Category: sleep

revenge of the teeth

Last night I posted a list of things teeth-oriented. Yes, a silly list. But I should have realized that teeth are no laughing matter. Now teeth want revenge, and they have launched a full-blown attack.

Phoebe has been showing some signs of teething this week. Fairly minor. A tendency to drool, and bite and chew on things. Habits which she’s largely outgrown. There has been some tugging on the ears, and our 15-month check-up confirmed that there are no ear infections. So, teething it is. No big deal. Right?

That is until last night.

I hadn’t been prepared for an attack of “vicious canines.”

Phoebe is a good sleeper. A phenomenal night-time sleeper. (Not so great with naps.) She rarely wakes up in the night, and when she does, she can usually get back to sleep pretty quickly. But last night, just as I was going to bed, at 1:00 a.m., Phoebe woke up screaming. The long and short of it is that she just would not settle down. Did not want to be put down. At 3:00, I finally decided to just hold her, and take her into bed with me. We slept fitfully, and she woke up at 6:00. Full of energy.

I spent most of the morning lying on various floors as she played nearby. She’s been in a great mood except when she’s expected to sleep. We tried a morning nap. She was very tired, and went down in her crib with no argument. Relieved, I stumbled back to bed, and collapsed.

She slept in her crib for 25 minutes.

At this point, I threw myself on John’s mercy, who has work he needs to do today, to let me get just a little more sleep. So, happily, I am now at least partially functional.

What scares me is that the offending teeth are not even visible yet. How long will this go on?

final countdown

Damn. I can’t even write that, even think that, without getting that song running through my head. (da da doo doo, da da doo doo doo, da da doo doo, da da doo doo doo…) (By the way, Wikipedia seems to let you play snippets of songs now. But I must warn you, this song is insidious. There is also no pause or stop button on the Wikipedia player.)

What was I saying? Oh yeah. My class is almost over. The takehome final is due tomorrow. I’m in decent shape timewise, I think. Also not in such bad shape gradewise, in spite of my previous stressings. (Have I ever mentioned that if there is extra credit available, I feel compelled to go for it? Even if I don’t need it? I’m trying to resist the urge to do the extra credit question on the final, since I’ll get more sleep if I don’t do it. And unless I seriously screwed up on the last assignment, I don’t need it.)

Ah, sleep. If only I could get some sort of credit for that. Screw the credit, if only I could just get more of it. Have I mentioned that I love sleep? Oh, right. I have.

I shouldn’t drink coffee

I’ve been up since 4 a.m., and this time it’s not directly due to Phoebe.

I’ve just come out of a really hectic stretch of days working on a class assignment, working on editing paper that I’m co-authoring with two of my bosses, and preparing a demonstration and presentation of some soundfile and data processing tools for my advisor and two other professors I work with. All of this was while dealing with trying to re-adjust to East Coast time, and even more difficult, trying to get Phoebe back on an East Coast schedule. Then on Tuesday, I was counting on having a solid work day, as Phoebe goes to daycare. But the daycare provider had a nasty virus, so we kept Phoebe home, leading to a loss of 8 or so productive hours. Then we had a rough night where the furnace shut off and Phoebe woke up cold and screaming, leading to an additional loss of sleep and productive hours.

Anyhow, I had the meeting to talk about the file-processing things yesterday, and was so tired from the sleep deprivation of the previous few days, I stopped for a coffee at a Dunkin Donuts on my drive in. (And no, I didn’t get a donut. I was strong.) I don’t drink much caffeine these days, as I know it keeps me awake at night. But I figured falling asleep while driving would be a bigger price to pay than another largely sleepless night. Which is true. But I am really tired, and strangely wired. Even now. Over 12 hours over finishing the coffee, which was supposed to be half decaf, but I’m suspecting really wasn’t. Or maybe it’s just stress. In either case, I was too tired to do much of anything last night, but too wired to sleep.

I’m hoping to wind down soon. Because I’m still too tired to actually concentrate on work, and I still have a lot to do. And I probably shouldn’t spend the day blogging…