I co-slept / co-sleep with both mine - 6 and 2 (dd aged 6 is now starting the night in her own bed and then comes through). We have a king size mattress on the floor turned the other way so it’s even wider and a small mattress next to it for dd when she comes in. Ds sleeps next to me on the mattress and dh comes in when he comes home, between me and dd.
Anyway, dd was / is a really difficult to get to sleep person - co-sleeping was the ONLY thing that worked once she came home from her 2 weeks in hospital (prem baby with breathing probs). We have always had to be there for her - she has NEVER got herself to sleep by herself, we still have to sing to her / play a relaxation cd and sit in the room with her. That’s just what she is like, any little thing would wake her as a baby, and once she was asleep I had to lay there for ages beside her before I could get up or she would wake up and we’d have to start over again with breastfeeding her down. At first this was really really hard - feeding or walking her to sleep, singing for about an hour, etc while feeding. She was very colicky as a baby as well which made nights even more hellish. So, with my dh on back shift and no family about it was pretty much me and my breasts (she breastfed until she was nearly 5 1/2).
Ds is completely different (prem, with some breathing probs, but only 4 weeks prem and only in hospital for 1 week). He would probably have coped without co-sleeping but we were so keen on it after dd that we did it with him and he liked it. So, I breastfeed him to sleep while singing but it only takes about 10mins now. Then he sleeps in the bed and I get up to take dd to her room and then he sleeps up there while I potter about downstairs. If he wakes, then I go back up and feed him back to sleep.
I think that the key for me was reading lightweight novels while feeding people to sleep and trying to remind myself that it would ease with time. This was really hard at first, especially with my first when I just imagined the awfulness going on forever. Now, I’m more laid back - I feel that if they want to be in with me, then hey, that’s fine. If they want to cuddle me at night, then hey, I have a book or my MP3 player with BBC podcasts on it and my knitting. I do not do housework at night, my dh is not here at night, or if he is, then he is asleep, so really, pottering about is fine.
We had a bit of a time of trying out different things with our twins (now 4). I remember moving their cotbeds into their own room at about 15 months and spending all day putting up nice pictures and making it look as inviting as possible. We began by sleeping on the floor in their room and then gradually tried to work our way back into our own bed. It felt so weird being in the room without them but, just like you, we all went back in our room as soon as they got ill. We’re still co-sleeping now (and they wont go to sleep without one of us there)!
We now have another baby (also 10 months) who falls asleep in the sling, with mummy bouncing up and down on an exercise ball of all things (it started off as a lazy version of walking around with him and has stuck). Although she can put him down for the odd half-hour to play with the older boys, we can’t rely on his sleep for getting things done. Actually, the sling comes in handy again, as my wife can do cooking with him on her back, and he is generally quite happy about it. At the moment, I do a lot of the cleaning either after the children are asleep, and my wife does the settling, or I do it in the morning before anybody else wakes up.
As far as babysitting goes, I would rather have somebody else do the cleaning for me. It would cost the same and I would get to do the nice bit (be with the children)!
Bedside cots? Like Jacqui above, we bodged something out of a normal cot bed, raising it to the height of our bed and filling the gap on the far side, where we had pushed the mattress across to meet ours. Generally though, the cotbed was empty, and the four of us squeezed into our double bed. When they were toddling we had 2 cotbeds together at the lowest height setting with my wife sleeping between them every night - with both latched on about six hours a night, perhaps the most uncomfortable and painful nights sleep you could imagine (apart from me, I was in the double bed, although in the same room). The twins finally moved into their own room a couple of months ago, although I now sleep between them every night.
Given the choice to go back in time, we would probably do things in a similar way. I can’t think of another way to have met their sleeptime needs.
Thanks so much Tanya and DaddyTom for your replies and warm welcome, I must say it’s good to know that I’m not alone in my views and experiences. I too am living a long distance away from family and close friends and have a partner that works shifts, he does 4 (long) nights on then has 4 nights off, so we don’t have much time together when he’s working and it is difficult for him to get into our daytime routine when he is off which means our time together is very precious and that’s when we also try to catch up with house work etc.
I must say I did miss B when he went into his own room and it did feel weird as we would often wake up in the night at the same time. We moved the bedside cot back into our room last night and he still ended up sleeping next to me in our bed : ) but at least there is a safety net there now in case he rolls off the edge of our bed. We still start him off in his own room until we go to bed and have put up the travel cot in there. I rock him in the nursing chair after he has had his milk until he goes to sleep. Last night he fell asleep very quickly but that’s not always the case. He also wakes up at any little noise as it is so quiet where we live and our house is quite small so any noise we make can be heard easily.
With regards to babysitting, I meant do you ever have the odd evening out as a couple whilst family/friends look after your babies/children? My Mum has offered to come and stay the night whilst we go out for an evening to celebrate my partner’s birthday together. I appreciate the offer but at the moment I think it’s easier if my parents babysit B during the day and we go out for lunch instead as I don’t think he will settle without one of us there at night and I don’t want him to get too upset (not that I’m feeling at all up to a big night out yet anyway…usually in bed by 9).
My youngest sounds very similar. Very unsettled sleep at night, became more setted at around age two, rarely slept during the day from birth, Waking to the slightest noise, but does not do this now. I am sure the unsettled sleep was/is due to teething, now nearly three still has at least one or two nights a week of waking up, Currently in a bed (previously in a cot with one side taken off and happened to be the same height as our bed) next to ours and just climbs in with me to settle/go back to sleep, I often don’t wake up.
In terms of self settling stills needs milk when going to sleep at night, but not during the night. Not napping in the day any more, when did occasionally would fall asleep without milk, but mostly settled after a feed.
I have been guided by both my children as to when they are ready for their own room, my oldest moved out at 3 1/2.
I have not been out of a evening (without the children) for over seven years we just go out for lunch, have friends for dinner or go to friends houses as a family if we want to celebrate! So never needed a babysitter, no experience of that, sorry.
I hope you find an arrangement that means you all get a good night sleep, rest and sleep are so important.
I’m the same, I go out in the afternoon or for dinner (as in back by 7pm!) with my dh. My parents have said that they will babysit, but I really feel that it isn’t worth it - that sounds terrible, it’s just that I’m not interested in going out in the evenings. I think since having ds I’ve had one late night - back at 8.45pm - so I could do some storytelling for a reading group. I love getting time to myself with dh and it’s so much easier now that my parents have moved near to us (they moved about 5 miles away when dd was about 3 or 4yrs, from being about 150miles away), but I ask them to watch the kids during the day and dh and I go to the pictures (or we take the kids to my folks and go to the allotment or go home and watch a dvd or even, just go to bed ).
When I didn’t have family around I found it very hard as either dh or I had to be with dd all the time and she was really high need. When I had a miscarriage when dd was about 20months old, we put dd into nursery for 1 afternoon a week so that dh and I could get some time together just to try and grieve and be there for each other. Before that I went to a local community centre with a great creche once a week for pilates (I knew the creche was okay as I had used it for a weekly course for women with post natal depression run by health visitors - you could hear when your child cried and dd went 1 1/2hrs between feeds for months, so during a 2hr course would always want me and as soon as she cried they brought her through) once dd was about a year old.
If you can afford it could you get a student to babysit for a bit - even if you just stay in the house and clean or have a nap or make a nice meal for you and dh? I did this once or twice when dd was little and my pnd was such that I didn’t want to leave her, but it meant that I could go upstairs and hoover and make the beds and put clothes away and then have a 30min nap. It was lovely, but the woman who babysat got a full time job so could not continue.
Would any of these work for you Daisy Belle? Sounds like you could use some time for being something other than only a mum.
Sorry to hi-jack your post Jen
Tanya
Hi again and thanks SustainableMum and Tanya, you are right, it would be nice to have some time for me. I will look into a babysitter. Funnily enough, I decided to ask my parents to babysit for B for the afternoon instead of the evening and me and dh went out for lunch….the first time on our own since B was born, it was lovely.
B has been going to a creche for the past 3 months which was provided for me whilst I was on a course and that has been great as I know the place really well, but it finished today. I already looked up the local sports centre and creche and am hoping to give one of the classes a go tomorrow, although I don’t have any recommendations from anyone for the creche but I’ll see how I feel when I get there. Gut feelings are usually pretty good.
Can anyone tell me how they have dealt with friends and family when explaining that you co-sleep with your little ones? I don’t have any friends or family that have done this or are doing this (we are the only ones) and the usual reply I get is that I am making a rod for my own back. Thanks in advance.
Hi DaisyBelle,
I didn’t have any friends or family who had co-slept and I got the same response, but my reply was always that I was getting a far better nights sleep co-sleeping than any of my friends who didn’t and it was far more important for me not to feel so tired. Plus I loved it (and still do - all three of mine co sleep still, although the bigger two start off in their own beds). I have also found that with friends who didn’t have children they were very anti co sleeping, but when they have babies now they also have to some extent co slept and several have commented that they wish they were brave enough to go for it full time as it’s always the best nights sleep they’ve had with baby. And many of my friends who are now on to their second baby have embraced co sleeping more, since they are more confident in their parenting choices and doing what feels right rather than what’s considered the norm.
hth. you may find you get a few more responses to this if you start it as a new topic (the button at the bottom right of the screen) x
I was also, by a very good friend, told I was making a rod for my own back and this hurt desperately.
My response has always been - this is how I get some / most sleep, I tried the other way and I got almost none and sleep deprivation is not used as a torture method for nothing. Frankly, having to ‘defend’ your choices implies that other people have some power over you - you have the right to parent in the way that suits you and your child, it’s no-one elses business what you do, so I’ve found that just the first statement about sleep and sleep deprivation usually shuts people up, then I just say if they continue, ‘It works for us’ and discuss other things.
The night that decided me to go for it even if dh was completely against it was when I had continuously rocked dd in the moses basket for 3 and 1/2 hours so she would sleep and then I dropped off for 10mins. When she woke up I took her into the bed with me and dh said, ‘No, you can’t do that, you just need to rock her and she’ll sleep’. Through gritted teeth I replied, ‘I have been rocking her for 3 and a half f***ing hours and stopped for 10 mins sleep, I need to sleep’. He looked a bit embarrassed and said, ‘Oh, I’ve been asleep, I thought it had been about 30mins’. He never criticised me after that and now we love it.
Thanks all, very good advice. I was going to start a new post but was’nt sure whether that was good forum etiquette (having never really been on forums before)!
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