When I first wrote about my co-sleeping experience back when I first started blogging, I had never expected that I would still be going through it almost 2 years later.
Yep, you read that right – Micah is still in my bed.
I kept going back and forth with the idea of getting him back into his bed, but when he turned 3, I really made up my mind to start trying again. In an instant, he became so a wild sleeper – I haven’t gotten smacked in the face, kicked in the back, head-butted, you name it – it’s probably happened at least once.
I’ve tried it all…well maybe not all, but I’ve tried a couple of things lol.
I have let him fall asleep, and then put him into his bed. I don’t know if I sense him or something, but I’ll wake up in the middle of the night and see him just standing next to my bed in that groggy state that says that he’s not fully awake, but not fully asleep either. I must admit that it’s the single most creepiest thing to feel – someone watching you while you sleep. In some cases, I’ve just let him climb into bed. Yeah, I know that’s bad if I want him to stay in his room, but come on, who’s really worrying about that when it’s 2-3 in the morning and you have to get up for work in a few hours. I am sometimes just way too exhausted to put him back in his bed. On some nights, I give him his marching orders and he’ll return to his room with a humph or crying. Either way, he’ll still be back again looking at me while I sleep, waiting for me to wake up and pull him back into my bed.
Other nights, I would just suck it up and put him back into bed possibly 3-4 times. Especially those nights where the insomnia is hitting me really hard. When the insomnia would finally give me a break and I’d drift off to sleep, I’d awaken with his head in my back or his foot in my face.
I even put a gate up at his bedroom door to keep him in. The first night that I put up the gate, which was bolted into one side of the door frame, I awoke to hear the gate swing open and hit the wall with a thud, and his loud footsteps as he made his way across the hallway to my bedroom. He didn’t even stand there and watch me sleep – he just made his way to the other side of the bed, climbed up, cuddled up next to me, and fell back asleep.
I have slept in his bed, and awoken to him shaking me so we could go into my bed. Depending on the time, I would just give in and take him to my bed. I have fallen asleep on the sofa, and he has arrived yet again to wake me up so we could go into my bed.
I have put one of my pillows in his bed, with the assumption that maybe the smell of me and my bed draws him back to my bed, and still he appeared back in my bed.
This is how I found him one morning when I fell asleep on the sofa. He climbed in with me, and completely took over. I fell off the sofa – that’s how I woke up.
At some point, I decided to give up on the cause. Just as he had decided that he would no longer be wearing diapers and start the potty training process, I will just have to hope (and pray) that he will do the same one day and want to sleep in his own bed.
At the same time, I have been enjoying having him in my bed. My paranoia with someone abducting him from his bed (I watch way too much news) or him not needing me anymore (inevitable but still sad) makes me treasure those moments that he still wants to spend time with me and get that extra cuddle time.
So although he’s still in my bed and I wake up achy and sore 95% of the time, I’m just going to enjoy it for the time being. There is no need to fight him being in my bed. When I do fight it, I’m more exhausted, so what’s the point??!!
