Saturday, October 11, 2008

What Am I Doing?

I'm starting to think my child doesn't like me. Or my husband. Or our home. Every time we're home, she cries and screams. It's not fun anymore. Everyone is on edge because you can only take a screaming child who is screaming for no reason for so long. Well, I'm sure there's a reason, but she's not sharing.

Is it because she's two? Are her molars coming in? Does she have tummy problems? I think it's yes to all of the above. She gets up 1-2 hours in the middle of the night every night now. She sleeps in her bed half the night and won't go back in. We had to move to a toddler bed, because she figured out how to climb out of the crib. So we bought Elmo sheets and bedding today in an attempt to make bed more "fun" and "likeable".

During the middle of the day she seems to be fairly ok. Four or five o'clock rolls around and it's duck and cover. I want to run away. My husband deals with it worse than I do and ends up behaving just as bad as the two year old. She wants something, you get it, and then she doesn't want it. Either option results in tears and shouts.

We're going through a half gallon of milk every two days because that's the only way I can get her to calm down at night. And at 2 a.m. I'm in survival mode at this point. I know almost all of the Elmo "Potty" video by heart now because it's another cure all.

My husband's convinced that something is wrong because this can't be just from being two or having molars come in. I don't know what to think at this point. All I know is I end up in tears alot. My daughter can be the most precious gift in one moment and ten seconds later I'm ready to UPS her to Michigan to live with her Gram.

Now I'm suspicious of a food allergy. Can a food allergy make a baby go off the deep end? She had a hive on her face tonight. I wondered if it was from her being worked up or a reaction to something. So I frantically put together a tracking sheet to monitor food, sleep, meds and behavior to see if I could notice any patterns.

Ha! She literally just spend a half hour rolling around the floor screaming, not letting us touch her. The way she moved I could tell it was her tummy. I'm definitely thinking milk may be in the running as the cause. Looks like I'll be calling the doctor's office Monday morning. After getting her calmed down, we drank some apple juice and off she went again. So she's back in bed....for now. Which is where I should head since it might be another hour when I get a wake up call.

Any and all comments are welcome.

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