Newborn days revisited

Eli's sleeping like a newborn these days. Or worse.

When Tom's parents said they wanted to come visit, of course I thought of the impact moving Eli's sleeping arrangement around (his room = guest room) has on his sleeping. Last year when they visited at this time, we tried putting Eli in Tobey's room. It was a big flop as Eli woke up 1/2 hour earlier every morning until finally at 5AM we had to put a stop to it. I can't remember what we did, whether Mom & Dad's visit was over anyway, or if we rearranged where Eli slept. At any rate, his sleeping was a disaster.

When Tom's parents offered to stay in a hotel for this visit, a significant part of me thought, "Hey, that would be great!" But the practical side of me thought about the size of the doghouse I would be living in if I actually sent my in-laws to a hotel, even though it was their idea. Besides, much of their time with the kids is the unplanned "just hanging out at home" times. Plus, they get to see the kids in their natural habitat.

The first night we tried both kids in the same room. Tobey actually suggested it and being the first night, sure, why not? The first night is all about adjusting anyway. Well, Tobey got up at 11 to pee and had a hard time getting back to sleep. I was woken up 4 times between 11-midnight because Tobey kept coming back to our room for various reasons. Then Eli woke up at 3:30 and 5:30, causing me to bolt out of bed to hold him so that Tobey doesn't wake up and start crying too. By morning I was wasted and by evening, I was hinting/joking/suggesting/telling Tom that it his turn to tend to Eli overnight. We tried a different sleeping arrangement last night. And I must admit that last night, I thought about what hotels might have availability for the rest of Tom's parents stay.

Ever since being kicked out of his room, Eli has not only been waking up at 5:30-45 (luckily, at that point, he will go down easily for another hour), but he's been napping horribly and last night, he woke up at 11:30PM and 2:30AM. Usually, we can deal with Eli's wakings, however random they may be, because he's usually easy to put back down. But we have entered the realm of unreasonable, as his 2:30 waking required us to go get him 4 times, even after we let him cry it out the last time for 30 minutes. We couldn't figure out what his problem was. My guess was that he was sleeping in Tobey's room but saw that Tobey wasn't in his bed like he was the previous night (after the first night, Tobey decided he didn't want to sleep in the same room as Eli because he cries). So whether my comforting words that Tobey is in our room worked or whether he just wore himself out from crying, he finally stayed asleep after 3:30. So much for "Tom's turn" -- Eli's crying kept both of us up. We're sure it woke up Tobey but he just stayed in his Thomas tent on our floor. And I'm sure Tom's mom heard the whole thing. Tom's dad sleeps like a log.

It is Eli's fault that he can't sleep through these different conditions. But the thing that scares me is what the future holds in terms of unusual sleeping arrangments. Thankfully, although my parents will be in town by the time Tom's leave, they will be staying in their hotel for the duration of their stay. But they will be back in a few weeks at which point, they will be staying with us for 5-6 nights. Cue Eli's bad sleeping. And then after that, in another couple of weeks, we're off to Utah for the Chang family vacation. Cue another week of Eli's bad sleeping, while on vacation. It just brings on a feeling of dread for me.