Meltdown

Brushing his teeth

As I was cleaning up downstairs last night, I heard Finn wake up and start crying.  At first I thought he could wait until I finished a few things, then I realized that this wasn't his "I woke up and you aren't here" cry, it was his "I'm in distress" cry.  I ran up the stairs, and found that he had half fallen out of the bed.  It looks like he'd wiggled around so much in the bed that he wiggled right around the bumpers and went head first over the edge - right between the bed and the bedside table.

He wasn't hurt, but he was very shaken, and I had to cuddle with him a long time before he calmed down enough to sleep.  And so, tonight, I decided to put him in his crib instead of in my bed.  It was a disaster.

He was definitely tired.  He half-heartedly nursed, and then I put him in the crib.  I sat on the floor next to the crib while he cried.  It wasn't 15 minutes before his cry sounded exactly like his cry last night when he was stuck on the bed.  Even though I was right there rubbing his head, patting his bottom, he sounded like he was terrified and miserable.  I caved and picked up him, planning to rock him to drowsy and try to put him back in the crib.  But he was pushing against me, refusing to even relax, and squirming all over.  I found myself getting irritated and then getting mad at him. So I put him down on the floor and let him crawl around, with tears still wet on his face.  He calmed down for a few minutes, then got fussy again, so it was off to bed for us.

He nursed once we got in the bed, but then was doing his whole "sit up and crawl around and try to take another header off the bed" routine.  Suddenly I lost it.  I turned my head down to the bed and just sobbed.  Finn stopped his fussing and crawling, reached out and patted my hand.  Then he leaned over, put his head down next to mine, pulled back my hair, took one look at my face and cracked up.  Full on giggles and snorts.  So of course I had to laugh, too.  A few slobbery kisses (from Finn) later, I was still tearful, but he settled down and finally fell asleep.

I never felt like cosleeping was the wrong thing for us, until he started getting more mobile and I worried about his safety.  After the last two nights, I really don't know what the right thing is anymore.   Going to sleep was already hard enough, and now that he's not completely safe in the bed, either?  What am I supposed to do?

To add to my anxiety and worry, his next MRI was just scheduled for May 2 (which was, coincidentally, his original due date).  I hadn't been too worried about it until last week when I mentioned to LB that it wasn't scheduled yet.  "Don't you want it to be after vacation, you know, in case...." She said another something like that this weekend, something along the lines of, "And even if the MRI shows something bad, you know you'll be able face it."  I've been so focused on thinking positive that it never even crossed my mind to contemplate the alternative.  Until now, anyway.  I know that this is just the way her mind works (the glass is always half empty, despite her attempts to pretend she thinks it's half full), but LB said very similar things after the first ultrasound with my first pregnancy, when she knew it didn't look great (but I didn't).  And so her saying those things has more power to make me anxious than if someone else said it.

I'd be the first to say that with my underlying level anxiety running so high, now is not the time to try to change our sleep routine.  But do I really have a choice?  Maybe last night was just a weird freak incident? Maybe Finn is ok and I just need a vacation?  (Four more days.  Four. more. days.)