It seemed like a good solution at that moment. However, I'm not really sure I'm very comfortable with the idea of co-sleeping (it's the term used for sleeping side-by-side with child). I would never want to be in a situation where a 5-year old starts nagging at me so I'd let her sleep in my bed. My bed is MINE (and Erkki's
). It's my space where I can toss and turn all I want and no one's gonna stop me. Just ask Erkki. He learned his lesson the hard way! The thing is, he has a tendency to slide over to my side of the bed slowly but steadily during the night. One night I taught him that it's not so safe and I actually elbowed his nose in my sleep. It took him days to figure out why his nose hurts until one night he woke up to me ALMOST doing it again. But my kid is on my side of the bed when co-sleeping so I am constantly worried about her safety and I don't go into deep sleep when she's next to me. I sleep better with her in her own bed.I'm especially uneasy about sharing a bed with my child after I read an article about co-sleeping in an Estonian news portal. It had got a over a hundred comments. Apparently there are so many women who have a problem with a child who demands to sleep in parent's bed. It all starts with feeding the kid there and pretty soon she isn't able to fall asleep in her own bed anymore. It was really scary reading material.
One woman said they had to teach their child to sleep elsewhere when she was many years old already and the parents constantly woke up to her elbowing and kicking them and often woke up with her feet on their pillow. Like... EWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!! Back to the 3-hour sleeping stretches and only 3 night time feedings. I think I was right about feeding her more at a time. In stead of stumbling to her, giving her just enough food for her to doze off and then stumbling back to bed, I have developed a new strategy. When she starts to cry I start by getting dressed comfortably enough to stay awake for even two hours if necessary. I feed her in the living room so I am awake long enough to offer her more food than she's able to eat. I even change her diaper and burp her and then feed her again. And once she's well stuffed, she stays asleep for a good 3 hours straight. During the day I feed her more often but I'm trying to use the same strategy - once I start feeding her, I do my best to make her eat as much as she can hold! I will let her cluster feed as much as she wants and then she's good for a couple of hours.
Basically I started with the plan that night time feedings should be short and boring so she'll learn to skip them. And I ended up with the plan that if she's gonna wake me up to eat she'd better make good use of it! So in stead of helping her fall asleep as fast as possible, I make her stay awake longer.
Today I read another article in the same place - this one was about weaning children off breast milk. As it turns out there are women out there who breastfeed their 1 year old children on demand. That in itself isn't so bad but some of these 1 year olds demand for food 5 times during the night! This means that the mothers have been waking up once every couple of hours for a full year already!
And it's not like kids really need to eat during the night at this age. It feels like those mothers have been horribly taken advantage of. They have been USED. Those poor milk dispensers. I was hoping my kid would sleep 6 hours straight by the second month and I see that's not going to happen but I really don't think I'm going to let her wake me up many times per night when she's already one year old! A sad fate that would be! 
I guess it's true then that every child is unique and the same methods don't work for all of them and it's impossible to make plans or strategies before you really encounter the situation. But I still don't plan on waking up multiple times per night to feed a one year old
and I don't plan on ever waking up with a 5 year old kid sleeping in my bed with her toes all over my face. 
Just a brief comment - I know it won't be able to compete with millions of newsportal comments, but I'd like to argue for my view of co-sleeping nevertheless. First - having co-slept with my older son until he was 1 year 2 month old and I stopped breastfeeding him. Then he slept in the bed next to ours for another half a year and then a few month before he turned two, he got his own room, his own bed and has slept in that one from that day onwards. Okay, to be precise, he has shared our bed as well a good few times after that, but on invitation only! Meaning that he doesn't get out of the bed by himself and creep-crawl into ours in the dead of the night, but he gets to come to our bed only IF we allow it. So, I have never had four-year old's toes in my face, despite the fact that we co-slept when he was little.
ReplyDeleteSecond, it seems to me a bit funny how you admit that you slept better, your baby slept better, but out of some principle of what MIGHT happen in 5 years time, you won't allow yourself that little luxury of sleeping well and sharing bed with your daughter. I understand your concerns of kicking your bedpartners etc, but you start your post by saying - we were both better rested. But it is indeed your choice in the end.
Third - by not co-sleeping with your child, you won't undfortunately elliminate the chances of her coming to your bed when she will be older and able to walk and get her own way. Only parenting will do that. So by not letting her do that now, you haven't actually elliminated any chances of it not happening in the future.
Ha, I had the best intentions to put Sander into another room when he would turn 6mo and sleep throughout the night..
ReplyDeleteThe reality was, though, that I weaned him (just as I did with Lauri) at the age of 1y2m or sth like that - and basically because I was fed up with this night routine of almost constant eating, ok, perhaps not really constant, but it was several times anyway.
Perhaps I had been too inconsistent (as I still am), perhaps for some other reasons; I have heard of babies who quit nightly eating considerably earlier than the daily breastfeeding ends, somehow it didn't work out for us; I keep wondering what does it depend on, so as not to make the same mistake with my future babies. But yes, I was horribly taken advantage of. Twice. :) (I may smile now, but I remember being quite frustrated about it at that time)
:) Katrin, at least you can sleep now. I bet it makes you really apprechiate sleeping in general.
ReplyDeletePille, if the baby is able to sleep over an hour without interruptions then I have deeper sleep with her in her own bed. But in the mornings she really wakes up very often - once every 30-60 minutes. Then it's not worth getting up and picking her up every time and putting her back in her bed. She's easier to console when she wakes up next to me and I can just put my hand on her back and talk to her (or feed her) until she falls asleep again. Then I sleep better with her next to me. I think I'll practice co-sleeping in the mornings in the future as well. But I think I understand why people co-sleep. The baby is just so cute when she stops crying, looks at me and then has this overall body language that says, "I feel safe now" and then falls asleep. That's so much more satisfying than seeing her fall asleep in her own bed with me talking to her.
Actually - for me the main reason for co-sleeping was that it was so much easier to fed the baby while sleeping. The sleep was disturbed, of course, but I seldom had to really wake up. Had I been compelled to get up, grab the baby, sit/lie down, feed, burp, put him back, get back to sleep - this would have required much more attention and wakefulness.
ReplyDeleteAnd I do appreciate sleeping :) Although by now I'm in the phase when I appreciate time for myself even more than sleeping. So mostly I stay awake for an hour or two or even three past recommended bedtime, which, of course, takes quite a big chunk out of my sleeping time.