I started co-sleeping with F when he was about two weeks old. There was a multitude of reasons behind this decision, the least of which being that I was too lazy to get up and walk across the room when he cried. Then there was the fact that my child absolutely despised his bassinet. And, of course, the decision maker: I had no partner to help me with things like taking the baby from the bassinet or crib to the bed, changing those middle-of-the-night, breastfed-baby-diapers or anything else. Although J and I were "together", he was away working and studying towards his welding diploma, so it was just me. And both F and I got way more sleep. To this day, I don't think I would have survived if I had to get up and deal with formula through the night.
When people started finding out about my co-sleeping arrangement, I got more backlash than I ever expected. It was around that moment that I realized how important what I do in my bed seems to be to other people, and I reckon that was the time I said "fuck it" and gave up on caring what people think about what I do in my bed or anywhere else. Parenting isn't a "one size fits all" arrangement. It's trial and error with some alterations and a lot of sleepless nights as you try to figure out what that alteration needs to be. I can still hear the "don't start that habit..." warnings, and perhaps I should have listened but I'm pretty sure most kids don't go off to university still sleeping in their mom's bed, so...
But, here we are, about to turn four and F still sleeps with me almost every night. When I say almost every night, I'm talking 29 out of 30 nights a month - unless of course he's not with me for a day or two at which point I'll get another night to myself. Sometimes that happens. He usually ends up sleeping with Grammie and Grampie in those cases. He has his own bed, and he was pretty into it back in the days when Red was part of our little family. Sure, it took a long time for him to settle and I lost the ability to fall asleep before he did but it was nice to have a sleep without a toddler beside me. Now, I rarely get him into that bed and when I do, it's often not a full night's sleep.
Sleeping with Mommy brings F a lot of comfort, and I expect I'm not the only parent to give in to that. He's had a lot of upheaval in his little life and if he's more secure sleeping with me most nights, so be it. I'll soon be begging him for a snuggle, why let it go to waste now?
I did the same thing, for probably the same reasons, until my son was 5. It became a real issue when I decided that it was time for us each to have our own beds. What a nightmare that was until I discovered something that actually broke the reasoning behind why the co-sleeping was still happening. Long story short was my son found my bed more comfortable than his. I discovered this after leaving him in my bed and going to sleep in his, expecting him to follow me thinking that I was the comfort. Turns out he just wanted my bed and once I gave it to him he was more than happy to stay in his own. It was actually a very funny discovery and made me feel a lot better about banishing him to his room :)
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