4 Molars and a Baby

Surprise, surprise, she's got teeth.

My little girl, Abigail woke up SCREAMING Saturday night. We knew she was acting odd, cranky and what not, but Saturday night was impossible. SOMETHING was wrong. After a while, I checked her mouth and sure enough, there were not 1 ... not 2 ... not 3 ... but FOUR emerging molars. OUCH. No wonder she was not our happy lil' peanut.

That night we gave her Motrin and she slept well the rest of the night. Sunday came and she was acting in pain again. No words, of course, but screaming and restlessness. We gave her more Motrin and off to church we went. Afterwards, she crashed for her afternoon nap. We woke her up - to our demise - at 630pm so she could still get to bed on time. Bedtime rolls around and she is dead-tired, but is not settling down! Uh, oh. What gives?? We had given her Motrin before bed ... ooooooooh, crap ... we gave her Motrin. We didn't realize until close to midnight after fighting with her to go to bed ("let her cry," "try a bottle," "is she changed?" "is she feverish?" "should we let her play longer?" on and on and on). Clearly, on the box it says, not only may it cause drowsiness, but Motrin may cause excitability. WHAT?!!

Her screaming had been resonating on and off for hours at this point - no one was sleeping. We had tried prayer, blessings, everything. Once we had this epiphany, we knew we were doomed. We gave her the Motrin at 8pm or so. The dose lasts about 4-6 hours. Worst case scenario, we wouldn't sleep until 230am. Poor girl. It was horrible for her. She was acting so zombie-like, but determined to play with everything for only a second until she moved onto other things. I've never seen her so hyper! It was hilarious as much as it was devastating for my sleep. I was really worried about her, let alone my first day "officially" at work (post training). Finally, we tried for a last time. Her zombie zone-outs were lasting for a couple minutes at a time now. We thought it a good time to try bedtime again. IT WORKED! YIPPEE.

I was ready to call everyone I know to hunt the number down for my cousin Lena, homeopathic medicine queen to get advice - what to do??? After prayer failed, what was the point? What lesson here did we need to learn (other than DON'T give this chick Motrin)? Argh.