She cried it out...

So more of The Sleepy Sarah Saga...

Wednesday night, Sarah kept waking up hourly. Around 1:30 in the morning her skin felt really hot, so I decided to check her temperature: 101.5. I made a phone call to the nurse on-call for the proper dose of Tylenol and gave that to her. She fell asleep taking a bottle and slept well for the next hour. I, of course, stayed awake listening to the monitor, convinced she was going to have a seizure. (I have since learned that it is a sudden rapid change in temperature that can cause a seizure in infants...not a fever in general.) I woke her after an hour to check her temp and it was 100.5. We all slept well until the morning, and she had a low-grade fever for the rest of the day. I'm not sure what that was about, since she had no other symptoms and was relatively happy throughout the day.

Thursday night was more of the same: frequent waking. She would fall into a light sleep only to wake herself up about an hour later.

Today we made the trip back to my parents' house. They are out of town at the moment. After walking/rocking/swaying Sarah for an hour and a half tonight, we decided to take advantage of the empty house and let her cry it out. She threw up twice at the very beginning. I have to give her credit for her aim though: It landed on the carpet, not on her sheets or blankets. (Sorry about that Mom.) She had a 50-minute period of angry wails (not cries...angry wails) before falling asleep in a heap in the corner of her crib.

I feel like we accomplished something tonight. I felt awful hearing her cry like that, but I truly think it is the best thing for her. She needs to learn to soothe herself to sleep, and I believe she will get better quality sleep once she learns that. So will Tim and I. :)