Please help! DS is 12 months and apart from a hellish start has always been a really good sleeper, following GF routines and sleeping 7-7 since 5 months. The last couple of weeks he has been waking often in the night, usually in the wee hours and crying very briefly. He settles down again in less time than it takes to read this sentence. He wakes then about every 30 mins, always settling quickly on his own. The last 2 night he has also been very unsettled in the early part of the night and I've given him some Medised. He's had a bit of a cold, and I suspect than he's teething as his mouth seems sore when he eats, and I noticed blood on his toothbrush (which HV assures me is normal - is it?!), but he seems more or less okay in himself. Not much appetite but pretty cheerful. I know he's not hungry in the night, because he's not that bothered about breakfast, and he's not got a dirty nappy.
The problem is that I can't sleep! When he cries out, I'm instantly wide awake and on full combat alert, pumping heart, churning stomach, chills, etc. I can't make myself think than he'll go back to sleep in a minute, and relax myself, and if I do the minute I feel myself dropping off again he cries out again. I have been awake since 3.45, and have no hope of going back to sleep now and I'm feeling pretty desperate. I've come downstairs to sleep on the sofa with the monitor switched off and dh who sleeps unless ds is really upset in charge, but still wide awake. I am a really anxious person anyway (clinically at times), and this is making me feel awful. I know logically that this will probably sort itself out soon, but emotionally I'm terrified that it won't and I'll never sleep again. Anxiety is a very irrational thing.
PLEASE tell me this is a phase!!!!! Why is he doing this?? I'm worried about ds because this is so out of character for him - he's never woken like this with teething before. At what point should I take him to the GP - at what point should I take me to the GP?!