Friday, November 4, 2011

Yes, He Sleeps In Our Bed

I really dont like to tell people that the baby sleeps with us. My husband has no problem with telling anyone, I
cringed when i heard him tell his mother. Not that she would say anything. But I'm for some reason expecting this flood of people telling me it's a bad idea and I'll be sorry or that I'm spoiling him.
I'll be the first to say that before I had my son, I swore that no kids were going to be sleeping in our bed, much less our room. And for a couple of months none did. Liam slept in his pack n play when he was born and then moved on to his crib once he was 2 months old. And there he slept at night for about another month. So why the change?
I was exhausted! So tired that I was beginning to sleep through his cries on the baby monitor. I'm breastfeeding. So Liam wakes up more often at night to eat than formula fed babies. And it got to the point where I was so worried about not hearing him that I wasn't sleeping. So I brought him back in our room into his pack n play when he was about 3 months old. That worked great. But I was still feeling pretty tired when he would wake up to eat. So my hubby suggested just feeding Li in the bed instead of going to his room. So that led to side lying nursing. Which led to us falling asleep after he ate and him spending the rest of the night in our bed. And it was glorious. We learned a few things about this new arrangement. 1. We all sleep better. 2. Liam doesn't wake up crying. Usually he wakes up grabs my arm then goes back to sleep. If he's hungry he will whimper and nuzzle up to me. 3. I usually wake up before he does. Did I mention we all get more sleep? And Liam doesn't cry? And after doing a lot of reading on Dr Sears' website I truly believe that this is just better for us. I'm not sorry he sleeps with us. I don't feel he is ready to sleep in his bed yet alone. And I'm sure once he is, we will have no problem transitioning to that. It's very obvious our sleep cycles have synced, so I'm not out of my mind exhausted when he wakes up to eat. I'm not sorry. This has worked out wonderfully. The only down side is we have a queen size bed. We have just purchased a king bed and are waiting for it to arrive. If I had known better I would've bought it sooner. By the way, did you know breastfed babies breathe better when sleeping with their mothers at night?
Aside from all that my four month old is trying to crawl. He gets on his hands and knees and rocks. Hes so close! He also has a new fascination with touching the cat. Of course i only allow him to do so under my very close supervision.

2 comments:

  1. I can't believe he is 4 months old already! and almost crawling. That is amazing

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  2. it feels like i just had him! i can't believe it either...time is flying by!

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