Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Who Needs Sleep?: When a Sick Baby Keeps You Up

Norah’s been sleeping through the night since the 2 month mark. In the book of babies, that makes us extremely lucky. Sometimes we forget that, though, and she keeps us up all night.
This past weekend was one of her "reminder lessons". On Friday night, she was fussy and wouldn't eat. She screamed when I changed her diaper, cried when I tried to play with her, and resisted bedtime like a cat to water. Where did our happy baby go? She'd clocked out, and angry baby had checked in.

Where did THIS happy baby go?
That night, she woke up screaming several times. We rocked her back to sleep. Then she woke up around 3 am and vomited everywhere. She also rolled around in it, so it was all over her. While hubby cleaned up the sheets, I cleaned the baby. A half hour later she was sleeping again and stayed that way until morning. Hallelujah!

On her first diaper change after waking, we found a bright red diaper rash that was bleeding, so off to the doctor we went. Upon examination, the doctor concluded that the antibiotic she was on for her ear infection last week proceeded to give her a fungal infection. We needed prescription ointment, stat.

Diaper changes for the rest of the weekend were awful. The rash stung, so using regular baby wipes was torture of the worst kind, keeping her from sleeping most of Saturday night. Luckily, we were able to give her some baby Motrin to get her through.

Sunday she was in better spirits, but mom and dad were beyond tired. With all of our weekend errands yet to be completed, we shipped Norah off to her grandparents' house where she spent the afternoon with Mom-mom, Poppy, Uncle Joey and Andrea.

So what do you do when the baby gets up over and over again? In the moment, you grin and bear it because there's nothing else to do. The next night, you go to sleep as soon as the baby goes down and hope for the best!

1 comment:

  1. Oh no!! That sounds awful for all of you! I hate when the kids, especially the baby, is sick.

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