Teeth

The bottom right tooth has broken through. The teeth are coming. Beware.

Er... Nine months?

I broke out the nine month clothes for Junior yesterday. He looks much more comfortable now, but it also looks like he won't last long in them and I may have to jump to the 12 month clothes soon.

Do you remember how old Junior is?? FOUR months - not nine.

All of Junior's clothes are the same clothes that Handsome wore (and the same clothes my brother's boys both wore) so that means they each have memories attached to them. These nine month clothes were the clothes that Handsome was crawling around in, pulling up in, and walking in. It's very weird to see clothes that I associate with a highly mobile child on my four month old. Junior is rolling all over the place and scooting to get to things, but definitely not crawling or walking yet.

Junior is his own person. He seems determined to stand out as an individual so that no one says he is just like Handsome.

I love you, Junior. Even though you may look a lot more like your Daddy, you have my personality through and through - both the good and the not so good.

It's funny how things work out like that. I think Handsome looks more like me, but has DH's personality and Junior looks more like DH but has my personality. Of course none of us is exactly the same, but more that we are leaning in the directions I'm describing.

Blissful sleep

Last night Junior slept for six hours straight again! Woo-hoo! And to make things even better, I got to sleep six hours as well. I did get up once to move him back to where the motion detector could feel him and DH woke me up a couple times cause the chair he sleps in right now makes too much noise when he turns over. BUT I fell back to sleep quickly each time so I'm counting this as a good night's sleep.

Ah, sleep, how I have missed you.

And when Junior woke up, he wasn't screaming. He cried a normal baby cry and it was a wonderful sound.

I don't really know what made him turn a corner like that. Maybe it was the threat of medicine? Maybe he heard my pleas? Maybe he was just as tired as we were? Maybe the keeping him upright for 20min after a feeding really does help? Maybe God heard my pleas? Maybe he likes the new location of his playpen? Maybe he just grew out of the worst of the reflux?

Whatever the reason, I am immensly grateful. Immensly. If I didn't want to lose more sleep, I would throw a party in celebration.

Now we have to pray that this isn't just a fluke couple nights. Also, I am moving him and I upstairs this weekend to my bedroom so we have to pray that the change in scenery doesn't spoil things.

Sleep

So the night after Junior's doctor's appointment was... difficult. He cried for hours. His reflux seemed worse and he was just plain miserable. As a result, both DH and I were also miserable. He hardy slept at all and he would wake up screaming. I think now that his immunizations contributed to him not feeling well. He's never reacted poorly to immunizations before, and these were all boosters, but I still think they were part of the problem.

The following night was better. I was still up every hour, but at least the crying was less. And then we moved to a couple two hour intervals. We also moved his playpen a little further away and put the motion sensor on him, so that I wouldn't worry about him rolling to his belly in the middle of the night and get him up prematurely.

But last night? Wanna know what happened? He slept for six hours straight!!!!! Woo-hoo! That's the first time he's ever slept that long. Prior to this he's slept about four hours a couple times, but that's it.

I, however, did not sleep for six hours. I was stressed about work and my mind would not slow down no matter how tired I was. Then once I fell asleep his monitor alarm went off because he had rolled off of it. I moved him and slept again. And then the same thing happened again... maybe two more times - it is kinda blurry. The last time the alarm went off I had to get up and ready for work. So I got about four hours total. I hope to get more sleep soon.

Four Month Stats

Junior had his four month check up today. He was 18 pounds and 25.75 inches long. This put him at 95% for weight and 75% for height. The child is huge. Everything else seemed to be on track. The dr did try to get us on reflux medication, but I don't think it's serious enough for that. She saidwe could also try a teaspoon of maalox before bedtime if we wanted something more mild.

Delirious Laughter

Delirious = Me.
Laughter = Junior.

No. Sleep. I have had no sleep. Junior has been waking up and crying every hour. This means that I get 30-45min sleep intervals between getting up and feeding Junior. I know I should stop feeding him so often so that he doesn't get hungry and doesn't need to be fed, but he doesn't just cry, he screams. It must be reflux or heartburn - or maybe those are the same things. I don't know. His latch has improved 100 fold. He hardly ever swallows air anymore so I can't blame it on that. When he wakes up screaming he does usually spit up when I pick him up. Last night I asked DH to help hold him which gave me a 1.5 hour interval of sleep, but Junior seems to search for me in particular at night. He will cry if DH holds him and then quiet down fairly quickly once DH hands him to me. It's not the same during the day. During the day he could really care less who is holding him, he just wants to be held and entertained - the entertainment part is preferably done by his brother.

We go to his four month check up tomorrow and I know they are going to tell me not to feed him at night anymore or that we need to give him medicine. I don't want to do either, but I do recognize that something must be done. My body feels like it is going to crash soon from lack of sleep.

Junior, despite the sleep issues, is growing and thriving. He is now starting on the belly laughs. DH will tickle his neck or his chest and Junior will laugh the loudest, heartiest, most contagious laugh. I took a video of it a few days ago and you can hear all four of us laughing at the same time.

Scooter

Junior is scooting. If you put a toy in front of him, he will roll to his belly and push his legs behind him so that he will scoot forward and get the toy. He is still technically three months old. While I am glad that he is progressing and doing new things, I'm also a little afraid of such a young child being so mobile. I'm also not so happy that he can flip over onto his belly at night while he's supposed to be sleeping. I'm still terrified of SIDS and I haven't figured out how to rig the playpen that he sleeps in to put the motion sensor under where he is sleeping. Just to make things worse DH added that a boy between the ages of 2-4 months is the most likely to have SIDS. Thanks Dear.

And Junior is still getting up every 2 hours at night. I need sleep. Seriously.