Being patient

[lizzylou]

At nighttime I seem to transform into a very impatient person. My son (15 months) is cutting molars right now and he is not sleeping well at all. Intellectually I understand this - during the day, anyway. At night I feel very upset about his interrupted sleep. I feel that I am very much showing a conditional kind of love during these disruptions - not showing him patience, etc.

I am just wondering how other people cope with this. I know that one solution would be to have DH tend to him, but he usually doesn't get anywhere with this - DS just cries for me.

In full disclosure, we stopped co-sleeping a few months ago when we found that we slept better when we weren't in the same bed. I brought him to bed with me the other night and that seemed to help, but I tried again last night and it just made things worse.

[LadyCatherine185]

I am right there with you Mama. DS was up every 20 minutes or more last night teething (the canines!) and stuffy with a cold.

I just try to remember he is in pain/uncomfortable and try to feel sorry for him rather than getting angry. It is really hard when I'm being woken up for the 10th time and it is only 1 AM.. I don't know if you are religious/spiritual/etc but I find that if I pray for patience that really does seem to help me calm down. If you are not, maybe you could try some sort of meditative breathing techniques?

I would definitely recommend bringing him to your bed for the time being as well. If not for the whole night, at least for part of it. That will make things much easier on you. We also have DH sleeping in another room for now and that has seemed to help, just having DS and I in the bed. He seems to be able to be more comfortable with more room in the bed.

Have you tried teething tablets, motrin, or tylenol for the teething pain?

[lizzylou]

Thank you. Your idea to pray is such a good one. I think that will help take the focus off of my woe-is-me mentality.

I have been giving him ibuprofen/tylenol but it just doesn't seem to have much effect. Poor guy, I know he is in pain. I am going to try co-sleeping again tonight - going to try to bring him to bed with me a little earlier than I did last night.