Answered Prayer

Nothing is more adorable than a sleeping baby, right? There is just something so sweet and innocent when they are laying there completely relaxed and totally silent except for the occasional coo or sigh. When your baby is sleeping, everything is right with the world.

I am sure that if you are a follower of my blog, you have read all my glowing reports of how Weston is a great sleeper. And that was true, but a little over 2 weeks ago, that all changed. He got a virus that gave him a low grade fever and he started waking up in the middle of the night. And he wasn't just crying, he was screaming at the top of his lungs (which seem to have expanded exponentially lately!) There was nothing I could do to calm him down short of waking him up and then working hard to get him back to sleep again. But even after he went back to sleep, he would sleep fitfully waking up sometimes up to 8 times a night. I tried everything I could think of. Ibuprofen, Tylenol, teething tablets, propping him up on a pillow, cereal closer to bedtime, cereal farther away from bedtime, no cereal at all, and the list goes on. I even tried nursing him in the middle of the night which went against everything I believe about babies sleeping (since I know he can last through the night.) Several nights I even slept in his room (we have a guest bed in there) and Tyler was getting a little concerned about why I was not sleeping with Daddy. But NOTHING worked. He still screamed. As you can imagine, I was a pretty tired mama. My brain would decide about 1/2 way through the night that it wasn't worth it to go to sleep between screaming episodes since it knew there would be another one soon.

All along I had been praying, but not with the fervency I should have been. Last night when I put Weston to bed, Sean and I went into his room and prayed over that sweetly sleeping baby. We prayed that God would heal him from whatever it was that was making him wake up in the night screaming and that He would give us the wisdom to know how to help him and the patience to do so. And we prayed that he would sleep through that night.

And guess what?? He didn't sleep through the night. He woke up at about 3:30 am, but he woke up talking, not screaming. Sean went in (it didn't even wake me up until Sean got out of bed) put in his paci, and he didn't wake up again until 6 am and he was talking that time too! I cannot tell you how thankful I am for that answered prayer. God is so powerful that sometimes I think I shouldn't even bother asking for the little things. After all, He made me a mom, shouldn't I be able to handle the little things on my own? This has been a lesson for me not only in patience but also in leaning. I should be leaning on my Heavenly Father for ALL things. Even the things I consider little. God cares for us. He even knows how many hairs we have on our heads and if He cares about that little detail, how much more does He care about the other things in our lives like screaming babies?!

So I am excited about tonight. Maybe Weston will sleep through the night, or maybe he won't. But whatever happens, I will be praying tonight that God will keep him in His more than capable hands. And in the morning, I will be thankful.

A well rested baby makes for a happy baby!