Crying, lots of crying

The sleepover has ended and the real work has begun. The beginning of the week Gabe was much less smiley, but still slept pretty good. On Tuesday he went to visit the doctor for a quick check up. Unfortunately our pediatrician is out of office for the next week, so we saw another physician. We were definitely not ready for what happened there.

Gabriel had been pulling at his ears, and with the long flight, we wanted his ears checked out. There was wax in both ears blocking the view for the doctor. He tried to use a tool to pull it out, but was not able to get at it. That in itself was hard, with Gabe crying and not wanting to be held still. Then we had to lay on him and hold him still on his side so they could put some medicine in his ear to break down the wax. After that was in for awhile, they filled this plastic pot of water, that was connected to a hose and tube, which was stuck in his ear, vibrating loudly, and they tried to flush the was out. What seemed like eternitly of this and him wailing (it may have been 10 minutes), they were able to look into both ears. Not sure how cleaning one ear got both ears clean, but I'll take it. Conclusion? The hardened wax had caused irritation in both ears, leading to an outer ear infection. And that's not all, both eardrums were red and bulging--and inner ear infection too.

Since then, getting him to sleep has gotten harder and harder. Gone are the days we could lay him in his crib and he would fall asleep. Now there is much walking, holding, swaying, back aching, crying, fussing, and more crying. On the positive, the longest it has taken is 40 minutes to get him to full sleep, he is starting to be able to play on his own for a short time, and he is starting to eat more. He is still pulling at his ears, so I'm not sure how the medicine is working, or if this is how he expresses himself when he is mad or tired. So many things to learn for all of us.