To Sleep Perchance to Dream

To sleep, perchance to Dream; Aye, there's the rub,
For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause. There's the respect
That makes Calamity of so long life
- Shakespeare's Hamlet

Having a new little one gives us all pause. Pause for the magic, the mystery, the mindfulness and preciousness of each moment. And there are the other pauses. The omg, what are we doing pauses. How is this every going to work? Will we ever go out again pauses. I can't believe how good we used to have it pauses. And there are the pauses that don't come. The sleep pauses. The totally necessary pauses to rest, rejuvenate, and jump back in the fighter's ring.  Here is a little insight into our sleeping adventure with our son, Kennedy, and our attempts at no tears at bedtime as we transition him into his own big boy bed. 

Looking back the beginning was somewhat easy. Kennedy was by my side each night, all the time. Snuggle snuggle snuggle. His little nose perches up near my armpit to get his full mama fragrance. I guess he needed to make sure I was close by; that's one way to do it- no one else has ever wanted to be quite that close! Flip, flip, flip. All night. Left side, right side. And sometimes right on my chest. It was different for me back then. All those new mommy hormones had me in a bit of a daze. It would take 12 hours of rolling and turning and nursing and left side, right side for me to get 8 hours of sleep, but it seemed to work. Somewhat. We made it through our son's  semi-Scarface thrashing of 3 months, the sprints up the stairs while visiting friends or family at their homes when he started to squawk and was unassisted lying on a bed. And then the 9 month crawler days where he got close to the edge of the bed. 

Bars went up on both sides of our king side bed. 

Boxspring came down. "What happened to our adult bed," My husband asked, staring our our new kingsize cozy playpen. "Our new family bed," I corrected him with a smile. A nervous smile.  But the same thought was on both of our minds: What if we want more kids? How would this ever work? We needed sleep; this pen wasn't going to be forever playing. 

But yet, Kennedy seemed to so happy. Thriving even. No tears. Bedtime was a dream come true most nights. Sure, he had the occasional too-tired meltdown but a little nursing and a snuggle seemed to a be a cure-all. Mama nurse. Mama leave the bed and hang out in another room with daddy. We'd watch him on the visual baby monitor. Mama come back as needed until she lies down for bed too. The thought of doing the cry-it-out anything made me get nauseous and nervous and shaky. 

But around 13 months times started to change. Kennedy started on more solid foods. Result: less breastmilk. Result: less breastmilk hormones running through me. Result: Less easy sleep-induced nursing moments. Result: Mom up all night as Kennedy continued to nurse through the all-night buffet.  

Bedtime  became torture. Even trying to move away from Kennedy for a few minutes was hard. He was teething, so constant sucking helped, I guess. Pacifiers and bottles were out of the question- he wouldn't consider it. So we took another step: added on to the king size bed. That's right, we took a twin bed from downstairs and put it next to the bed. "We have a kingle," my husband, declared triumphantly,"A king and a single." It was the biggest bed I had ever seen. Small countries and artisan colonies could have peacefully fit in our bed.

Night became a sort of hide and seek. I would nurse my son to sleep, escape with my husband in another room for a short time to relax and watch TV and then back to the Kingle.... It didn't take long. He would find me within 20 minutes of my lying down. The added space was nice if we ever did all sleep in our own space, but more often it involved my husband off in the east wing of the bed and Kennedy pinning me down on the west wing as I tried to roll away, gasping for air as my nose pushed against the mesh wire bar on the edge of the bed. No artisan colonies. No small countries. Such me losing in a sleep hide and seek to an infant.

Two months passed. Kennedy was 15 months old.

 I was a sleep-deprived monster. "That's it," I declared one morning. We are switching things up. 

That night, I slept downstairs. I took a sleeping pill to relieve the anxiety of leaving my little one upstairs with daddy. And down I went. The first night was hard for me, but Kennedy and daddy did ok. My body wasn't used to trying to sleep through the night. I kept waking up thinking Kennedy needed me. Was that a cry? Was it the furnace? Gosh, I hated being in the basement. After a few weeks of this arrangement, our basement was transformed. My mattress off the boxspring on the floor. That way when Kennedy woke up at 5am or 6am to nurse, daddy could bring him down to sleep next to me and he would be safe right on the floor. My life was the biggest state of limbo ever. My new room looked like a crack den with two empty box springs and bedframes on the floor (that we were no longer using) and my little corner with my single mattress. More sleeping pills. Different combinations (all breast-feeding safe). More nights of getting up in the middle of the night. 

Oh, and the setbacks. Ski trips. Weekends away. Weekends to visit family where we all shared the bed again. And mommy back in bed. Back to not sleeping. Back to all night nursing. 

But again, two more months went by. I took a course which mean  my husband putting the baby to bed one night a week. I would come home at 9pm and serenity prevailed over our little home, my boys passed out together. So now Kennedy could go 9pm-6am without nursing on the good nights. Good, right? But not good enough or consistent enough to rejoice. I read baby books on sleep. I read books I swore I would never read because they conflicted with my attachments parenting philosophy. I read them anyway. I learned. Kennedy had earlier naps. Earlier bedtimes. I started sleeping in the baby's nursery upstairs, in a bed. 

There were hair-pulling out moments. No sleep. The screams. The fights. But luckily, no screams from little one. Tim and I were at each other's throats. The "you take him, no you take hims" had a high frequency in our conversations, or rather, yell-ations.

Then a few weeks ago we had a life changing event that made it truly the best of times and the worst of times. 

We had an awesome little 5-day trip to Kiawah Island with family. Two bedrooms for the three of us. But we all got a little stomach flu which set off our delicate balance. Some nights I was in with the baby, some nights my husband, and some nights he was alone for a while depending on who was sick. And???? It worked, mostly! Maybe it was the vacation. Maybe the fevers. Maybe the exhausted toddler running on the beach all day in the fresh windy salty air with his cousins. Whatever it was, Kennedy finally seemed to be content with long gaps without nursing. He even liked to snuggle near me without the constant suckle that kept me up all night. I was elated. 

We came home from the trip. Kennedy was going to sleep in his big boy bed. Not with my husband, not with me. And most differently, not in our king size bed. 

The days of the kingle were over.

 I nursed him off to sleep, and then a few hours later put myself to bed, a little uncertain, a little nostalgic, very sleepy, and a little self-assured. And guess what? It worked! 

Mostly. 

My husband had to go in and lie next to him a few times to reassure him. Then at 6am I go in for the morning feeding and we both pass out until the majestical time of 9:30am (or get up at 6am and then go back down for an early nap). Are we out of the hole as far as him sleeping through the night on his own? Are we ready for baby # 2? Not yet, not yet. But getting there. Muddling through. Finding our own way. Our own way in the dark of the nighttime parenting. 

The takeaway? Don't let anyone make you go to that place that just feels wrong to you as a parent, or a person. The wisdom will come, either out of desperation, perspiration, or just keeping a conscious curiosity about a situation. Many fail-proof situations fail. Many parents who claim to have the easy solution don't as it turns out later. So don't give up on your dreams to give your child a gentle transition, day, night, anytime. 

Postscript note: As of the date of this publication, Kennedy has been successfully sleeping in his big boy bed for almost 2 weeks. He is happy, we are thrilled, and he and I still get plenty of snuggly time during his naps and getting him down at night as he falls asleep. Daddy is still lying with him at night in the bed. It's a process and we are not "done" yet, but as I like to joke with my husband, hope is on  the way!