Have you ever seen a bed this big?

This afternoon I sent Camilla into the other room to get a rattle for Blaise, but she returned empty-handed. 

"Mama," she said worriedly, "there is some kind of ant in there."

"Some kind of ant" turned out to be a huge moth, crouched threateningly on the floor near the rattles.  Have I ever mentioned how much I hate moths?  Only junebugs creep me out more.  I'd rather find a spider in my house any day.

Fortunately the moth is dead now.  (Turns out he was striking a lethargic rather than a threatening pose; his reflexes weren't up to much.)  But hours later, I'm still shuddering at the memory of his presence, and I keep imagining I see fluttering things out of the corner of my eye.

The imagined flutterings are making it hard for me to relax, but I need to be relaxing right now, because both kids are sleeping.  I know!

Here is one thing I'd forgotten about having an infant: how much the topic of sleep consumes your life. 

These are problems under constant consideration at our house:
1) How to get the baby to sleep,
2) When the baby should be going to sleep,
3) How to get the baby to take a nap longer than forty-five minutes (currently a near-impossibility),
4) How to get the baby to wake up fewer than three times per night,
5) Whether it is even possible to arrange our lives so that we, the parents, get enough sleep in spite of our baby's sleeplessness, and
6) If so, how to do that.

What makes it really confusing is that the answers to several of these questions are completely different than they were when Camilla was a baby. 

We were so ready to tackle the sleep problem the second time around.  Having had a child who hadn't slept through the night for 22 months, we assumed we had seen it all when it came to baby sleep.  We were VETERANS.  We could do this.

And while it's true that we can do it, it's turned out that the bag of tricks we developed to deal with Camilla are not so useful with Blaise.  Children are unique individuals with unique needs, apparently.  Go figure.

With Camilla we bought a co-sleeper before she was born, thinking it would be convenient to have her nearby at night.  But I was sure she would sleep in it, not in our bed.  (This was back before I had children, when I thought that you could just put babies down and they would obligingly sleep where you'd left them.  That turned out to be SO HILARIOUSLY UNTRUE with Camilla.  Ironically, it is mostly true with Blaise.) 

I didn't think we'd be a co-sleeping family.  I had nothing against it, I just kind of assumed it wasn't for us.

Turns out I was a little clueless about the parents Bryan and I would turn out to be.  Because we are not just a co-sleeping family.  We are a hard-core co-sleeping family.  And we love it.

It's a joke among our family and friends that we don't just have a bedroom, we have a BEDroom at our house.  As in: the room is almost completely taken up by the bed.  And it's not a particularly small room.  It's just a lot of bed.

Camilla never slept in the co-sleeper, so we removed it and she slept in between us in our bed.  Around twelve months, we bought a crib and set it up in a side-car arrangement with our queen bed.  She did okay with the crib, but crawled into our bed often enough that it still felt crowded, so we bought a king bed and moved our queen into the guest room, freeing the twin that had been in there to be Camilla's bed.  So we had a twin bed next to the wall for Camilla, and our king bed next to that.

When Blaise was born I assumed he'd sleep in our bed for at least the first year like Camilla did, but that didn't work with him.  Reflux means he can't sleep flat, so we set the crib back up and elevated the head of the mattress so he'll be more comfortable at night. 

I'm kind of sad that I don't get to sleep with Blaise right in the bed with me, but we do have the crib set up as a side-car to our bed (one of the sides removed, attached to our bed frame with luggage straps) so I have very easy access to the baby in the middle of the night.

And now we have the hugest amount of contiguous sleeping space I've ever seen.  Twin bed, king bed, and crib all attached to one another.  It's crazy.

I never thought we'd be co-sleeping parents, but it turned out to be what works most easily for our family.  So instead of fighting it, we embraced it and made it work for us.   In our BEDroom, we're all pretty much as comfortable as we can get.

Comments

[Petroni]

I remember the first time I saw the bedroom setup, even before the crib for Blaise. I thought then that it was HUGE. But it must be seriously comfortable to have that much space! Not sure what we'll do if we end up needing to co-sleep; there's really not room in our bedroom for a king-size bed.

[Manda]

When I look at that photo I honestly have NO IDEA how Blaise was conceived! HA!!

[Erin]

Ick. My sons collect caterpillars, and will gladly bring me moths and ants pinched between their little fingers. I try not to get too grossed out, but sometimes I just can't help it, especially with the caterpillars.

[Elsha]

When it turned out that for the first few months of her life Kalena would only sleep right next to someone I was SO GLAD to have a king bed so there was room for everyone.

[AJU5's Mom]

I dind't htink we would be co-sleepers either. But, dd slept either in our bed or in her bed next to ours until she was 10 months old. Unfortunately, she needs solitude OR snuggling to fall back asleep in the middle of the night. So, she was moved to her own room at just about 10 months old! I don't know what we will do with this one- probably just wait and see what it prefers.

[Luann]

"In our BEDroom, we're all pretty much as comfortable as we can get"

And thats ALLLLL that matters.

My 4 year old sleeps between my husband and I. Actually ON me. And I wouldn't have it any other way

[CMerie]

Both of my kids have done the 45 minute thing. I read somewhere that it is actually part of the sleeping process, especially for young children. They will sleep good for the first 45 minutes and then transition to a very light sleep. If they can get through this light sleep, they will then transition to a very deep sleep, where they get more quality sleep. Unfortunatly, during that very light sleep, any noise or change of light or whatever can wake them up. With my son (he was a difficult baby like your Camilla) if we let him, he would have just cried and cried and never gone back to sleep. I learned from that experience though, and now with my daughter (ahhh...an easier baby) when she would wake, I would initially move her to the swing and she would usually go right back to sleep. This didn't work all the time, and now she's a little big for the swing. Now if it happens with her, I will give her about 10 minutes of fussing (it's really just a fuss, no screaming) and she'll usually go back to sleep for another hour or so. Again, this doesn't always work, but usually it does. I have heard that when a child is more rested, they sleep better. I know your little Blaise has reflux though, so maybe it is different.

[Celeste]

I thought we'd be co-sleepers but my baby would have none of it. You just never, never know about these things!

[Rosemary]

Oh, yes, my boy could rarely sleep for more than 45 minutes for quite a while. Giving up caffeine completely seemed to help some. But some kids just have a really hard time making that transition from 45 min to beyond. You are not alone!

[Lisa]

I assumed that the baby would at least sleep in the same room with us for a few months, but it turned out that it didn't work for her at all. She just couldn't sleep well in the presence of other people. Every kid is different.

[Rosemary]

oh I meant he wouldn't take more than a 45 min nap - like Blaise. then he would wake up crying at 45 min and wouldn't go back down. But when he did sleep past the 45, he was so happy when he woke up!

[Nancy from Indiana]

Oh, yes, I'm so familiar with the 45 minute nap thing that my friend and I gave it a name - "The 45 minute fuss." I think it is them shifting out of a deep sleep cycle into a lighter sleep phase, and they have to figure out how to do that and sleep more if they are still tired, but it's an agonizing process until you get there!

My second was also a very different baby from my first, and I felt really clueless the first few weeks with him. I remember telling my husband (in hormonal tears), "I've done this before - I should be better at this!" :)

That is an impressive bed set-up. Whatever works!

[ashley.star]

I love your bed setup. A room full of bed is my childhood dream, man!

(I'm also with Manda though. Haha.)

[mia]

When you went dairy free with Camilla, did you cut it out of baked goods as well? I know this is off topic. ~8-) Long time lurker!

[Michelle]

For quite sometime the 45 minute nap was the bane of my existance. When Brenna outgrew it and started taking 2 regular naps (1 1/2 hrs each) I cried with joy. Sometimes it scares me how much I focus on the sleep my kids are getting - then I remember that their sleep is more important to me than my own! I love your BEDroom set-up. Clearly it works for you and that's what matters most!

[Arwen]

Manda and Ashley, you guys are hilarious. Also, clearly, not very creative. ;)

[NEB]

Hey Arwen, Thanks for posting this. Sometimes I feel like the only mom in the world obsessed with figuring out sleeping arrangements... I'm currently co-sleeping with my 22 month old in a double bed in one room while my husband sleeps in our queen bed in the master bedroom, and baby #2 is due in a few weeks. And as I nurse my daughter to sleep for every naptime and nighttime and night waking (which is every night, usually more than once) I think, HOW is this going to work with a newborn?!? We can't afford a king sized bed right now, but we did get a toddler bed for my daughter and pull it alongside the full sized bed so we at least have more space. But I keep thinking: will she climb on the newborn likes she climbs on me? It won't be safe to leave the two of them together while I go to the bathroom, will it?

See? Obsessed! ;-) We'll figure it out...

PS Oh yeah, it doesn't help that all the other moms in our small group at church are like, "What's the deal? Don't your kids sleep in cribs in their own room?" And I'm like, um... No. (Most of them quit nursing very early to go back to work, so the tandem thing is freaky to them, anyway.)

[Barbara]

Hi Arwen!

Hi, I'm Barbara from Fairhaven Health- the makers of Nursing Time Tea, the Pregnacy Plus Prenatal Vitamin line, Healthy Mom, Happy Baby Yoga DVD and quite a few other TTC and pregnancy products.

I've been reading your blog and you've got some great content! If there's interest on your part, we'd be happy to send you product samples for you to review or to use as giveaways. Just fyi, we're by no means a large pharmaceutical company and are committed to helping women safely and naturally.

I can be reached via Barbara@FairhavenHealth.com.

[Christiana]

I have been so curious as to how you all are arranging the sleeping thing, as I don't know a lot about purposeful co-sleeping (my BFF has a toddler who comes into her room every night uninvited. Her husband hates it and she tolerates it, so it continues). Thanks for sharing!

[Andrea]

Hey Arwen! Good luck with the sleepage. I remember the catnaps. A nurse I met at St. Joe's told me that her first baby was on a "schedule" at 8 weeks and her two subsequent children were only catnapping til 8 or 9 months. Monica was only 10 weeks old at the time, so that story made me a tad nervous. It is amazing how much sleep issues can consume parents of little ones. By the way, Blaise's birth story is really beautiful! I'm glad you had such a wonderful experience. A gift from God for sure.
Let's try to get together some time this summer. It's been a long time!

[Elizabeth]

I should totally just get on Twitter (instead of reading various feeds in Google Reader), but for now: Stegner = great 20th century American lit. Angle of Repose, Crossing to Safety, Big Rock Candy Mountain.