Epic Fail

This morning I had my very first epic fail moment in motherhood.

Colin spent most of yesterday crying. No...not crying. Wailing. For. No. Reason. I tried everything to soothe him. I rubbed his belly. Laid him on his belly. Did the "bicycle move" with his legs. Gave him a warm bath. Sang him songs. Walked with him while bouncing and singing songs. I pulled out all the stops. But to no avail. The second I would stop, he started screaming again.

I finally concluded that he had an upset stomach. There's not much a mama can do for an upset stomach. Finally he settled down around 7pm. I gave him a warm bottle of breastmilk (a natural laxative) and put him in bed. He slept until around 11pm. Not long enough for this mama. I was frustrated and exhausted. I did NOT want to get up with him. But I did it. I fed him another bottle of breastmilk and he slept until around 4am. I was still tired but in a far better mood than I was a few hours earlier. So I got up and headed to his room.

Then I smelled it. Spit up. And a lot of it. When I picked Colin up, I discovered that his entire back was soaked, the back of his head was soaked and he had spit up in his ear. I felt like the worst mother ever and I may have shed a tear or two. I can't believe I let him lay in his crib while he was soaking wet from spit up. But I pulled myself together and got him into dry jammies and a dry diaper. I handed him over to Mark to feed him so I could get his crib cleaned up. We have a "wet mat" for his crib that we lay him on and he had spit up so much that it soaked all the way through the mat and through his sheet. More tears ensued.

I know stuff like this happens but I felt awful. All I could think about was what if he had choked on the spit up? He lays on his back so it's entirely possible. I made a mental note that it's not a good idea to give him that much breastmilk before bed time. Especially since he's not used to it. Usually we give him formula before bed to help fill him up so he (and we) can get a restful sleep. Lesson learned. Unfortunately, it was learned the hard way.

On the bright side, he is in a much better mood today and his stomach isn't upset any more!