Zombie Duty

Jackson continues to torment his loved ones at night, so late yesterday evening I snuck him home with me. Well, perhaps snuck is the wrong term as Bentley clearly understood what was going on and demanded to come along, too. (I think Bentley might have misunderstood and thought he was invited instead of Jackson. He started putting on his coat to leave with us and we could not deny him, so we took both boys home with us.)

Bentley doesn't require much care from us at night. We give him a warm bottle, a stack of books, and prime real estate in our bed and he's content to drift off to sleep without too much fuss.

Jackson is a different story. The closer to your bedtime it is the fussier he gets.


Even though he had recently eaten, to calm him down I handed his opa a 4 ounce bottle. Jackson guzzled it and was content for a brief time. When he became cranky again, I fed him 2 ounces more. He was happy for another short interval, but then demanded that I sit upright with him--absolutely no lounging on the job.

I had the perfect solution for that. His opa stays up until at least 1AM every night, so I figured they'd make the perfect buddy team. Well, opa decided (for the first time in over a week--I wonder what prompted the decision?) that he ought to go to bed before midnight (it was 11:56PM), so I ended up with the cranky baby. I made him another 2 ounce bottle. He sucked it down and finally fell asleep after a few grousing comments. He slept until 4:30AM.

Getting up at 4:30AM (Zombie Duty) when I've only had a portion of a good night's rest gives me an instant headache. That's before I even pick up the crying infant who needs a diaper changed and wants a bottle NOW. Fortunately, that's all he demanded. He was content to go back to sleep once he had those two items. He didn't demand (like earlier) to be held in an upright position by a caregiver with a smile on their face. I'm pretty sure I could not have provided both of those services at the same time.

He slept until 8:30AM at which time I propped a bottle in his mouth and he ate most of it before falling back asleep. (I didn't want to risk waking him up fully by removing him from his bed, so I didn't change his diaper.) I was able to exercise before the two boys got up for the day. Isn't that a miracle?