Good morning!

I'm obsessed with sleep. I'm always talking about it and every night I can't wait to do it. And after last night, it looks like I may be able to stop obsessing.

We woke this morning, like every morning, to the cry of a baby, but this morning it was Sophia and this morning it was 7:30.

Last night, Ryan slept through the whole night. When we woke up and realized that neither of us got up with him, our first instinct was to make sure he was OK, but our survival instincts kicked in and we thought better than to go into his room and potentially wake him.

That lasted 15 minutes before the urge to make sure our son was still breathing became overwhelming. At 7:45 a.m., my husband tip-toed into Ryan's room and found our little boy awake and smiling. He must have slept well.

In my experience, that first full night of sleep is stressful in the morning. Instead of waking up feeling well-rested, I wake up and feel anxiety.

Sophia first slept through the night when she was one month old, and since then, with the occasional exception, she has always been a good sleeper. But even now, if we wake up before her, we have to channel all our willpower to not run into her room and check on her.

I don't want to jinx it, but I'm hoping that last night wasn't a fluke and that tonight, tomorrow night and every night after, Ryan and his big sister sleep soundly through the night. It will help everyone feel better, but it won't stop us from worrying about our kids -- I know that will never happen.

Keep breathing

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out. We’ve been counting my son’s breathes for the last 36 hours. It began Thursday when I got a call from daycare around 2:30 p.m. telling me I had to pick up Ryan because he had a fever. So I left work (thanks to my extremely understanding boss) and drove him from daycare right to the pediatrician’s office. She looked at him, listened to his chest, counted his breathes and checked the oxygen levels in his blood. She suspected it was bronchiolitis, gave us a nebuliser and told us to come back Friday. We went back for the recheck on Friday and from the doctor’s office, we went right to the hospital.
Ryan’s breathing was labored, his oxygen level’s were hard for the doctor to read and he was wheezing. The ER doctor’s took a chest X-ray and his lungs are clear, but he did test positive for RSV.

After an entire day at the ER, we are home tonight but we’re going back to the pediatrician tomorrow. He’s not any better, but he’s not worse. I’ve been told that this is a very common virus in infants. I’ve also been told it’s common in daycares and since the virus is so contagious, by the time a child exhibits symptoms of the disease, it’s already spread through the entire classroom.

I am so worried about him. This is not like anything I’ve ever experienced. I can’t help but worry about him, he’s having trouble breathing. It doesn’t get any scarier than that. It’s a simple act that keeps our heart beating and the blood pumping through our bodies and my son is working very hard at it.

I’m exhausted, I’m completely stressed out and all I can do is believe that we will make it through the weekend and my precious little boy will be healthy again.