Teething and Sleeping

As most parents know, teething can be one of the worst stages a child goes through in terms of sleepless nights and requiring pain management.  In my experience with my son this was quite a short term issue (relatively speaking) and once he had his first 4 teeth by the age of 1, the rest just seemed to appear without any fuss. As with most things for Aiya the process is much slower, teeth are similar to bone and just like the rest of her they are growing very slowly. Therefore the whole teething process is very protracted, which means lots of sleepless nights and crying though the night. Aiya is 17 months and has 1 and ½ teeth which have taken the best part of a year to come through… I’m exhausted.

The hardest thing about being a parent is the lack of sleep which slowly starts to get better as babies get older but children with MOPD, in addition to a protracted teething process, are reported to have poor sleep patterns. I think we’ve pulled the short straw on the sleep front as Aiya very rarely sleeps more than 4 hours at a time and add in teething issues and she won’t sleep more than 2 hrs.

Not only is she a poor sleeper she’s also been understandably spoiled. The first 6 month I would put her on my chest to fall asleep as all I wanted to do was cuddle her and she was so small I didn’t really notice the weight. She is now refusing to sleep unless she’s fallen asleep on my chest first … yes I know I’ve made a rod for my own back but when those big brown eyes look at me I can’t say no.  It’s not like she cries, she just lies in her cot smiling and staring at the chink of light coming in through the door waiting for someone to come and cuddle her. I know this as we have a monitor with a camera and as soon as I go in to the room she starts kicking the cot in protest so I lift her out, all the while with a cheeky grin on her face. I challenge anyone to resist her charms!