Learn #1: Trust your instincts!!

It started pretty much at 12 in the morning. I was going on my 2nd hour of trying to nurse Elle to sleep. She kept waking up and crying. She hasn't taken a pacifier in weeks so she has to be fully asleep when I put her down. I think I have a pretty high pain tolerance but my nipples were just burning with pain and I kept checking to see if there was blood streaming down from it. There wasn't. Around 2 am, I decided to go for a drive cuz that was a sure fire way of getting her to sleep. I drove around a bit, drove up to the suburbs to fill my gas tank and came back home, parked in my driveway and slept next to her until she woke up at 4:30am. I brought her back into the house and it took her another hour to fall back asleep.

She had a really good morning nap for about 3 hours on my bed. When she woke up, I got her dressed to go to that fabric store but when I got out, it was raining and I didn't want to drive the hour that it would take to get there so we just went to costco.

ok, the worst part is coming.

After we came back, I nursed her to sleep at 1:30pm and was eating lunch with Alex and I hear a loud thump. which made Madison bark but I thought it was the cat knocking down something in the basement and I was yelling at madison to shut up when I heard Elle screaming. I never ran so fast in my life. I was sliding on my hardwood floor from the speed and lack of friction. For a second, I felt like I was running in place and getting nowhere. She had gotten up and fallen off my bed and landed on her forehead and nose. I screamed when I saw her on the floor and picked her up right away. She didn't cry long at all and seemed ok but I am beyond heartbroken for letting it happen because when I was fixing my lunch, I thought I heard her from the kitchen so I went closer to the bedroom without looking in and heard nothing so I thought she was still sleeping and since my doors and floors creak, I didn't want to get any closer and look in (cuz it usually always wakes her up). So I'm most certain I was right and did hear her and if I had only gone in at that moment, I would probably have seen her up and playing.

Oh, my heart aches just thinking about it again. She's ok. she has a little redness on her nose and I squeezed it lightly several times today to see if it hurt her but it doesn't. That's the last time she naps in my bed and the last time I don't listen to my instinct.

I felt sick to my stomach all day because of it and my nipples are still sore from her nursing for so long last night and my back is killing me from sleeping in the car.

I also tried to give her a little formula to save my nipples from another torturous night but she wouldn't take any. But before giving it to her, I took a taste of it to check the temp and about 30 minutes later, I was sick to my stomach because of the lactose.

I will never doubt myself again. I will never sacrifice her safety.