What a way to start 2012!

I rang in the New Year by going blind in one eye. And no, I didn't go on a bender the night before. (Quite, the opposite actually, we were in bed by 10pm.) But sure enough, around mid-day while chatting on the phone to my mom, a black curtain was slowly drawn across my right eye. I saw nothing but blackness out of that eye for a couple of minutes, and then just as slowly as it closed, the black curtain opened up again, and I could see.

I didn't think much of it, but when Paul found out about it, he made me call the telephone nurses. Long story short, I was told to go to the ER immediately because they thought my retina might be detaching. We got Sam to watch the boys until Yvonne could arrive, and we rushed off to Armadale hospital. I was seen almost immediately, and then we were sent up to the main hospital in Perth to see an eye specialist. On the way there, I started to have other funny symptoms, tingling face, ear pain, light sensitivity, flickering lights, etc., and I suspected that there was something going on besides a detached retina.

It turns out I was right. The eye specialist confirmed that there was nothing wrong with my eye, and I was just having the beginnings of a migraine. By the time we got back home, I was definitely feeling the symptoms and spent the next 48 hours living liking a vampire with all the curtains shut and lights off. It took over a week (and a trip to the chiro's) before the eye pain completely stopped, but I'm happy to report that I'm feeling super now. And hopefully, that will be the last one of those I have. Not fun.

It's a bit easy to understand why I might have had a migraine. Things have been a bit stressful around the house, and Paul and I have been suffering from a serious lack of sleep. Why, you ask? Well, this stay-at-home-mommy went back to work last week, and I was very very nervous about all I had to learn (long story that includes another change management and having to learn all the School of Education courses plus learning all the new versions of the 20 or so old courses that I used to advise on). I was also dreading the fact that I needed to get used to my new digs. Instead of a private office where students could come and talk to me confidentially, I now work in a huge open office with a call centre like set-up with a take-a-number machine and everything--yuck.

I was also a bit sick about sending the boys to daycare. I was very concerned about how Oliver was going to adjust to being away from me two days a week. And on top of that, we decided to change daycare centres again, and Elliot wasn't too pleased about having to leave his friends at the old place. But we just weren't feeling good about the level of care and communication at the previous place, and I was very nervous to send Oliver there with his allergy.

Turns out that most of the worrying was for naught (you think I would learn to just not worry and save myself the stress, but geesh it's just not that easy!). Work isn't so horrible. I've hopped right back in the saddle and am (slowly) picking things up like before. There are also some really lovely people there (although I still miss Danika heaps).

And the boys are doing great at daycare. Oliver didn't cry once his first day and Elliot is really warming up to the place and starting to make friends (not like I was worried about that with our Mr. Social!). And Paul and I are so happy with the new daycare! It's another community run one (like Elliot's first one) and has a very good reputation and long waiting list. And all of it is merited. The boys brought home photos and paintings and certificates for their first day, and the ladies who run it are all so kind and personable and actually come up to us to tell us about the boys' days when we come in. Novel concept!

So now about the lack of sleep. Well, we decided to finally get on top of Oliver's ongoing refusal to sleep through the night as well as Elliot's increasing demands at bedtime and waking up at the crack of dawn. We just couldn't continue with the lack of sleep that we were getting. Everyone was starting to get really cranky. So I rang up Ngala again and got some good advice for Elliot as well as a plan for little Oliver.

We've ordered a sleep training clock for Elliot but until that arrives we decided to implement a few changes right away. First big change, Mommy or Daddy only cuddles in bed with Elliot for five minutes while Scout plays bedtime music instead of the increasing stretches of time that Elliot pleaded out of us before. Second, Elliot is not allowed out of his room until six in the morning. If he wakes up before that and comes to wake us up, we firmly tell him that it's not time to wake up yet, and he has to go back to his room until we come and get him. And at nap time it's the same thing. If he doesn't want to sleep that's fine, but he has to stay in his room and read books or play quietly for an hour. And the punishment for infractions to these new rules?? No tv or computer!! Egads! Usually we only have to mention this and Elliot goes hightailing it back to his room.

Ollie's sleep regimen is a bit more demanding of Paul and I. Ngala suggested a plan where we gradually make things harder on Oliver until he eventually is sleeping through the night. The first step was getting him to go to sleep on his own. We'd already been working on this one so that wasn't too difficult. The next major task was getting him off of the middle of the night bottles which proved to be considerably more difficult. And finally, he'd be sleeping through the night, or so we hope.

This little plan required Paul and I to set up a bed on the floor of his room where we could respond the minute he wakes up and before he gets too worked up. The first several nights were long and hard. Oliver would wake up, start to get upset, and then we'd settle him down, most the way down anyway. He'd only settle for a few minutes and then we'd go through the whole thing again until finally, Paul and I could take it no longer and finally give him an increasingly diluted bottle. By night four or five he was waking just once, drinking just a few gulps of water and then going right back to sleep for the rest of the night. And for the last few nights he hasn't needed a bottle at all, just a few calming words from Paul or I once or twice a night. Now we slowly move our little bed on the floor out of his room until we're out of his room and he's sleeping through the night on his own. If it didn't work so well, I'd think we were nuts!

So that's what we've been up to. Here's to an easier second half of January and rest of the year.