During his first two months, those of you who know Jacob or have read all of blogs here know that he had some pretty bad issues when breastfeeding didn't work out for us and when I started him on dairy formula. After battling through a day pretty filled with Jacob's screaming, crying, and fussing, Dave and I were both exhausted come nighttime. We had him in a bassinet in our room from the start, but it was just too tiring to have to get out of bed every ten minutes or so to replace his Binky (pacifier) when he woke up screaming because it fell out of his mouth... or to pick him up and rock him or sway with him when the pacifier wasn't enough to comfort him (and when he didn't need a bottle or to be changed). I can't even imagine if we had put him in his crib in another room that early on! Anyway, after about a month or a month-and-a-half of struggling with this and getting very little sleep, we brought Jacob into our bed on his Boppy Newborn Lounger Pillow.
Jake never liked laying flat on his back - for naps, diaper changes, or anything -, and the lounger pillow is contoured to support/raise babies' backs and heads up a little and cradle their bums. The only way we could get him to nap was to lay him in this pillow. Once we started using it for nighttime sleeping, too, (bringing it into the bed with us) we all got a lot more sleep. I started off placing the pillow next to me but away from Dave for fear that Dave might roll over on him or something. The pillow is actually pretty thick, though, so I probably didn't even need to worry about that to begin with. Plus, babies don't start really moving around in their sleep much until about four months or so, so there wasn't much to fear in the way of any accidents happening. After about two or three weeks of having him next to me constantly, I moved the pillow in between Dave and me so Dave could help out occasionally, too. So, with him in bed next to us, we could just reach over and feel for his Binky in the dark and put it back in his mouth or lean over and put our arm on him for a little comforting pressure or just sit up in bed and rock him in our arms (well, usually MY arms). Most nights, that's all it took to get him back to sleep - unless he was hungry for his 2 or 3 am feeding. No more up and down, up and down, up and down every ten or fifteen minutes!
At first, sharing our bed with Jacob was something we did out of necessity so that we could get a little extra sleep and not go insane as first-time parents. After a few weeks, though, I came to love sleeping next to my little one. Hearing his little breaths right next to my ear... being able to reach over and touch his little hand (which led to him closing his tiny fingers around one of mine)... inhaling his "clean baby scent" on nights I had given him a bath... gave me comfort at the end of the day as well as peace-of-mind in the knowledge that he would never have to wake up alone in a dark room after being so close, safe, and secure inside my belly for over nine months.
After a few months in bed with us, though, Jacob continued growing... and started moving around. The first night of concern was when he started making noise, and I opened my eyes to find his head flopped over the top of the Boppy pillow. I repositioned him and he was fine for the rest of the night. After that I started placing another pillow above the Boppy (between the Boppy and the wall) to prevent any more head flops. A few nights later, he had wiggled himself half off the side and was partially laying on top of me. So, I started rolling up receiving blankets and stuffing them under the Boppy to prop the sides up. A few nights after this, I woke up to Jacob fussing because he had scooted his legs and bottom off the end of the pillow. I had been too scared to just lay him between Dave and I on the bed, but I was too scared NOT to at this point. Bye-bye, Boppy Lounger!
After he seemed adjusted to the soy formula, he
didn't mind laying flat much anymore. So, we kept him between us and folded up the thick, super-soft blanket that coordinates with his crib sheets to use as his "bed" on our bed. We folded the top portion of the blanket under to make a little pillow so that his head was still elevated (in an attempt to help with his periodic congestion). With the blanket keeping him at a slightly different height from us, it seemed to be a good next step. Over the next few days and weeks, Jakey started moving around more and more... so I rolled up receiving blankets again to use as a bumper so he wouldn't scoot into my chest at night. (I would always lay facing him while Dave would lay away from him, so he almost always turned toward me instead of Dave.) Most recently, he realized that he was just an arm's reach away and would wake up flailing his little arms around while babbling to the ceiling fan which, of course, would wake us up in turn. So, despite the fact that both Dave and I love sleeping with him in our bed (most of the time waking up to his sweet smile), it was time for Jacob to start sleeping through the night in his own crib... in our bedroom, of course.I took measurements of everything and figured out where all of the furniture would fit. Over the course of about a week or so (we're pretty slow-moving sometimes with Dave's hernia and being busy being baby-parents), we got everything moved and in place. There's still some organizing to do, but the big part's finished. This past Saturday was his first night in his crib, and he slept just as peacefully as he did when he was in bed with us. He fussed a few times like usual, so I got up to give him a little rub or to turn him on his side or to put the Binky back in his mouth (yes... the Binky is back!) and he went right back to sleep.
Jacob usually sleeps a good eight hours or more and is sleeping even longer now that he's taken to the pacifier again. It'll be nice to have the bed to ourselves again after all of this time, but we both miss him in between us even though he's still in the room with us. I figure he'll probably wind up back in our bed periodically once teething gets too bad... unless that ends up entailing resuming the rocking chair and/or pacing and bouncing routine. I don't know anything about teething yet!
