Sleep Part Seven: Teething

If you have been reading my blog you know that sleep does not come easily to my little munchkins.  We have tried everything short of crying it out to get these kids to sleep through the night.  Not much has worked.  Little by little, however, we get glimmers of hope.  During the daytime we notice that the boys can sometimes wake up from their naps and be content to play for a half hour stretching their time between feedins to three and a half hours.  There are some nights in which one of the boys will go four or even five (or dare I say it...si--...no...I dare not say it) hours between feedings.  I do believe that their bodies will adjust as their needs change and we are getting closer to sleeping through the night as the weeks go by.  I woke up this morning and asked Derek when Aaron was fed and it wasn't until 5:00 a.m. which means he ate about 9:00 p.m. and slept for almost 8 hours!  The boys were fed twice before bed and maybe we have to be more diligent about that. 

A few nights ago things were bad.  Jeff has been teething for some time.  He would often wake up, take his bottle, go to sleep and wake up within an hour screaming.  Poor little guy was not happy and I'd often have to rock him back to sleep in my arms praying that his cries wouldn't wake up Aaron.  Aaron is a couple weeks behind Jeff in the teething department so I'm dreading the nights in a few weeks.  We have tried teething rings, frozen washcloths, homeopathic medicine, crackers and more but the boys are just cranky these days.  Luckily pacifiers seem to keep them calm so that's our main defense. 

These next few weeks (or mont---no...I dare not say it) are going to be rough.  It seems like there are two steps forward and one step back now.  At least that's better than my previous posting of two steps back and one step forward.

And I will say that as much as I covet sleep, I now do the nighttime feeds and then hold them on my chest for 10-15 minutes when they're done and let them fall asleep on me before putting them back in their cribs.  I'm realizing the time for that is getting shorter and there is something peaceful and wonderful about letting your child dream on you while kissing the top of his head.