Sleeping and Anxiety and Sleeping Anxiety

Since returning home from California, Moose has been a fuss monster. The first few days, we chalked it up to teething and just readjusting. The two-hour time change also makes a bigger difference to a person his size. After a few rough days, I was finally able to get him to take a reasonable nap. I just nursed him to sleep in our bed and he slept for hours. Well, yesterday he woke up silently, moved the pillows around, found the remote, turned on the TV, and sat happily four inches away from the edge of the bed. This is how I found him, and I was terrified. So, he can no longer sleep alone in our bed anymore.

He slept with us last night ... after two rounds of screaming.

Today, he fell asleep nursing on the couch. The moment I moved him to his crib, he freaked out. He's still freaking out.

I have played nice - in the last week I have nursed him, rocked him, patted his back for 20 minutes at a time. The second I set him down or walk away, he freaks out. I have tried going in every 5 minutes to calm him down. I've done that for more than hour straight. I've also done it on a progression level (5, 10, 15 minutes ... this is what worked with Bean) ... Moose just freaks out more. I'm not a fan of a flat-out cry-it-out method, but I don't know what else to do at this point. His not-sleeping and constant screaming needs to go and every day it is getting noticeably worse. He has till 3:30 in his crib alone. I am not going in there to calm him down. He's been screaming non-stop for 45 minutes now. I feel awful, but I just can't keep going through this for nap time and bed time every single night. It's too much.

I never dreamed that Bean would prove to be the easy one this summer. Not that it's a competition, but if it was, Bean would be winning by leaps and bounds ... I'm just saying :)