Is there such a thing as a 5.5 year sleep regression? Because, I think we're in it.
My poor kid has been waking up 2 or 3 times a night, for the last 15 days. Correction, she did sleep through on 2 separate nights, a week apart, but I suspect it was because she was just too exhausted to wake up. Every single wake up is a bad dream - things in her bed, geese pecking her face, a cat scratching her legs, and last night, after we watched The Little Mermaid sequel, the sea witch "blinked her eye" at her. At that point, she was in the bed with me and she nearly strangled Luke (who is always in the bed with me at some point during the wee morning hours) in her effort to get closer to me.
I've told you how I love sleep, and how nighttime parenting is the hardest part, right? Every night of broken sleep just compounds the problem until I'm a hot mess.
Last night, as I dragged my arm away from her own sea witch-like tentacles that were trying to hold me in place until my limbs were numb, I snapped at her: "You are touching me from your toes to your head. I think we're covered!" She replied in her pitiful voice, "I'm just scared." I was a hot mess.
She is scared; so scared she is waking up sobbing, with tears running down her face. I remember being scared like that from my bad dreams. I remember just needing to be close to my parents to feel safe, so I'm trying so hard to be patient - to pray and cuddle and reassure her through this while also begging God to make it pass. I need it to pass for me and for her; we have matching blue circles under our eyes right now.
In those wakeful moments in the middle of the night last night, with one kid on one side of me and the other on the other side of me, both holding on for dear life, I pondered how one person can feel so many things at one time. Desperation, frustration, anger, heartbreak, empathy, compassion, exhaustion, hopelessness, love, dread, shame - all of it swirling inside me. I prayed and thought and prayed, and finally we all slept for a couple of hours.
When I woke up with the alarm, I wiggled to turn it off without disturbing them and I laid there, picturing the calendar in my head and counting. Two weeks ago, her 6 year molars broke through the skin. I know new teeth have always caused bad dreams, but they are mostly in and the dreams should be going away by now. Then I realized that she started taking Singulair again that same week, after having been off of it for 2 months. I was mulling that over when Dave came in. "Did you sleep at all last night?" I didn't know. "When did she start that medicine?" He was thinking the same thoughts. We talked about it, and I Googled it.
I found this:
"Tell your doctor immediately if any of these rare but serious side effects occur: mental/mood changes (such as agitation, aggression, anxiety, trouble sleeping, abnormal dreams, sleep-walking, memory/attention problems . . . "
I even found some anecdotal "evidence" that some kids experienced the horrible dreams after having taken the medicine for years without issue. Ella was on it for three years with no problem. We started it back after her allergist appointment because her nose stayed stuffy all the time. I don't know if this is happening now because she was off of it for a while, or because her dose was increased, but we're done with it.
I just hope this resolves it. We can live with a stuffy nose; we cannot live in terror of sleeping at night.
So, this is a lot of whining to make myself feel better, but also part public service announcement. This is the second time one of the kids was taking medicine that made them crazy, and both times I think it took us too long to figure it out.
If your kids suddenly go wacko, check their meds!
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