One Goal at a Time: Another Update on Sleep

I want to write about something besides sleep again, but until I’m actually getting enough, this topic will remain forefront on my brain. So here goes, one more time.

I’ve been tired lately. And busy. And we have tackled a lot in the last six weeks. We went from all three of us sleeping in one bed, with Cedar waking every few hours and nursing back to sleep for his entire life, to-- in six weeks—Cedar now sleeping in his own bed, in his own room, and sometimes for a nine hour stretch without nursing or waking. It sounds like we should be celebrating, right? It's hard to, though, when most nights he is still waking a couple times and the new wake up call is often 5 a.m.-- resulting in an even more sleep-deprived child than before.

           

The back story (last post): we moved our king bed into the living room, creating a little nook for my husband and I, and giving the bedroom to Cedar. Now, even if we still have plenty of bad nights, it does still feel like a small miracle each morning I turn to my husband and ask, “Did he wake last night?” And he says, no. Even if nine hours is still is not enough for Cedar to be fully rested (he needs at least 10), it is still a major milestone. Here is how we did it.

The first couple weeks after moving the bed, I would rush in whenever Cedar woke and nurse him, eventually just giving up and going to sleep next to him because I couldn’t fall asleep apart from him myself. Not only did he seem to be waking more (and not less like we’d hoped) without our presence in the bed, but I also didn’t realize how much I would miss sleeping next to him, how strange it would feel to be so far away from him. Of course, this feeling was only compounded by the fact that my body felt tensed on alert, ears listening closely for to any noise coming from the adjacent room—regardless of the fact that my husband said he would listen for Cedar and wake me. Somehow, just knowing that I’d be on duty sooner or later, and wanting to be able to respond right away to my son in order to ease the transition and any potential anxiety he might feel about suddenly being made to sleep alone, made it near impossible for me to drift off easily in a separate bed. Co-sleeping for two years was too deeply ingrained.

So, for the first couple weeks of the new arrangement, I more or less slept with Cedar in his new bed. I didn’t consider this a failure (despite the fact that I thought it sounded this way to others when they would ask how it was going), for to my mind it was enough just to introduce him to the new furniture arrangement and the idea of his new bed, all his own. That part actually went over really well. Step one was accomplished.

At this point, I decided that I needed my husband to take over. We agreed that what really needed to happen now was to night wean. No more milk at night. I’d heard from many sources that once night weaned (or weaned altogether), their former terrible sleepers finally started sleeping through the night. So I convinced my husband to take over for a couple weeks (to start)—meaning to be the one to go in when Cedar woke, and he’d remind him that there was no more milk at night. I could then put in earplugs and fall asleep peacefully, knowing that—for the first time in over two years—I was no longer on night duty. Hallelujah!

As was to be expected, the first few nights were the worst. Lots of waking and complaining. Then we had one breakthrough night where Cedar slept for eight hours. Then 9.5 the next night. High five! I couldn’t help but proclaim my joy on Facebook. Of course, I knew better than to think that it would be smooth sailing from then on, and true to form, the last several weeks have been up and down—some bad nights, a few more nine hour nights, and most nights, something in between. On top of that, my body still seems to be trained to wake a couple times each night, and when I wake I have to pee. In short, sleep hasn’t really improved tremendously, but when you consider the fact that Cedar is now in his own bed and night weaned, and that we’ve had a fair number of before-unheard-of sleeping through the nights, then I realize that we’ve already come a long way.

We decided that “after the sun came up” would be our way of letting Cedar know when he would get milk. Coincidentally (or not so coincidentally), Cedar’s been waking around 4:45-5:00 every morning, and at that waking he’ll either stumble out to find me or Matthew will nudge me and I’ll go in. Then, Cedar will proceed to nurse or at least be attached to my boob for something like two hours! And since it’ll take him a long time to fall back asleep at that hour (if he does at all), I don’t dare move him off of me for fear I’ll ruin my chance of him—and me—getting in another hour or so of sleep. Because otherwise, like I said, nine hours sleep (and averaging six for me) is not enough.

And so, that brings me to the present, where we’re all doing okay, operating most nights on almost enough sleep, but not really—which over the course of a week creates quite a deficit. Matthew gets to crash hard for another two hours after Cedar wakes at five, so that helps to counter the couple times a night he might still have to get up. And I get the peace of mind, at very least, of knowing that when Cedar goes down around 7:30 or 8:00 each night, I’m off duty till the next morning. There is great joy in that.

Matthew was hoping that around now he could be relieved of exclusive night duty and we could start switching off nights. But I’ve convinced him to give it a little longer, with the hope that the longer the new sleep patterns can get ingrained, the easier it will be when we introduce yet another new variation on the norm.  I did put Cedar down one night recently when Matthew came home late, and I was a bit wary of what would happen when I would have to put him down without nursing (something I’ve never done). But to my great relief, it went just fine; Cedar didn’t even ask for milk until about ten minutes in when a light suddenly went on and he remembered this missing ingredient in our ritual, but then he only gave me a few token whines when I reminded him that there wouldn’t be anymore until morning. I did sing to him still and rubbed his back for a bit, but mostly he just lay there himself, and was asleep in 15 minutes. Success.

Later that night though, when it was my turn to try out night duty, I couldn’t fall asleep again—the curse of my anxious listening body reigned. Rather than risk all-night insomnia, I woke and begged Matthew to go back on duty, and he agreed. The next day I asked if he could just keep being the default nighttime parent for now, and he could let me know if he needed a night off. I reminded him that at least he got that nice last two hour chunk in the morning, whereas I’d be hardly functioning if I had to wrestle with my own insomnia, go in if Cedar wakes, and wake up at five to boot.

He agreed, for now, and I thanked him profusely. He has been a great support throughout this process. It would be so much harder to make this transition without him.

If he’d protested, however, I might have reminded him that I’ve been on night duty for over two years, so surely he could stomach a couple weeks, or even months. “But we had no other choice then,” he protested once. “Yes, I’m not saying you’re at fault, but that doesn’t take away from the fact that I’ve been doing this for two years.” He was silent. I also told him about several couples I know of where the husbands took over at night once the baby was night weaned. I understand how it might be too much to ask if Cedar was still waking a ton and if it was increasingly hard for him to function at work, but if he was functioning okay, then surely he could handle a little more sleepiness. After all, it’s not like I don’t value my brain functioning well during the day as well. I suppose one could argue that my work is flexible enough that I have the luxury of deciding not to work on the days where I am brain dead, but this is increasingly not always the case.

Anyway, this argument is moot, because my husband has agreed to keep going like this for the time being. Our next hurdle to tackle is to try to get rid of Cedar’s 5:00 waking. We are thinking of getting one of those devices where some kind of light comes on or animal pops up at the time that you’ve decided it is okay for your child to call for you—even 6:00 would be so much better than 5:00. We’ll try to teach Cedar that he cannot get out of his bed until this magic moment. Although it sounds like a stretch, I know it’s worked for some parents and I also know that a mere couple months ago, the idea that he’d transition so smoothly to sleeping in his own bed for most of the night would have blown me away. Never mind that he’s not sleeping through the night every night yet still. We are on our own timeline. Other people’s norms do not apply.

And… the next step after that? Total weaning. Maybe by the end of summer? Or mid-fall? “Why are you waiting?” my husband asked. “Why not now?” Well, think of all the changes we’ve already introduced recently, I explained. I want to do this all gently, one thing at a time. Also, every week that passes, his diet expands. I’m still gauging each day just how much more dairy I can get away with giving him, thereby increasing his protein options exponentially. (Soy is not an option; meat is often rejected). I know he’d be “okay” without my milk nutritionally, but there are plenty of days still where he doesn’t get much more down than fruit, almond milk, and bread products, and on those days in particular, my milk source still feels like such a blessing.

The other hesitations? The fear that tantrums will increase, or be harder to calm down once full-blown. And? Of course, just losing our precious bonding ritual. All those chill moments of cuddling and winding down together. The end of an era, I suppose. And, yes, certainly I know this too: the beginning of a new one, filled with so much more freedom to get away. The ability to go on a week-long writing retreat, in theory anyway, if I could convince my husband and our parents to take over for that long—not an easy logistical feat. 

We’ll get there when we get there. For now, we got plenty on our plates. Namely getting over this whole sleep saga hump, which can be likened to the metaphor where you’re climbing a mountain and think you’re nearing the top, only to then realize that there’s yet another big hill to climb, and so on and so on. For now, we just need to remember to celebrate that what we've already accomplished is huge, and we just need to keep taking it one goal at a time.

Sleep Deprivation, Bed Swapping, Night Weaning, and the Pain of Separation

Last week, an acquaintance I was talking to on the phone commented on how tired I sounded. I was surprised. Yes, I was tired, as I often seem to be, but I hadn’t realized that my voice had betrayed this. After all, there have been plenty of days recently where I’ve been even more tired. I had thought I was doing a pretty good job of keeping up my end of the conversation despite my occasional pauses where I’d grasp for the right word.

After hanging up, I felt a little sad as I thought about how for the majority of these last two years since my son was born, I’ve been functioning at a sub-par level. How although I’ve been able to congratulate myself for still managing to write, volunteer, and finally get back into teaching, all while taking care of Cedar, I’m still only achieving a fraction of what I might be capable of if I woke up every day refreshed-- if I, for just one night, actually had an unbroken night’s sleep, and didn’t still consider a night where Cedar “only” wakes two times a “good” night. Big sigh. Yes, sleep has been a saga.

A lack of sleep has been the main reason why I have posted so little on this blog over the last couple months. It’s not that I haven’t tried to write new entries, but I’ve been so tired every time I actually have a chunk of time to write (and not pay bills, do dishes, shop, cook, etc.), that I’ve just ended up spewing out a convoluted tangle of words. I’ve logged three attempts at blog posts in the last couple months, and not surprisingly the topics have revolved around sleep—or topics related to sleep, like breastfeeding and weaning (for if I night-weaned perhaps I’d get a better night’s sleep?) or co-sleeping vs. giving Cedar his own bed (because maybe he’ll sleep better if he’s alone, or maybe he’ll sleep worse?).

It’s sad when you’re so used to sleep deprivation that you don’t even realize you are functioning in a compromised state anymore, when it’s just become your reality. If I pause to think about it, I can specifically recall the few mornings at Cedar’s preschool co-op where I’d gotten more rest the night before (and/or indulged in coffee), and thus actually had the energy to start up conversations with the other moms around the snack table. I can’t help but wonder if non-sleep deprived moms still do things like leave the keys in the front door. And I get so tired of answering the question, “How are you?” with “Tired” because that’s the only word that really sums up my condition.

Anyway, needless to say, I’ve been sorely needing some change on the sleep front. Initially I considered night weaning as the first line of attack, banking on what others have said about how night weaning leads to fewer night wakings. But the idea of night weaning while co-sleeping, of having to lie right next to my son and then deny him my breast which he has used to fall back to sleep from day one, and then having to listen to him howl and rage (and quite possibly hit or grab?), does not sound ideal. I would probably end up getting out of bed to “sleep” on the couch (or rather to listen on the couch, since you can hear everything in this house), while letting my husband deal with the brunt of my son’s fury. There’s no knowing how long this might have to go on before my son would accept the new status quo, and no saying if once I moved back into the bed if he wouldn’t just fuss for “milk” all over again.

So, I talked myself out of that approach. Instead, we decided that an easier strategy might be to first make the transition of getting Cedar used to sleeping in his own bed—no small task in itself since we’ve co-slept since Day One. Then over the last month we have slowly began to clear room in the corner of our living room where our king-sized bed would now live, and in the bedroom in its place we installed a full-sized futon for Cedar.

Week by week, friends kept asking if we’d moved the bed yet, and I would explain how busy my husband and I were, and how we had to pick a date a whole month out in advance where we would both be home and have childcare for Cedar while we made the final furniture switcharoo. (We didn’t want him to be home while we did it because, based on past experiences, we figured it would be more upsetting for him to be involved in the chaotic rearranging process—especially while Matthew and I were both busy-- than to simply come home to it all nice and arranged anew.)

Finally, after a month of anticipation, we moved the beds.

From one perspective, the move has gone quite smoothly. Cedar liked his new bed, sheets, and rug, and with the exception of seeming a little weirded out by the changes the first few nights (as in, being hyper-aware any time he woke up and calling out, “New bed!”), he hasn’t seemed upset at all that his “old bed” is now in the living room. But I know that this “success” is only the first small step toward our larger intentions of one day having him sleep alone, and one day, finally, please Lord, sleeping through the night.

So far when Cedar wakes up around midnight, I’ve ended up crawling into his new futon and staying for the rest of the night. Prior to that, I lie with my husband in “the big bed” in the living room, feeling strange to not have his little body and sweet breath at my side. So strange in fact that I could not go to sleep hardly at all for a few nights, hyper-alert of any sounds coming out of his room, knowing he was going to eventually wake up and that I would then rush to his side, ready to assure him that Mama was still here, even if he couldn’t find me immediately upon waking.

I want to do this whole thing gradually and gently. After all, it isn’t as simple as what most parents go through when they make the switch for their children from a crib to a toddler bed; it isn’t just about changing the bed. It’s about changing his—and my-- entire way of sleeping at night. I don’t want it to feel like we are “banishing him” from his old place of belonging next to Mama, and forcing him to “grow up” overnight, tears be damned.

Maybe if I could actually fall asleep again before midnight then I wouldn’t be so hyper-aware when wakes, and maybe he’d surprise me some night by actually going back to sleep on his own. But so far, it doesn’t seem this way. So far, neither Mama nor Cedar are used to being in separate beds.

***

When you’re chronically sleep deprived, it’s hard to embark on any big changes that threaten that sleep is going to first get worse before it could potentially get better. After several nights last week with insomnia, (and prior to that about 3-4 months of a downward spiral of Cedar waking more at night-- was it from teething? Teething’s always an easy target.) I still just want to get a decent night’s sleep. Not great, just decent. So after lying awake for a couple hours away from my son, I practically run to his room now when I feel I’ve “given the separation thing a fair shot” and can call it good, settling back in snuggled next to him where it feels like I belong.

I don’t think I realized how hard not sleeping--or trying not to sleep-- next to my son would be on me. I don’t think I realized just how much of me truly loves it, or is deeply attached to it, despite the agony of being consistently woken or squished or lay upon by a thirty-pound nursing toddler.

I love the intimacy of being able to snuggle in and settle down with relief at the end of the night next to my son. I love the way his head will stretch out to find my shoulder in his sleep, or his hand will rest on my arm, and how I can tell that this physical closeness—even as he sleeps—comforts him. All is right in the world; Mama is here.

But I also admit that perhaps I suffer from my own form of separation anxiety. From the beginning it did not feel right to sleep apart from my son, and my desire to stay close to him has not abated. It was heavily reinforced during the first year and a half of his life when he’d often wake up in pain from gas; I would rush to his side or else already be right there to bring him to my breast and offer physical relief to his tummy. And by now? I’m just conditioned to hurry to his side.

           

Perhaps I have a touch of PTSD from this period I joke, although I’m actually serious (even if a diagnosis PTSD may be too extreme). Because there is some part of me that still bolts up to attention when my son cries out for me at night, especially now that I’m lying in the big bed apart from him, trying to go to sleep on one hand while the other part of me is just lying there, aware of the silence, waiting for Cedar to wake up.

For now I console myself with the fact that even though we are a way’s off from proclaiming any true success in the sleep department, at least we’ve already reaped some benefits from the big move. For one, it feels great to have another comfy space to hang out in the evening hours, to luxuriously spread out and read in bed, or to lie, talk, and be intimate with my husband, just the two of us. I am also fond of sitting on the bed during the day and reading or writing, occasionally glancing up to look out the adjacent window. Miles, our cat, likes the added lounging space as well and has quickly tried to assume his old spot sleeping next to our sides. And the space that the bed occupies actually looks more streamlined and visually pleasing now than it did before when it was filled with a bunch of clutter. And finally, even if I’m still mostly sleeping with Cedar and he’s still waking, I think overall I’m sleeping a tad better because I’m not sandwiched between two people.

After sleeping next to my son for two years and counting, after never having felt like there was a right month, developmental milestone, or moment where he or I were “ready” to make a sudden change, it’s hard to try and change it now all at once. It starts to make me question if even a good night’s sleep is worth the sadness of taking away the bond we have through co-sleeping. Though a larger part of me feels like it’s time, I still worry about how this could lead to more separation anxiety for Cedar or more tantrums. It makes me wonder (not aloud until now) whether it’d be such a bad thing to go to bed with my husband and then keep sleeping with Cedar for part of the night. After all, it’s up to us to decide “what works.”

At the end of the day, I just want the solution that will guarantee the most and best sleep for everyone.

And yet… at the end of two years, I gotta ask myself if it isn’t time to bite the bullet and do something hard. Now, two weeks into this whole bed-change thing, I’m starting to suspect again that the more critical change that needs to happen is night weaning. So many people I have talked to who were in similar situations have confirmed that once they night-weaned (or weaned for good), their chronic poor sleepers started sleeping SO much better. The lure of this promise looms big. Not to mention the fear that taunts, The longer you wait, the harder it may get.  

Every child is different, of course. Some kids “wean themselves” at 12 months, 18, or 24. Others, like mine, I suspect would just keep going and going if I let him. I’m not okay with nursing Cedar until he’s five. At least I don’t think I am. Even until he’s three is sounds a bit long, even if I have always said that is my cut off point. I do want to keep going for a while, especially since nutritionally it still helps my peace of mind so much to know he's getting the extra protein from my milk since he can't tolerate much dairy or soy. But now, I’m thinking I’d like to wean by the end of the summer—by the time he’s two and a half or so. Mostly because of the fear that the stronger, more verbal, and more demanding my son gets, the harder it will be to wean.

Basically, until we’re willing to lose more sleep while I night wean (meaning telling Cedar that Mama and milk need to sleep and that he can no longer have milk at night-- or at least “until the sun comes up”), I’ve realized that sleep isn’t gonna get a whole lot better. And so Matthew has agreed to play the role of the enforcer, going in when Cedar wakes up to bear the bad news, because it feels like it will be easier this way than if I tried to deny Cedar my milk while it was right there in front of him (especially if, say, he’s been crying for an hour and we all just desperately want to go back to sleep).

I told Cedar last night about our plan. That in a few days, there wasn’t going to be any more milk at night, and Baba was going to come in to Cedar when he woke. I didn’t elaborate much further; I didn’t emphasize how Mama and Cedar would no longer be sleeping together at night. I just said, no milk.

Cedar listened closely, then clung to me. I’m not sure what he understood, for instance I don’t think he knows what “in a few days” means, but obviously he got the gist of it. I will continue to remind him in the coming two days, and then on that last night, I will tell him, “this is the last night,” just so the pain of change will come as less of a slap of surprise. Then our plan is for Matthew to start putting him down every night (right now we alternate), because we think it will be easier for Cedar to wake to Baba’s presence if that’s what he’s gone to sleep with as well.

I know that once we start this process, we’ll have to stick with it lest we want to backtrack and erase whatever work we’ve already invested. So we’ve picked our night to begin; we’ve steeled ourselves for a long, sleep-deprived weekend to follow. And then we hope, pray, that within a few days it will already start to get better, and that within a few weeks, the transition will be complete.

Sounds so easy, huh? Right. No one says it’s easy. But plenty of parents have done this before. I guess it’s finally our turn.

Boob Salutations, Co-sleeping with my Toddler, and Trust

“I finally figured out what my breasts are for,” I said to my husband the other night. For feeding my little suckling pig, of course! Sometimes these days the way my son lunges for them and sucks reminds me of a little animal. And no longer will I ever look upon my breasts as some sensual, yet essentially “useless” fleshy, doughy appendage. When my son nurses it is utterly obvious now why they were created—not for my partner’s pleasure, much less for the ogling eyes of men on the street, and not even for my own enjoyment. Breasts, hands down, are for babies.

When Cedar was first born they grew huge, hard, and sometimes clogged with milk. For six months—or more like nine—I wore nursing bras religiously, accepting their less than flattering support for the convenience of being able to whip out the breast at a moment’s request. Eventually, though, I realized that they’d shrunken back down to my pregnancy size and that I could fit back into a couple of my nicer bras. Cedar also wasn’t nursing as much by then, so I could usually just nurse him at home and there’d be no emergency need to feed in public—which exposes more flesh than I’d prefer, especially when not wearing a nursing bra.

It’s been a relief to not have to nurse quite as much in public, simply because it’s a hassle to have to stop what you are doing and find a comfortable, clean place to sit down yet still be discreet. That said, I don’t plan to stop nursing anytime soon. I still love nursing--and as my baby undeniably makes the transition to toddlerhood, I appreciate this ritual that much more.

Nursing has changed since when Cedar was a baby. Long gone are the days when he’d just lie there inert for over an hour sometimes, and gone are the days when he’ll easily fall asleep at the boob. Now, at times, nursing can feel more like an acrobatic sport. We still mostly nurse lying down on the bed, only now Cedar will stick his butt up in the air and nurse in a “downward dog” position. Or, he’ll want both breasts to be out and accessible so he can switch back and forth as he pleases. He’ll let me know this by signing for milk, tugging at my bra, or simply grunting in his all-encompassing language, “Uh.” (Amazingly, I almost always know what “uh” means.) I indulge his requests, as long as he is actually nursing and not say, patting at my other boob, biting, or pinching my other nipple. That’s where I draw the line. Mostly though, his antics amuse me. He can be a goofy kid, and I am more prone to indulge silliness than stifle it.

Cedar nurses the most in the morning when he wakes around 6:30. I am usually still half-asleep, so I’m not sure how long exactly he nurses for, but it feels like a long time—half an hour, sometimes more? On both boobs. Lying down, draped across me, downward dog, moving through all the positions—call it “Boob Salutations.” Then during the day he usually only nurses for five minutes or so at a time, before or after his two naps. Before bedtime, he nurses for another 10-30 minutes depending on whether he’s in the mood to fall asleep that way or not. And although I’ve tried not to nurse him every time he wakes up at night, I’ve recently gone back to just wanting him to fall back asleep as quickly as possible (in order to gain back more of my evening with Matthew or to go back to sleep myself), so that means that I usually nurse for about 5-10 minutes every 2-3 hours throughout the night.

For those who co-sleep, this may not come as a big surprise—a fourteen month old who still wakes and nurses through the night. For others, it probably sounds like hell and you are probably quietly thanking your own wisdom in choosing not to co-sleep. For me, by now, I’ve pretty much accepted this situation. I went through a few periods of “we’ve got to change this night waking problem!” resolve, but Elizabeth Pantley’s ‘”no-cry sleep solution” nipple removal techniques didn’t seem to reduce his waking, and nor did my husband’s intervention (we’ve been having him go to Cedar when he wakes before we’ve gone to bed ourselves, and although this has helped Cedar learn to go to sleep better without me and the boob, it can also take forever and has not helped him wake any less).

I know I would sleep better (duh) if Cedar wasn’t waking so much still, but that said, I am mostly only half-waking when he half-wakes, and unconsciously putting the boob in his mouth for a quick fix before we’re both snoozing quietly again. I know Cedar isn’t hungry. I know that this is now a firmly entrenched habit (or call it ritual if you want it to sound better). I know that it could potentially be broken with “only” a couple weeks (or more) of night weaning torture (especially since we are not planning to stop co-sleeping any day soon), but frankly I’m not ready to put us through that yet.

I am all for doing what’s easiest, as long as it’s still working for us. There were periods when Cedar was waking even more than he is now when I wasn’t so sure it was “working” anymore. But now, it’s been several months with no real complaints from me, aside from the occasional off night. Cedar no longer wakes from gas at night, unless I happen to have been testing eating or feeding him some new food that doesn’t settle well. Mostly now, I think Cedar’s waking now just comes with the territory of co-sleeping.

When Matthew and I were trying to decide whether or not to co-sleep, I read all kinds of literature that proclaimed how mama and baby both sleep better when co-sleeping-- yet I also read things that said they both sleep lighter and wake more. Contradictory? Perhaps. I don’t want to fully debate the merits versus shortcomings of co-sleeping here, but suffice it to say that since we didn’t and don’t plan to switch to a crib, we’ll never really know if Cedar would have slept better that way. Sometimes I think he would, because sometimes me and Matthew’s movements or sounds (when first coming to bed at night, for instance) wake him. Also, even though we have a king-sized bed, sometimes Cedar rolls over virtually on top of me, and then I have to move him and then he stirs, nearly wakes, and so I nurse him quickly so that he won’t wake for real.

And yet, despite all this, I’m still tempted to believe that co-sleeping was the best choice for us all. Not only was it a practical choice since we have a tiny house, but I also can only imagine what it would have been like to have to get up each time he woke during the many hard months when his intestinal issues would cause him to wake crying in pain in the middle of the night, and how long it might have taken for both of us to fall back asleep. And now, even without his gas problems, I can’t really imagine giving up co-sleeping. Ultimately we chose to go this route because we wanted to. And now, I’m as attached to it as Cedar is.

For those who choose to co-sleep, there is undeniably something we love about it, something we grow close to, something that ingrains itself in us over the many months we do it. When you grow used to being so close to the soft breath of your baby upon drifting to sleep, it feels strange and wrong to have him elsewhere. When you grow used to those morning snuggles and nursing sessions and the “wolf pack” feeling of all being in one bed, it seems like it’d be hard to arbitrarily pick an age when the baby is moved into a separate space. Of course, if you didn’t enjoy anything about co-sleeping in the first place, it’d be a no-brainer to boot the baby, for you’d gain back luxurious space to stretch your limbs and freedom to make love or read or whatever else you do for pleasure at night in your bed.

It’s not a black and white issue for me. There are definite pros and cons. I don’t know if we would do it differently if we were to have another one. A part of me says, yes, definitely, we would move that baby into a crib after that initial, intense newborn stage of constant nursing-- by four months perhaps… or maybe six. But then I wonder if I’d really be able to. Perhaps if turns out to be a really hard transition getting Cedar out of our bed and if he goes on to have trouble sleeping alone, I will rethink this strategy. And yet, I’m not really that worried about this transition; beyond the initial getting used to, I think that most kids who co-slept as babies and toddlers end up doing just fine on their own. Mostly, it’s just hard to imagine doing things differently than whatever you and your partner have chosen. We gravitate to what we know. It’s easier to go with the status quo than to tempt the unpredictable results of executing change.

Some might be surprised to learn that even the most stringent sleep-training experts (think Weisblaum and Ferber) now both have sections in their books that allow for co-sleeping as a viable, healthy option. Weisblaum talks about how if a mom chooses to nurse immediately upon demand at night and the baby consequently doesn’t wake all the way, then the baby’s sleep cycles are not disturbed and so there is no “sleep problem.” Along these lines, I feel Cedar is well-rested (except for the occasional off night). And hands down, he’s got a secure attachment to me, to us. Hands down, he’s got a cozy bed.

But what about you, you say? What about my sleep cycles, I say? Well, most days I feel fine. I have plenty of energy, and only drink a couple cups of tea a day—not coffee, but tea! Of course, I’m not required to use my brain that much or sit in meetings or talk to other adults, so it is entirely likely that if I had a different “day job” I might discover that my mental capacity is sub par—but that’s what coffee’s for, right? I go to sleep at 10:30 or 11 most nights and I get up around seven. I get a decent night’s rest, even if you should probably subtract an hour or so for the nightly interruptions of my sleep cycle (even if I am not technically even awake for an hour).

True, I admit I am also excited for the day when Cedar moves to his own bed and when I am not waking (briefly) every two or three hours. But I also know I’ll miss co-sleeping. Just like I’ll miss nursing when Cedar is eventually weaned. I’ll miss that snuggly feeling of fitting inside each other’s bodies. I’ll miss the way he throws his foot on top of my belly and leg, I’ll miss the way he rests a hand on my breast. I’ll miss the perfect way in which we fit together within this act of nourishment.

My body makes the perfect nutrients for you, my little one. Nutrients that have kept you healthy, with only one cold the entire fourteen months of your life, not to mention providing a major source of your daily diet that is free. I don’t have to worry about you not getting enough to eat, because I know you will make up for it when you nurse. And although it has no doubt been challenging to have to restrict my diet because of your sensitivities (I’m still not eating dairy, soy, garlic, onions, citrus, tomatoes, coffee and chocolate—with an occasional exception), I choose this any day over having you wake in pain or get a red itchy rash on your face.

I’ve never considered not nursing you. First of all, there’s no easy solution since you couldn’t even have dairy- or soy-based formulas to supplement. But mostly, breastfeeding just seems like the most natural, bonding act for me. You came into this world with the instinct to root and nurse, and despite all the ways in which you are growing and changing from a little baby into a little boy (oh my!), nursing is this seamless link that we have, this way of connection and love. You’ll have your whole life to be more “independent” and weaned. What’s another year at the breast?

I know plenty of moms who are still nursing and co-sleeping with their toddlers. In our Seattle culture, it is not so strange; even the World Health Organization recommends nursing until at least two. But I know that the older my son gets, the more strange our choices may seem to others—and I admit, I don’t really want to have my son run up to me on the playground for a quick nip. So the older he gets, the more seldom we will nurse, until eventually one of us will decide that it’s time to stop altogether.

Which will come first—weaning from the breast or weaning from co-sleeping? Hard to say. I wouldn’t be surprised if they happen close together. Maybe not at the exact same time, so as to ease the transition. But they are tied together for us. It would be hard to wean while still co-sleeping, though not impossible. And it would similarly be hard to move Cedar to his own bed and simultaneously deny him this great source of comfort he’s known since birth. So we’ll see, keep taking it day by day. Keep making the choices that feel right for us.

At a certain point, I just stopped caring what the books said—whether they were of the mainstream variety or in the attachment parenting vein. I found that all the reading, questioning and plotting based on someone else’s recommendations just made me feel stressed out or guilty about my own choices that diverged from the norm. I found that once I accepted that I was doing things the way I was because they felt right, and not because I could rationalize them into being right, then the arguments for pros and cons dropped away.

I am learning to accept that in parenting there is no “perfect” way to do things. There is only the one winding, messy, and unique path that you and your family carve out for yourself. And this path is based on way too many variables—both the seen and the unseen—to follow any one singular guide but your own.