My baby boy is 8 months now. He usually spends the first half of the night in his playpen after falling asleep in my lap or the car. I let him stay there until he wakes up for his night nursing because I found moving him to the bed would wake him up and he'd want to play, not so good for a tired mommy. Unfortunately, the boy has allergies or something because he's ALWAYS congested and recently it's been worse than usual. Tonight in particular he's been so congested that he can't get back to sleep. He's been fussing and squirming. I've tried him on allergy medication prescribed by his doctor, but it doesn't help. I think he maybe has a cold at this point, so maybe cough and cold stuff would be better, but I don't keep any in the house unless it's going to be used. I know if he could just sleep propped up, he'd be okay, but he just won't sleep. Of course, the only thing I have to prop him up in is his exersaucer or on pillows. He won't stay on the pillows and he just keeps screaming in the exersaucer, which he used to just put his head down and sleep in whenever he was tired with no fuss. Normally I'd just hold him or let him lay in the bed with me until he finally got comfortable and settled down, but I know that can take hours when he feels like this.

Now, I know it's not his fault, but I can't handle this right now. Between my son and my daughter, I haven't gotten enough sleep in a week. It takes a good hour or more to get him to sleep every night. Then when I get him to sleep and put down, I try to spend a little time with my four-year-old daughter to get her into bed, but she keeps asking for just one more story, and then throws a temper tantrum when I cut her off after two or we'll be at it all night. That wakes up the baby and then I've got to spend a whole hour putting him to bed again. I have no help at bedtime, so it's not like I can deal with the baby while someone else takes care of my daughter. Daddy is in Iraq right now, so I'm stuck and alone. With the baby now waking me up after only four hours of sleep, I'm just too tired to deal with it. I can't just suck it up and go get him some cold medicine because that means waking up my daughter and dragging her 20 minutes away to the store, dragging them both through Walmart to find the stuff, then dragging them both home. Then I've got to convince both of them to go back to bed so I can get some sleep. I've tried taking a nap when the baby's taking his nap, but my daughter wakes me up because she wants some attention too. I can't imagine how this would all work if I was working! I'm burnt out now and I'm at home with them all the time!

I feel really guilty right now because I'm tempted to just let him scream until he figures it out. I need sleep to be a good parent. I have real world responsibilities. I've got to go do laundry so he has diapers because I don't have a washer and dryer at home. I've got to do grocery shopping. I have another child to take care of that's been getting no attention because I'm either I'm dealing with getting the baby down to sleep, nursing him, feeding him, changing his diapers, trying to cook, trying to clean, or doing any of the other million things that NEED to get done or I'll get too far behind again. On top of it all, I'm so tired that I'm not efficient at any of it. It's not fair to her because the only time she gets with me is when the baby is sleeping, and that's if I can put him down without him waking up. She gets really jealous if I try to have time with her while holding the sleeping baby. I'm only one person and I'm having a real problem trying to be mommy and daddy and still get enough time for me. I even got a comment yesterday that I "smell like a hippie" because I don't get to shower as often as the rest fo the world would like because I have to find a time when neither of the kids are demanding my attention to do so and I can't take the baby in the shower because he get scared and screams. It would be different if my husband was actually here to help me, but courtesy of the US Army, he's not going to be home for a while yet. I just don't know what else I can do. I NEED my sleep, but he's not figuring it out with me holding him. It seems like no matter what I do, he's going to scream. I'm starting to think there's nothing in the realm of something reasonable that I can do to make him feel better. There's no one I can call to take the kids for a couple of hours so I can get some sleep. Even if there were, I wouldn't feel right giving them a baby that screams like you're trying to kill him every time he's tired and just won't go to sleep for a whole hour at a time, no matter how much I try to cuddle him, rock him, soothe him, or whatever. I don't know what to do, but I need something to happen because I need to get some sleep soon or I'm going to be useless as a mother because I'll be too tired to function. Unfortunately, there's a reason children have two parents...

I'm sorry, this is a bit more of a rant. I'm just frustrated and exhausted. I really don't know what else to do other than wait until morning and get him something for the congestion after my daughter's awake, if I'm alert even alert enough to be driving a car. That won't help the bedtime battle with the two of them, but I can't deal with less sleep than I'm already getting. I just really don't know what I'm doing wrong that he won't sleep and what else to do to get my daughter to bed without a fight short of hiring a maid to take care of my house and a laundry service so that I have enough time to spend with both children. If I could get the baby to sleep without such a long fight, I'd have more time during the day to spend with her. I just don't know what else to do other than let him scream, bury my head under the pillow, and pray that he eventually falls asleep because I'm just so tired and nothing I do seems to be working...