herself. Unfortunately, that means we’re awake to hear her, but at least we’re not standing up.
I think the kicker is that he was a miserable sleeper until he hit about 18 months, then gave us about six months of good sleep…had a massive sleep regression for the next six months, but from about 2.5 until a few weeks ago had been sleeping beautifully again.
It’s making me realize how *awful* a parent (and person!) I am when sleep-deprived.
I hear you too. We have two kids who religiously get up every night. My husband tends to our five year old non-sleeper and I comfort our two year old. It doesn’t help that our kids are night owls too. I don’t know how they run at full speed all day, have endless nights of interrupted sleep and still keep going. I know there will bee a day way too soon where they won’t need mommy or daddy to sleep with them at night anymore. Our sleep deprived nights will end and it will be in the books as a “Remember when…” moment. Ahhhh, I’ll just dream for now.