Tuesday, October 9, 2012

But Who's Been Sleeping In MY Bed?

So, you know how before you have children you spout rubbish like
'the baby will just have to fit into our lifestyle'
or
'it won't change us that much'
 or
'hey please shoot me if I crap on about my son/daughter all day long'
???

Ha ha ha!!
How things change hey?!

Even the most determined of parents seem to have their world turned upside down and inside out in more ways than they anticipated.

Right now, in our household Missi has taken our (my!) quite routine and settled nocturnal a-bedspace-for-everyone-and-everyone-for-a-bedspace style and flipped it every which way.

Magoo has always slept in his room and in his own bed. I'm a lucky duck, I know.
Hubby and I have always slept in our room and our own bed - never even swapping sides!

These nights - it's anybody's guess where Hubby and I will end up.
(And that's not in an adventurous, risque sense I'm afraid!!)

Magoo, bless his sleepy little heart, is the only consistent one around here at the moment.
He still sleeps in his own bed all night, every night.

When Missi arrived home, I placed her in her bassinet in my room beside my bed.
Hubby made the wise decision to take the rather comfy 'front couch' and enjoy full, uninterrupted nights of sleep while MIssi and I are enjoying nocturnal adventures.
I even converted his side of the bed into a makeshift night time change station for Missi!
(Quite the marital arrangement, I know!!)
Now, this arrangement could work nicely for Hubby and I! :-)
But, for the last few nights I have demoted Hubby from the front couch to the 'back couch'. 

After 6 weeks of Missi's night noises, I'm feeling the pinch.
I don't want to move MIssi to the pretty bedroom that I so lovingly prepared for her yet as it's beside her  brother's room - and I don't want to disturb his sleep.
I also like having MIssi in our bedroom at night as the breathing monitor is plugged in there at the moment and it gives me some peace of mind having it on.

I'm now sleeping on the front couch - only metres from Missi's bassinet - but enough to muffle the shuffling, snuffling, kerfuffling, snorting and grunting a tad.
Hubby is on the back couch, snoring to his heart's content.

I'm pretty confident (hopeful?) that this is a temporary arrangement - but for now our very comfortable (and fairly expensive) queen bed is currently unoccupied and that tiny MIssi has the entire master suite to herself between feeds!!
Yep.
'The baby won't change anything.'
Much.

How do your children 'rule the roost'?

Shar :-)

5 comments:

Toni said...

Oh, boy.

I co-slept my two youngest, because they woke every 2 hours or so and I was too freaking tired after a few days of that to wake up enough to put them back to bed.
So they stayed in our bed for .... oh.... two years or more? each.
NOT good sleepers, my kids.

PS she is ADORABLE!

posie blogs Jennie McClelland said...

Oh this is so sweet, look at how big your Magoo is now. What a darling relationship they have.
My 4 all started sleeping through the night by 3-5 weeks, 12 hours, each of them. They always slept in their own cots in their own rooms, my husband (soldier) is a jumpy sleeper, so just a baby com on the bedside table, no babies!! I also got up to feed them, in the lounge, worked so well for me.
Sleeping has never been an issue, so not only was i young, i had energy to burn, i miss new babies!! Love Posie

All For Love said...

Oh Shar, this brings back memories for me. When Felix came along the whole sleep thing was turned on it's head. Angus, who had been a remarkable sleeper, got all bent out of shape and started waking through the night and fretting. For the first 10 weeks, Felix and I slept in the lounge room... I was couch bound. I would be so tired, I'd pick him up, put him on to feed and wake minutes... maybe hours later... with him wrapped around my neck. He used to grunt, snort and snuffle into me and was quite forceful with the feeding. Those were crazy times. BUT it worked...in a fashion... and in time, it all fell into place. I think once you become a parent, it's all about 'whatever works'. You're doing great to have one child sleeping beautifully and the other relatively content at 6 weeks.
Love the pic, Missi looks quite in awe of her big bro Magoo xo

Jane said...

Oh Shar, Such an adorable photo of the two of them. Hmm, I feel your pain. And exhaustion. Been there, etc!

The only thing I would caution is not to do as we did. India slept with us for the first few months in the bassinet. Then we moved her into share with Joshie. I would spring up whenever she stirred to remove her, lest she wake him.

That was my big mistake as she never learnt to resettle herself. He would have slept through anything but I didn't realise at the time. By my pouncing and extracting her, I upset the applecart.

Cue our 4 night stay at Tresillian when she was 9½ months old. I'd had about 4 months of 3½ hours of broken sleep a night. I scraped the car twice in 2 days - I was like a drunk driver with no sense of perception. I'd been BF her about 6 times a night. I wan deathly tired. Of course, they managed to stop her night feeding in a night!

I mention this not to alarm you but just in case it might have some bearing on your current arrangements. After some months, it can become too much! J x

lucypilz said...

Man, that photo is just adorable!!

Luc X

www.loveluc.blogspot.com