Natalie's cold has progressed from a tickly cough to a full-blown runny nose. The nurse practitioner at Urgent Care (the HMO sent me since her fever was 102 for 3 days now) checked her ears and said they aren't infected, but probably congested, and she refuses to nurse on my right side. (Thank God for the friend who gave me her Pump In Style! :?) Her teeth are coming in somewhere too, and no amount of ibuprofen or even the Hyland's teething tablets seem to be helping the teething discomfort or the fever. Sometimes she seems to want stuff to chew on, and other times sge just cries and cries - and her nose gets more congested,
Now that her nose is full-blown runny, she absolutely can't get comfortable enough to sleep. On the rare occasions when I can nurse her to sleep and get her to sleep on an incline on my lap, it lasts 45 minutes tops - all night long, 45 minutes down, an hour-plus up. Last night I had 2 hours of sleep and I'm shattered, and tonight is shaping up to be worse. :cry: *sob*
There's a steam vaporizer running in her room - doesn't seem to make a difference. I've done saline nose spray and aspiration - makes her upset enough that she cries enough tears to undo all that. :roll: Inclining her mattress we run the risk of her sleeping downhill since she rolls around so much. She refuses to sleep in the car seat or her bouncy chair; it took a good hour for her to fall asleep in the car on the way down from my folks' this morning, and gas is too pricey for those kinds of jaunts all night. :?
We are at a loss as to how to help her get some rest and some comfort. I finally gave her a micro-dose of Simply Stuffy (J's cold med, decongestant only) to help dry up a little and maybe stave off an ear infection, but she's still up crying from tiredness. PLEASE, what are we missing?