Oh, sweet 7 1/2 month old (alternate title: Sleep woes)

George has never been a particularly good sleeper.  But it was pretty workable. He wanted to nurse most of the night, which we remedied by sleeping together. On occasion, he would unlatch and sleep next to me for an hour, but mostly he would sleep in the crook of my arm. The co-sleeping wasn't great for quality of sleep, but it was something. And with the addition of two cups of coffee a day (don't judge me :P) I could make it through the day relatively easily most days and felt pretty good.

And now, no. He slept kinda bad when he first two teeth were coming in, understandably. Then things got ok again. And then last week, oh my.... I don't know what happened. I thought it was his ears, or maybe his teeth because he wasn't sleeping well during the day, too and he was pretty cranky when he was awake. But now, he really doesn't seem uncomfortable. Just sleeping poorly. Like, in the middle of the night, when he would normally just nurse/sleep, he nurses and then gets all flail-y. Doesn't really want to nurse, doesn't want to be put down, most of the time. Sometimes wants to rock. In the middle of the night. He's been getting up between 4:30 and 5:45 most days, just to play for an hour.

Oy, it is wearing me out.  Last night, I watched the clock every time he got up, out of morbid curiosity. This is how the night went:

• Nursed down pretty easily at 7:30. Slept until 10:40 (I should note that him sleeping all evening is extremely rare. Most of the time, he is up every hour to hour and a half in the evenings.) 
• I nursed him for about 15 minutes in the recliner in his room, he was really restless and didn't make the transfer to his bed.
• Joe, mercifully, put him back to sleep and kept him until 12:20. He nursed and we dozed peacefully in bed until about 1:00, when he got restless. I put him in his crib and he slept until 2:00.
• At 2:00, he nursed for about 15 minutes and then slept in his crib until 3:10.
• At 3:10, I tried to sleep with him, he nursed and was flail-y until I put him down at 3:30, where he slept until 5:00.
• I tried to nurse him back to sleep at 5:00, but no. I tried to rock him back to sleep, also no.
• I took him out to the living room, he played with some toys, pooped and I changed his diaper.
• Nursed him back to sleep at 6:00. He slept till 7:00. 
• The end.

So I am feeling kind of tired.  And I wish I knew what was going on, so I could help him (and me and Joe) sleep better.  Developmentally, he has done a lot in the last month.  He cut his first two teeth, started crawling, and sitting unassisted within a weeks time.  He is also pulling himself up a lot more these days.  He started eating solids, which he seems to like- no reactions, his poop is still pretty much the same, no rashes or anything.

I don't expect the answers or anything. I know this will pass. My 9,7,5 and almost 3 year old sleep mostly without our assistance every night.  But man, when you are in the thick of it, it sure seems like it will never end, doesn't it?