What a change

For the past twenty months I have slept with two people in our bed: Chad AND Kaiya. It has always been a pretty flawless system I nurse her to sleep and when she wakes up I hurry and nurse her again so we don't lose anymore sleep than necessary. I decided to do that the night after we got home from the hospital because every single time I laid her down she woke up crying and when I held her, she slept. I was NOT prepared for that much lack of sleep at that time, I was still a busy student in my senior year and I hated to see her sad. It seemed like she didn't like to be alone, I guessed it was because she was used to being in my belly and wasn't ready to be all alone in her bassinet. The first time I just fell asleep with her on my belly and she slept way better, so we kept doing that. Then it turned into laying her next to me and putting my hand on her to help her stay asleep when she stirred. We got into a comfortable routine and never really felt sleep deprived like we always heard we would.

Chad was nervous at first so he stayed up and watched me to make sure that I didn't roll on her or something. Then he did massive amounts of research on the topic of sleeping with an infant and learned that it's called cosleeping and many people do it. In many other cultures it's the only way they do it. He also learned that when practiced correctly it can be just as safe or safer than having them alone in a crib.  I love having her sleep with me, I don't know if it's just cause I'm so used to it, or because it really has helped us to keep a close bond at night when things get hectic during the day. Chad likes it too. Well he did like it, until recently.

It was perfect until recently when she started getting so big and moving all over when she sleeps. We only have a queen bed, so space is getting very limited and she's not sleeping as well, and neither are we. So we've been trying to move her to her own bed in her own room and it has been so HARD. Hard because I can't sleep without her next to me. Hard because we're also night weaning. Hard because I slept for two hours last night. So I guess I'm probably going to make up for all the lost sleep I didn't lose before. She's doing really well, she's not really crying and she's rational. I couldn't have done it sooner because I want her to understand why I'm not nursung her, which is the hardest part for her.  I have to tell her Mommy's sleeping, Daddy's sleeping, Kaiya's sleeping and muk (which is what she calls nursing) is sleeping. Then she says "okay" in a sad voice but then she goes to sleep. She's such a big girl and I'm proud that she taken to all these changes so well. It's a slow process and it's a big change for her (and us), so it will probably take some time to get used to but I think we're sticking with it. I can't wait till we get to sleep peacefully again and I'm hoping it's soon.