Mateo's sleepless days and nights

Mateo is still teething....at least, that's the only conclusion I can come up with for all the crankiness. Either that, or he is going through a really rough phase right now. He will not sleep on his own. I'm so exhausted! He will NOT take his naps like he is supposed to. He absolutely refuses and fights sleep. I don't know if something is bothering him or if he just doesn't want to miss out on anything. He used to take two naps a day...each about an hour long. Now, I'm lucky if he takes even ONE nap. And if he manages to fall asleep, its only 20-30 min long. So he is extremely cranky all day long. Yesterday was the worst. He fell asleep in the car after lunch and I was able to get him into his crib...where he woke up 20 min later. He wouldn't go down for a nap after that. He was exhausted...red, swollen eyes and as cranky as can be, but he wouldn't sleep. He cried for about an hour and I just didn't know what to do. Lately, the only way we can get him to sleep is by riding around in the car with him.
Then, he wakes up a lot at night. Now, I know he is getting his top teeth in....but does that really cause this much sleeplessness? I don't know. Last night was rough. We got home late (at a Superbowl party) and I got him from the car to his crib asleep, but as soon as he touched the mattress, he woke up and started screaming. As long as I was holding him, he was fine and drifing to sleep...but as soon as I put him down, he started screaming like it was hurting him. It scares me. I never know what is normal. I never know if its heart related or not and I worry all the time that something is wrong.

So either his teeth are really bothering him, or he just wants to be held all the time. I don't know. Finally, after an hour of fighting with him to get him to sleep, I gave him some Motrin (in case he was in pain) and he slept the entire night through. Didn't even wake up once. Of course, I didn't sleep. Its so out-of-the-ordinary for him to sleep through the night, that it keeps me awake because I'm worrying that something is wrong and I have to keep getting up to check on him. So its a lose-lose situation for me. Oh well...I know "this too shall pass"......its just really hard to know when something serious is happening and when its just run-of-the-mill baby stuff. I will be very happy when those teeth pop out!