Or, if she then refuses to go to bed until she gets at least thirty minutes of playtime in her pack n play.
Or, if at nine months, she still needs a three A.M. snack...and then another at 6.
Or,
possibly it's just time for her to start sleeping in her room, REALLY sleeping in her own room.
Transitioning my daughter from sleeping in our room, (and to be honest) a lot of times our bed, has been trying, on both her and me.
She sleeps better and longer in our bed than in her room. Or at least that's what I've been telling myself. I'm sure once she gets settled into a rhythm of sleeping in her own crib, the three a.m. feedings will most likely cease. Who wouldn't want a midnight snack with a 24 hour restaurant located right beside them?
As for her one a.m. parties in her playpen? Well, we'll have to see.
I think my resistance to moving her into her own room stems, in part, from the fact that I work. As it is, I feel like I lose too much time with her throughout the week. I leave a little before seven on school days and don't pick her up until between 4:30 and 5:00, placing us at home 30 minutes after. In the three to four hours we have between coming home and her bedtime, she nurses twice, eats dinner, and often takes a bath. There just isn't enough time. I am all too aware of how quickly she is growing up. Cuddling and falling asleep with her on the couch, caving in and pulling her into our bed, gives me just a little more time with her; time that I need and that I'm sure I'll miss down the road.
If there is one thing I've learned since becoming a parent, it's that everyone's family, and their approach to parenting is different. Books, blogs, websites, other parents are all helpful, but ultimately you do what works for you and your child.
Before Grace was born I had all of these goals and ideas from nursing for the first year to how much she'd get to use her binkie; from the introduction to solid foods to sippie cups, to what foods we would feed her to when she'd sleep in her own room, etc.
There are a few Ken and I felt more strongly about than others.
We are right on track to meeting my goal of nursing for a year. It hasn't been easy. In fact, those first six weeks were really tough. There were lots of tears and frustrations, and I'm not just talking about my daughter. We managed to muscle our way through and I'm really proud of that.
Grace only gets the binkie at nap and night time, which was our goal from the beginning. We didn't want her to be dependent upon her binkie, so we waited to give it to her until she was a month old, and then we did so with hesitancy. We wanted to make sure we didn't use it as a crutch. Hopefully this summer we'll be able to wean her away from using it at all. She hasn't been much of a binkie girl, so I'm hoping that will be a smooth transition.
We had initially planned to move Grace from our room at three months, but once three months hit, it felt too soon, so we moved our goal back to six months. Well, six months came and went, and now here we are at nine months, and Grace still sleeps the bulk of her nights with us. We've tried transitioning her here and there, but have always found ourselves pulling her back into our bed.
There has to be a middle ground somewhere, so we'll start with baby steps.
In fact, I think we'll start tonight.
It may take us a little longer to get there than anticipated, but I think that's O.K.
We'll get there.
The truth of the matter is, once she is sleeping in her bed, I'm going to miss our midnight play dates.
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