Sleep, And The Lack Thereof

Hello, new neighborhood! We hope you like having us here! What's that? Oh, that thing, where you sometimes consider calling the cops on me, because my kids are screaming? Like, crazy screaming "NO MOMMY NO" in the middle of the night? I know, right?

Say again? You think I've put on a few pounds, maybe have darker circles under my eyes? You think it might be related to the nightly antagonizing of my children?

Please. Let me explain.

Ever since roughly December 18, when Marta turned 3, we have been having night tantrums. She has, I mean, though I come close. Two, three, four a night, during which she wakes and SCREAMS, screams in that husky way, screams so that she sounds likes she's gargling, screams an horrific cry of sheer furor, screams in one of those car-screeching ways. She screams, and she yells "NO MOMMY NO!" and, occasionally, "OUCHIE! OUCHIE!"

Seriously. And I go to her, and I rub her back, and she hits and kicks me and yells at me to leave. I calmly ask what's bothering her, would she like a drink, does she want mommy to hold her? Kick. Punch. GO.

So I leave. And in five minutes, as the screaming intensifies, I go back in and suggest that she stop right this instant, or else I'll take away her ponies on the next day. Nothing doing.

And then I just wait it out. About 20 minutes, sometimes longer, and then she's calling me to come in and hold her, so I do, and in about two minutes she's ready to sleep again.

This isn't a nightmare. This is a *&^%$ tantrum. And it's not just one, it's a HANDFUL every night.

(The "OUCHIE" part? That's when she bucks so much in her bed that she hits her head on the wall or the bed post.)

When I return to my bed each time, by the way, our room is a sauna because Marta's room sits in a position over non-insulated house with no storm window (yet), and it's the last room upstairs to have the radiator kick on, and ours is the first right next to the thermostat, so we keep our door closed so that her room might get warmer. Restful.

While this is going on, Berit is over in her room, oblivious to the screaming but in her own little torture chamber, having nightmare after nightmare. She dreams that wolves want to get in. She dreams that foxes are chasing her. She dreams that dragons are coming in her window. "We" go in to her cries, listen to her whole dream (the WHOLE. DREAM, told in falling-asleep language, so it's even slower than Berit's normal speech, which usually sounds like "Um. Mom? Um.... huhhhhhhhh, can I, um.... go to.... dance today?), then take it out of her head (pinch it over her hair, of course) and put it into the jar (our hands), then flush it down the toilet. Seriously.

Of course we have the talks about wolves and foxes and dragons. She gets it, that they won't really get her. Her dreams, on the other hand, don't.

And so, after the fourth or fifth time I return to my room, I turn off my alarm, set to 6 a.m. so that I might run before the kids wake up, my workout for the next day gone in favor of any extra sleep that might be granted.

So here we are! Hope you love us! Thanks for the cookies you brought over!

Several

As in, number of days in a row that Marta has not napped.

As in, napping is pretty much over.

As in, typically I might freak out about this, but since she's going to bed before 7 and is waking up at 8, I'm pretty OK with it.

Good Morning

Black Monday, aka "The Day After Berit Comes Home From Grandma and Pop's House," continues into the night with Marta, wide awake at midnight.

Peace and Quiet

Let's Just Hope She Uses It For Good Someday And Makes A Hit Record

My friends Emily and Kelly have clear, loud voices. Whenever I'm with them and I tune into this fact, I think about what a neat trait that must be to have. My muddled voice gets lost in a crowd, even when I'm being forceful so that my children will hear me. But to have a voice like a bell -- soft and feminine yet commanding and clear -- would be so unique, so handy.

Marta has that voice, but not quite in a good way. Take, for example, last night -- all of it. I'm not sure if she's figured out that she doesn't necessarily have to stay in her crib but is supposed to, or if she's ailing in some mysterious way, but for the past few nights she's been a train wreck. She doesn't cry in a sad or helpless way, which makes me think she's not hurt or sick. She yells, screams and thrashes angrily -- furiously -- and her voice hits loud, clear heights that remind me of when you watch a performance by Mariah Carey or Christina Aguilara and the camera is right up on their face, and their mouths are open hitting a high note, and then they go higher, and higher, and higher, and you're all, "I really hate this music but damn if that girl doesn't have pipes."

Only, with Marta it's more of an example of how she'll sound as a teenager, I suspect. Yelling in her baby talk and screaming at the monitor, vocal chords rolling with rage and, of course, waking Berit constantly. 

We go to Marta, but find after a half-hour of our soothing her and helping her back to sleep, the moment we leave she starts all over. So what do we do? Keep going in? That doesn't seem to be helping. Last night I just sat with the monitor in my hands, watching her tirade and thinking about how loud she was, and then I realized that I didn't even have the sound on on her monitor -- I could hear her clear as day through Berit's, sitting on the nightstand.

Oh Marta. Shrinking violet you're not.

Marta, The Less Dramatic Of The Two (Really)

I can't remember the last time I nursed Berit, though I do recall being somewhat obsessed with weaning for at least three months leading up to it. It probably didn't help that I was five months pregnant at the time, and the first four months I had spent throwing up, in the hospital being rehydrated, and lying on the couch. So I have a feeling all of the trips with Daddy to his parents' house to give me some rest may have helped her make the transition. And just now I'm remembering having Trevor go to her in the middle of the night, and her crying, and me crying in bed listening to them on the monitor. So it happened, and it wasn't all that easy.

But it's sounding like a walk in the park compared to what's going on in Marta's world these days. At only 15 months old, we have two sources of drama with her:

1. Nursing/weaning.

2. Separation anxiety.

Let's start with the first. Berit was 18 months old when I finally weaned her, and I thought that was ridiculous. I know many children nurse for much longer, but for our family, it was too long. She didn't need to for the same reasons Marta doesn't need to now: She ate full meals, she drank plenty of milk and water during the day and it wore on my personal level of patience. 

The only reason I'm not pressing weaning on Marta is because she is comforted by nursing. She doesn't nurse to sleep, though when she wakes it's one of the only ways to calm her. Which brings us to the second part of our current situation...

I have never met a child who is so saddened by being away from her mother as is Marta. This is not to indicate my superiority as a mother; in fact I don't know why she is this way, as we're a family that tends to be together more than apart (Trevor's job is very flexible and he can always be at gatherings, bedtime, even playdates and lunch if we ask). Yet even if I'm in the kitchen washing dishes and Trevor is in the living room playing with the girls, just 15 feet or so away in full view of one another, Marta is crying to be with me. 

Poor Trevor. He's a great dad who actively plays with the kids whenever they're together. He's gentle and kind, gives them both a bath and gets them ready for bed each evening, and will go to either of them when I prod in the middle of the night. He's trying hard to help me with Marta's dependence on both me and my lactation delivery system, yet Marta refuses him every time she sees or hears me. Whenever I leave while she's sleeping and he gets her up from her nap, she's fine. And in fact she loves playing with him when I'm not in the picture -- it's just having the option, I guess, makes her weepy and insecure. 

I'm a stay-at-home mom who almost never leaves the kids. We have a babysitter come for a few hours once a week and the kids LOVE her, and I even stay most of the time in another room working, and the whole time she's here Marta is saying, "Mommy-Mommy-Mommy-Mommy-MOMMY!" (For the record, Marta doesn't know I'm in the other room.)

I don't like the idea of forcing her to overcome this; I wouldn't put that on her tiny shoulders. But I'd very much like to help her deal, especially because...

In the beginning of June we have an overnight getaway planned for just Trevor and me, and the girls will be staying at our house with Trevor's parents. 

The girls love Trevor's parents, so that won't in itself terrify Marta. However, somehow before then we need to:

1. Wean Marta. (She nurses only before each of her two naps and once at bedtime, then throughout the night -- see below.)

2. End night wakings (about three or four times a night, and I nurse her then put her back to bed "drowsy but awake" and she falls asleep; yes, Trevor has gone to her during these and occasionally it works, but not twice in a row -- if this happens she simply won't go back to sleep, no matter how many hours pass, no matter how much Trevor rocks, offers her a cup of milk, until I go in and nurse her). (And, we are not the type of people who can ignore our baby's cries all night, nor is Berit the type of child who can sleep through screaming in the room next to hers.)

3. Ease the separation anxiety.

So.... I don't know where to go from here. I would love guidance, if you have any to offer; I would enjoy commiseration, if you've been there, done that. Thanks for reading, thanks for brainstorming. It takes a village... :)

Who's Crying It Out Now?

I'm looking at the screen on Marta's monitor, and with her in the crib are: 

• Two blankies
  
• One sippy cup of water 
  
• Two books
  
• One Glowworm
  

The books have come in handy lately, as I can leave her sooner in our nighttime/naptime ritual and not feel badly about rushing out to be with Berit (or, as is the case tonight, to watch Twilight with Trevor, who is currently bathing B and may just miss the movie altogether if he doesn't step his pace up a bit). The cup is there in the very, very slim chance she realizes she's simply thirsty when she wakes up and doesn't actually need holding, rocking, singing, nursing, etc. to get back to sleep. Because most babies (toddlers, whatever) wean themselves when they realize they're just not being practical. 

The blankies are both there because she must at all times have one nearby, and if she spots another one in a five-yard radius she must also have it, and there was a dirty one in her room so it was necessary for her to also sleep with the boogers, drool and dust that's surely settled on it in the past week of being in her bed.

And now I'm realizing that so many things in her bed, meant to pacify her to peaceful dreamland, are keeping her from sleep. Mostly because she's having a hard time fitting in her crib, and somewhat because she's distracted. 

My point is: Duh. 

Sick and Crazy

On Sunday night I once again met up with my old friend Stomach Flu, who held my full attention for 12 straight hours. It's the second time SF and I have had the pleasure of sharing the same human body this season, and I can't tell you how much I enjoy the surprises SF brings. Like, will it be throw-up? Will it be *other*? Will it be both at once?

Anyway, now I'm waiting. Waiting, of course, for my children to start vomiting in the middle of the night and continue to do so all over the house for 12 straight hours. It's not the mess factor I hate (though I don't really know anyone who loves to scrub throw-up out of carpeting). It's the anticipation. It's going to bed at night, exhausted, pushing the monitor button to eyeball the kids one last time before leaving their awakenings up to my ears only, and snapping to attention because I realize that at any moment they could wake up covered in throw-up, screaming. Their bedding needs washing immediately, their pjs are stuck to their bodies, there's throw-up in every crevice/nostril/fingernail on their bodies and they really, really need a bath but all they want to do is be held and go to sleep. And then it happens again and again, because they are babies and don't realize that they should just get up and throw-up in the bathroom like civilized people. 

Neither of my children has ever begun their stomach flu bouts during the daytime. Have yours? I don't know why it's always nighttime, when they're so unsuspecting, so untelling of mysterious symptoms. It wouldn't be so bad if they woke up in the morning, threw up and spent the next 12 hours sick. At least then we could watch them constantly. But what am I saying? I DO watch them constantly, even at night. I am glued to those monitors with every sniffle, every coo, every shuffle of the blankies. 

I'm living in such fear of the SF that I've got both of their bedrooms tricked out in case of illness. They've got pots for us to hold once we've got a system down, old towels covering the carpeting, blankets already laid out as beds for me or Trev to lay on, waters ready. And I will be so, so pleased to not have to use them. 

I figure I've got until Friday before we're home-free. Unless, of course, today one child becomes infected but fights it off silently and then infects the other on Saturday or something. Does this even happen? All I know is the last time we got the stomach flu, each of us got it exactly four days apart. It's only Wednesday and we're already going stir crazy, trapped in the house! (Though at -19 --YES, NEGATIVE NINETEEN -- we're not going far anyway.)

In other news, Berit and I were crafting today and it occurred to me that she is in no way interested in playing anything at all if it can't be made into "house." For example, we played Play-Doh yesterday, and we could only make balls of various sizes to represent mommies, daddies and kids, and then we had to play with them like they were those people. And then today I got out the glue, paper, macaroni and fuzzy balls and tried to help her make something, and she did stick a few pieces of macaroni onto the glue, but mostly gathered up the fuzzy balls, named them and played house with them. I ended up just drawing different scenes onto construction paper and letting her pretend it was a dollhouse for her... fuzzy craft balls. I tried getting her to match things, notice similarities and differences, pick out textures, even make a mess with the glue, but nothing doing. Just house. What does this mean? There are very few math skills being built up in playing house. Will she not be the famous heart surgeon who travels the world healing impoverished nations that I had planned? Will she be a mere (gasp) housewife who thrives on putting babies into cradles, taking them out, and putting them back in?

Have we been cooped up too long, living in fear of the vomit? Am I making up mirages to analyze out of boredom?? Am I suffering from lack of sleep, lack of inspiration, lack of protein due to my week-long enforcement of the BRAT diet?

Odds and Ends

Well, our house did not pass muster. Apparently it was the couple's second choice; the first being right next to the school that their child will attend. Oh well; nice to have some interest again.

Our current drama of the moment is babysitters, and the seeking of. We had one girl who didn't work out for the kids, and another promising possibility got a better offer in her own city, and driving for a half-hour to come watch my kids for three hours wasn't very enticing. So we're looking and hoping and then when one surfaces, we get nervous, because we don't want to act like they're not trustworthy but still, it's our KIDS. And it's only for three or four hours a week, so it's not as if we're offering them the world. Yet, I can't help but want Mary Poppins. What mother doesn't?

In Sleep News, last night we went back to trying to get Marta to sleep through the night. She gets so worked up when Trevor goes to her that she becomes overstimulated and screams until she shakes. Sigh, we just don't know how to crack this code. 

Top Teeth; or, Sleep's Enemy

Since Trevor is leaving for Las Vegas on Monday for the International Builders Show, and since he'll be gone the entire week, we resolved to "help" Marta sleep through the night before he leaves. That way, even though we'll be missing him and I'll be flying solo all day and night, at least we'll all be sleeping well. 

We had our plan in place; the same plan we used to get Berit to sleep through the night. When Marta woke, Trevor would go up with a cup of milk (I can't stand thinking that she might be genuinely thirsty, hungry or maybe hot or cold, and we're not responding to her) and sing to her and rock her back to sleep. We were bolstered by this past Sunday and Monday nights, when Marta woke and Trevor went to her after my efforts failed to get her back to sleep, and he sang her to dreamland with ease. 

We hadn't bargained on her top two teeth coming down. And here they come, bursting through her precious baby gums, making her crazy 99 percent of the time, like a little match that needs only the tiniest bit of rubbing and it bursts into flames. I just have to tell her "no" during the daytime, or try to get her to sit down to eat, or change her diaper and she's screaming and twisting and throwing a temper tantrum. 

Apply this to nighttime, when everyone is sleepy, and the results are not what we'd hoped. I spent another sleepless night last night going up and down, up and down the stairs to an out-of-control screaming baby, who'd already had the maximum amount of Tylenol allowable. We tried to have Trevor go to her, but she was just a mess. 

So unless her teeth come all the way in today and stop bothering her, it looks like next week is going to be a little frustrating.