Fair warning: This post contains some, um, colorful language. Because that is my teething reality, people. That is my teething truth.
7PM
Bedtime rituals commence. Baby is pure glee in the bathtub – water finds its way onto the walls, the window, the mirror, and into my left eye. Pajamas are donned without incident. Teething tablets are distributed as a preventative measure. Fingers are crossed.
7:45PM
Night-night bottle is a no go, unless chewing, spitting, hissing, moaning, and other generally alpaca-like activities can be considered a “go.” Milk finds its way onto the walls, the window, and into my right eye. Approximately 1 out of 8 ounces finds its way into toddler.
8PM
Lights out.
8:15PM
Baby is practicing steamrolling – squirms herself to the far side of the mattress, then aggressively barrels herself toward me, but, too small to generate the force necessary to roll up my larger body, just bashes her head repeatedly into various hard parts of my anatomy – elbow, chin, knee, chin, repeat.
8:30PM
After three misleading minutes of laying perfectly still, baby sits bolt upright and frantically begins “Twinkle Twinkle” hands, refusing to stop until we sing the accompanying song through seven times.
8:43PM
I suspect baby may be sleeping.
8:44PM
Twinkle, twinkle little star…
9:17PM
Baby, furious with me for not allowing her to roll off the edge of the bed, finally collapses in an exhausted puddle of drool while I struggle to grip her ankle tightly enough to keep her alive but loosely enough that she can’t actually feel it.
Baby stays asleep during transfer to crib (thank the Lord in Heaven)
9:54PM
Wellllllll shit.
9:55PM
Retrieve yelling baby from crib, offer her a variety of soothing things to chew on, all of which are rather violently refused. Poor love falls back asleep in my arms in the rocking chair, chomping on her thumb and seeming wildly dissatisfied with my parenting skills.
10:30PM – 1:30AM
During this ENTIRE magical time, the adults in the house should be sleeping. Instead, we read books, eat ice cream, chat, and enjoy each other’s company, then drift off around midnight.
This behavior is unacceptable to the powers that teething be, and thusly, we are punished.
1:30AM
I jump a solid foot (while lying down!) when I roll over and see baby standing in her crib and staring straight into the lense of the infrared camera, eyes glowing like a roadside fawn. She contemplates her options for a few seconds, a time I use to pray with great passion for mercy. She chooses not to remain cribside.
1:31AM
Retrieve yelling baby from crib, offer her a variety of soothing things to chew on, all of which are rather violently refused. Readminister teething tablets. After baby is returned to crib, all attempts on my part to exit the room are met with apocalyptic levels of protest. Baby seems to wake magically from a deep, dreamy sleep the moment I venture more than two feet toward the door. I fall asleep several times, leaning over the edge of the crib rails.
2:15AM
Mercy appears in the form of my husband, who repeats all steps, minus teething tablets, as I half sleep/half spy on him with the baby monitor.
2:54AM
Fave returns to bed.
3:15AM
Shit.
3:54AM
I surrender and return to bed with baby in tow. Baby flops contentedly into the space between sleepy Fave and me. I enter into the half-sleep that is co-sleeping with my husband and my child.
4:02AM
Kicked in the nose.
4:14AM
Someone bites my wrist, hard.
4:25AM
Remove sleeping Fave’s arm from baby’s face.
4:37AM
Baby is now sleeping on my face.
5:20AM
Baby sits bolt upright in the middle of the bed and says “Dog,” clear as day. “Did she say dog?“ Fave asks without moving.
5:23AM
It would appear that one of us is up for the day and ready to party. Therefore, all of us are up for the day and ready to party.
7:00AM
Baby falls back asleep and sleeps for 3 hours straight. Fave and I sit on the couch and stare at each other for a while, because that is the only thing to do.
“Did she say dog?” he asks again. “Absolutely,” I say, and we laugh for an hour, saying “dog” at each other over and over in strange baby voices as we go about dishes and breakfast and life.
The dog is, himself, confused and slightly alarmed.
And so we go.
HA HA HA HA HA HA!!! Oh my gosh Karyn… BEST blog yet! I was literally laughing out loud to myself. You two are the best parents ever! 😀
Bahaha, thank you lovely! Please call me at 3am and tell me that again.
Thanks for the laugh:)! I needed that. This was my month plus infant. My favorite part was the starring at each other in exhausted haze (toddler 1, parents 0) and then the “dog” repeat sequence. We do this constantly with new funny words.
Plus infant. Amazing. You deserve all the coffee. Love you!
It’s like you were at my house last night.
I keep thinking of clever responses to this and they all sound totally creepy. But thank God I’m not the only one in molar land.
Laughed out loud several times (because what else can we do but laugh, right!)!! L-O-V-E the way you write!!
K
Haha, thank you! And yes – the laughing helps. The laughing sustains.
Such a good recap of teething. It sucks. You will survive. Maybe 😉
Oh I hope I hope… thanks love. 🙂
I’m sorry you had to go through all that, but it made for some hilarious reading! It’s not often I actually LOL at stuff I read on the internet but you got me going. Thanks for the laughs!
I’m glad. We laughed too, in hindsight. Really, I mean, there are worse things. 😉 Ah, parenthood. I used to think we’d travel when we retired. Now I know the truth, and the truth is sleep.
Laughing at work. This was Monday night for me and hubby. Stayed home from work on Tuesday. So tired. Thanks for letting us know we are not alone.
You are so, so not alone. Ugh. I hope we all get lots of sleep soon.
I feel your pain (and your poor baby’s). I have been there with my oldest son, my youngest is just starting the teething journey. My teething recipe is an amber teething necklace, teething gel and pediatric pain reliever for the nights that you can see them really suffering. I know it sounds like a lot of things at once, but is definitely works for my boys.
Poor things, growing up is hard work! Love your blog!
I love this advice, thank you – we have just put her teething necklace on, so we’ll see how we go (she’s been asleep for 2 hours currently, which is a pretty long nap for this one… I have hope!) Thanks, Zanda!
Love this one! Oh the happy days (and nights) of parenthood!!!!!!
Hmm, maybe a few nights with Oma and Opa will fix her while mama goes to the spa… 😉
Best blog on teething, EVER! I can’t wait to show this to my husband when He gets home from work so we can both get a good laugh : ) thanks for sharing!
Aw, thanks Kellie! I hope you got that good laugh!!
Amazing article. Some of my nights are definitely like this. I loved the falling asleep on the crib rails part…..SO TRUE! Thanks for writing such amazing blog posts. I wish our kiddos could be friends. Too bad we live in seattle 🙁
I am really, really glad I’m not the only one who does that – the falling asleep on the crib thing. Thanks for your encouraging words! And we will always take Seattle friends, any old day.
LOL I love this! I was laughing out loud! Too great, because we know its all true. Its happened to all of us!!! LOL
Yay! Thanks Alycia! Teeth are jerks. We should make shirts.
I laughed at least 4 times… out loud… despite my sleeping baby! My tired heart goes out to you and Fave. I hope you get sleep soon!
Thanks Darcy! We do get to sleep most nights, I promise. But these ones are super special fun times. 🙂
I love it! My toddler is going through his 2 year molars teething phase… Loads of similar fun! Not quite as bad as the first batch of teeth though… Good luck!
Just wanted to add my name… Didn’t really need to be anonymous! LOL.
Now to go be ridiculous and watch TV with Hubby instead of sleeping!
Bah ha! I love it. I’m about to do that very thing. Thanks so much, Simone, for stopping by and commiserating. 🙂 love.
Nina told me this was laugh out loud funny. She was right! Hang in there!
Ha! Yay! Thanks, Katie. We are hanging in!