Sleepless in Henderson

If you’re a loyal Pete’s Blog reader, you’ll know that I’ve mentioned before how Vickey and I are sleep challenged (see my March 25 post).

Last night was a particularly difficult night because Eliana was up 3 times, pounding on her door to be let out (you’ll also recall from earlier reading that we lock her in her room on nights following nights she wakes us up … nearly every night), claiming she needed to throw up, waking us and Dominic up every time. It was grueling.

Then, about an hour after the last middle-of-the-night episode, she was screaming for help because — you guessed it — she threw up in her bed.

There’s a stomach bug that’s floating around our neighborhood between a handful of houses (all the places Ellie frequents). It seems like we’ve had this bug at least three times now. In fact, our hallway carpet is still stained from Eliana’s last throw up experience when she had come to our doorway and was walking back down the hallway to her room when she threw up.

And did she stop walking when she started? Oh no. The stains continue down half of the hallway.

And why is it this always happens in the middle of the night, anyway?

Needless to say, I’m feeling like a zombie. I believe I can honestly count on two hands the number of nights I’ve slept through the night at home since Dominic was born. And if I had to lay blame on him or his sister, his sister would win by a mile.

So, if anyone has any parenting tips for getting a four year-old to sleep through the night, with the exception of needing to be up due to illness, I’m all ears.