My Night

Yesterday I was at a doctor's appointment for Simon when I thought, "What the heck? I'll ask just in case. Do you happen to sell miracles? My son doesn't sleep." He smiled. He began asking questions about his normal routine. "What time does he go to bed?" "What day is it?" was my answer. Babies his age do begin waking up at night even if they used to sleep through the night. He asked about Simon's waking habits and it was decided by both of us that he indeed was waking up more than usual. :)
Long story... too late... yesterday was a very nice morning with the kids, but very full. We didn't get home until 2pm. Simon still hadn't fallen asleep for a nap. The doctor suggested not allowing him super long naps after a rough night, because it perpetuates the problem. SO... long story... anyway... Simon didn't take a nap at all.
He went to bed fairly easy that night. He went to bed in his crib, which is at the foot of our bed. He usually starts sleeping in there and when he wakes up I'll pull him into bed with us. He sleeps horribly anyway, so what's the difference? But I  thought I'd start the habit of putting him back into his crib. I think he went to sleep around 9:45pm. By 10:30pm he was awake. I think that time he went back to sleep when he was picked up and patted on the back for a while. At 1:30am he woke up again. This is after no nap. Not only did he wake up at 1:30am, but at 2:30am I woke up in our bed with him nursing. After a while of thinking, "Okay, I'll get up in two minutes." I finally got out of bed and put the sleeping baby back in the crib. Every time I put his body down he began crawling towards the sides again. I must have tried ten times to put him back on his tummy to sleep. I hate the crying it out method. In my experience and my kids there is no fussing or crying. There's screaming until the babies are so worked up they couldn't fall asleep if they were sedated! I kept trying to put him back in his crib, but after he consistently wold get up and start crawling back to my arms I figured it was too darn late to keep trying this madness. I brought him into bed with me.
By this time while Simon was sleepy he was awake. It was a very sweet time watching him in the darkness and perpetually smile at me. He played calmly with my fingers, touched my face, kept smiling. I thought it was so sweet, but by this time it was 3:30am! I finally enlisted Brad's help. He took the baby into the living room and I fell asleep eventually. Now it's 7:30am and the whole family is awake and active.
The doctor had said a baby this age should be sleeping a full amount of 12 hours in a 24 hour period. After no nap during the day and a restless night I knew for sure that 12 hours happened for no one. I'm going to try to be more vigilant about naps that aren't too long, and I have no idea, but whatever I can do to encourage more sleep I'll do.
I must say that when Brad sleepily walked out with the awake baby I thought, "He's the Energizer Bunny reborn!"