We had about 2 weeks of full night sleep bliss. Nick was going down by about 9:00pm, and sleeping until about 6:30 or 7:00am. I guess I got too cocky telling people, and it has come back to bite me in the rear.
That's right...every time somebody found out I was a new mommy -- either my boss would tell somebody at work "Melissa is just back from maternity leave" or one of the other mom's at daycare would say "Oh! You're the baby's mom!", or someone random on the street who would ask "oh when are you due?" and I'd have to say "uh, three months ago...thanks" -- the next inevitable question was always "so, are you getting any sleep??" And as of the past couple of weeks, I have always answered with "yes! He is the best baby! He is sleeping completely through the night...10-12 hours at a time!" To which most people would say "isn't that the best?!" or "wow! he IS a good baby!"
But the past two nights? Yeah...not so sleep filled.
Nick has been happily going down for bed by 8:30pm. But he'll only sleep until about 2:30 or 3:30am, when he wakes up fussing. Not full out crying...not hunger screams...just fussiness. But enough fussiness that it wakes you up, and makes your heart sad because you want to go in and scoop him up and love on him and help him fall back asleep. So what do I do? Just that. Only I try not to scoop him out of the crib, for fear that he'll think it's party time. Instead, I go in and frantically search the crib for his pacifier (the dark combined with my blindness makes this a rough task), pop it back in his mouth (which also entails groping his face and poking him in the eye, nose, and neck before finding his mouth), pat his little belly and rub his forehead, blow him a kiss, tell him I love him, and then tip-toe back to our room.
Because I'm so exhausted, I typically fall right back asleep as soon as I crawl back in bed. And Nick usually falls right to sleep as well. But in the past two nights, he has woken back up with the same fussiness every hour, until it's time to get up and go to daycare.
I canNOT figure out what is different. He's generally a happy guy...eating well...no poop or pee changes...no fever...so why all of a sudden has he decided to go back to the early morning wake ups?
In all honesty, I don't really mind the mid-morning wake up. I like hearing him, because I know he's still there. But I'm afraid I'm only encouraging his fussiness by going in and replacing his pacifier and giving him a little rub. Is it possible that he has ME figured out, and knows if he fusses, I'll come running? Because it's true -- I will. I just don't want this to become a habit. Because if he's anything like me, he'll be waking me up every night until he's 12, just to ask for a drink of water (sorry about that mom...you'll be happy to know that when I get up to pee or get a drink in the middle of the night now, I don't wake up Todd to inform him).
Hopefully this is just a short phase, and he'll get back to his great sleeping habits. But, until then, I'll make the most of his early morning announcements...because I know it won't be like this for long...and when he's grown out of the baby stage and out of the middle of the night 'I-need-you-right-this-minute-mom!!!' stage, I'm seriously going to miss it.
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