Trusting kids: sleep
It’s interesting. I never thought I’d ever be thinking this ‘radically’.
With my recent research into home-schooling/unschooling and the ideas floating in my mind and beliefs forming about trusting our kids more completely, we’ve come up against something:
Sleep.
When did I make the shift from fully trusting in Gwen’s newborn sleep intuition to trying to dictate when and where she sleeps? Does this even make sense? Does anyone tell me when to sleep?
When Gwen was first born, I trusted her to sleep when she was tired and wake when she was rested - or, more often than not, hungry! I also trusted her to sleep where she felt safe, which generally meant in my or Brad’s arms. We brought her to bed when we went to bed and she slept snuggled up beside me all night.
It flowed so naturally. There were no struggles - except when she was fighting sleep and wouldn’t give in. But even then it was her struggling with herself, not with us.
Then, at some point, we decided that we needed “us time” or “alone time”. We decided that our need to have some time to be by ourselves (to what - watch TV? Surf the internet?) trumped her biological need to be held. So we started putting her to bed - oftentimes with me sitting on the edge of the bed in the darkened room attempting to force a swaddled, angry baby to sleep. I hated bedtime. I often cried. I should have figured it out then!
Sometime later, we decided that Gwen “needed” to start the night in her own room. Then the decision that she needed to spend all night there. What a complete and utter waste of our time! For months, we fought with her to sleep in her own big, dark, cold room separate from our warm, living bodies. I cringe to think about how much energy we expended trying to have her fit some mold for baby sleep. And I weep for the nights that she could have spent by my side.
Eventually, we gave up trying to get her to spend all night in her room (seriously - it was months we tried!) and decided to just bring her into bed with us whenever she woke.
We all slept better.
Which brings us to now. Bedtimes were becoming increasingly difficult (think: Brad upstairs for up to 1.5 - 2 hours to get her to sleep!) and we were becoming increasingly irritated. Then she started being awake until 9:30 or 10. What’s a parent to do?
Then we thought about it - if we can trust Gwen to eat what she needs as long as we provide a healthy variety, if we can trust Gwen to tell us when she needs to pee or poop, if we plan to trust Gwen to learn what she needs to learn when she needs to learn it, well then why can’t we trust her to tell us when she’s tired?
Gwen has been staying up with us the past few weeks and coming to bed with us or, if she’s tired before that, letting us know.
Before, Gwen would be obviously tired but resist going to bed. She would never fall asleep when she was tired with us, and she would never admit to being tired.
Now, Gwen will walk to the stairs and say, “Loom. Leeping.” (Room - sleeping). She has begun to ask for a nap during the day (or, at the very least will agree that it’s time for one if I notice she’s grizzly).
Sure, we went through a few days of her wanting to stay up VERY late. I believe it was her way of saying, “How long could this possibly last? Do they really trust me?”
It has been worth it. Both Brad and I (although sometimes we are frustrated by her being ‘underfoot’ so late in the evening as we were accustomed to having child-free nights) are happier. There is less conflict. I don’t dread the evenings anymore.
The best part? I’m enjoying bedtime as a special time to snuggle in, read a few stories, chat, and drift off to sleep surrounded by my beautiful family.
For some great reading on this, check out the article Zen Bedtime by Naomi Aldort. An excerpt:
Children join our lives and want to participate at all times. They don’t want to miss a moment. They even hold their pee to avoid missing the fun. When we insist on separating the child’s daily rhythm from ours, she will resist, or drag us to bed with her as your daughter does. Being pushed away and excluded from being with us, the child is determined to fight for his autonomous desire to be included. If she is tired, she will resist sleep as long as she can. She would rather fall asleep in the midst of the activity with you than isolated in another room. It is so much more fun to respond to her natural need.
Also, check out a great series in three parts (babies, toddlers, and call to action) that is a mama’s thoughts and ramblings about this issue. An excerpt:
Also I have to come back to the question of the nature of our society and what we do with our night time. In times past, did we live in little nuclear “boxes”, alone with just one other adult and computers and TV’s to entertain us? NO, so then what?
I assume that we just went to bed at the same time as our offspring because it was DARK! And did we not live with others? Was not our entertainment and leisure time about community? Come on Anthropologists enlighten me!
If you were sitting round a fire or kitchen hearth with other family members or members of your tribe or community, wouldn’t your kids just fall asleep on your lap or at your breast while you continued your conversation uninterrupted. Or maybe they just fell asleep where they landed? Aren’t beds just a modern construct too?
Sounds so simple, doesn’t it?
Brandy said,
April 12, 2010 @ 12:23 pm
Kim , I’m so glad you guys have found a solution
your now sleep habit is what we’ve been doing forever. It’s awesome to find what works and clicks.
Yes we love our alone time and we get it. She tells us when she’s tired and one of us puts her to bed. If we are tired too we go to bed with her.
It’s funny even tho she has her own bed butted to ours, essentially an extesion of our bed, we feel the change. And it’s good and different. She will a few times a week ask to nap in our bed and I let her. We snuggle and it’s so nice. I still wake at night to help her with her covers and find a stray bink ( soon to be gone I hope) and also, we hold hands or she rubs my arm during the night. I love it.
I have sincere visions of all 4 of us piled in bed together enjoying our sleeping space.
Nicole said,
April 12, 2010 @ 8:34 pm
We work the same way with Mary. Some nights she is ready to crash around 8 or 9, some nights not until after 10. She’ll usually just fall asleep where ever she gets comfortable and then when I am ready to go to bed, I will put her in with me. My older two still sleep together (and sleep better that way) as that is what they did when they were toddlers.
Now Veronica does not sleep well with me at all. She is very restless and wakes more often during the night if she is in bed with me. She one who definitely needs her own sleep space.
Way to go in finding the sleep solution for little Gwen. It’s so nice when things run smoothly like that.
kim said,
April 12, 2010 @ 9:16 pm
Thanks, ladies!! It seriously KILLS me how long we fought what she clearly needed - to just be with us. It seems so silly now, looking back, but it’s obviously been a journey for Brad and I to fully embrace our parenting philosophy!
Kathryn said,
April 13, 2010 @ 8:29 am
I’ll be the different one. This is one area I am not AP. Sorry, can’t do it. I tried sleeping with Nadia next to me in a bassinet when she was just a newborn, I could not get any sleep, at all. I woke to every single sniffle, movement against the sheets, whatever. I awoke. I blame a lot of things on PPD, but it’s true! Sometimes the best thing for Nadia and Rhys was being away from me, because I would have lost it on them. I’m serious. Rhys and Nadia both go to their own beds at night and Andrew and I have our own space. I needed that. I still need that. But that’s me. So much of me is for my kids, but for me and my sanity, my bed is my husband and I”s. And I like it that way.
kim said,
April 13, 2010 @ 9:24 am
Kathryn, I can completely understand and respect that!! In some ways, I wish it were like that here, too, but my kids won’t go for it and trying to get them to is SOOOOO not worth the time/effort. And the more I relax and let go, the more I enjoy it. I used to wake up to every sniffle/movement too, with Gwen, but after the first week or two I got used to it.
Brandy said,
April 13, 2010 @ 11:02 am
My brain has learned to differentiate moving to move and moving/crying for need. Last night she got her covers real messed up and could not figure them out in her sleep state so I helped. I can also tell her to ’ssshh” and “You’re ok, go to sleep” and she will if she’s in the right stage of sleep. It hasn’t always been that way tho.
Kim, I remember how much you guys worked with her and agonized and all the rest. That is the trial of the first born I think. We find our footing and we learn as we go. You guys did what you thought she needed.
I would love my own space some nights
Tonight I’d love to go get into my big deep tub alone. But no way that’s gonna happen when she’s sleeping 10 ft away 
and I’m ok with that really!!! Feeling uneasy about some stuff and could use the relaxation but I will live 
Claire said,
April 14, 2010 @ 2:51 am
It never ceases to amaze me how different all kids are; how one mum’s perfect solution is another’s complete nightmare lol! We live in a house of happy, no-cry bedtimes and I thank my lucky stars every day. We never did ‘cry it out’ or other such hideous processes, I have always listened to my instinct with regard to responding to his need to be picked up, fed, cuddled etc. Through gentle persistence we taught our son to self-soothe and sleep through the night alone. There is no way I could comfortably give up my ‘me time’, and in our house if I wait until the point when A is visibly tired, then the point at which he will go happily and easily to sleep by himself in his room is often already past. For about the first six weeks of his life he was with me ALL the time, 24/7 and I have to say I found this physically and emotionally very difficult. When we started putting him upstairs at bedtime, before we went up ourselves, was when I began to feel ‘normal’ again after his birth. At 5 months we put him in his own room and even though I had to get up 2/3 times a night to breastfeed, my sleep in between was of a much better quality and again, I felt more like my old self. Maybe it makes me selfish, but I needed to have a clearer boundary of where my child stopped and I began.
Nadine said,
April 14, 2010 @ 7:09 am
Here’s my two cents for what it’s worth. N has always slept with us - since he was a newborn and he’s 22 months now - we tried the crib for a couple of weeks at the beginning but I got too tired to get out of bed at night and found it easier just to have him beside me (we breastfeed).
N’s dislikes blankets (like his Mommy!) and then would get cold and wake up - and Daddy likes piles of blankets and to be super-warm, so there were some serious issues until we figured that out!! Reading “Nighttime Parenting” helped out there!
N’s a wiggle-worm too - feet in the face are quite common - so he now sleeps in his crib with the fourth side off - butted up against our mattress on the floor. He cuddles Daddy when he needs to and now that our newborn sleeps with us as well, if N needs to nurse, Daddy and I switch places temporarily.
Tom wasn’t impressed at ruining the look of his carefully chosen bedroom set but I’m a little more stubborn than he is and made it clear that if N went to another room, he would be sleeping all alone. I think Daddy was tempted to think that sounded good at times!
Overall, I think we all get the maximum amount of sleep we can and it’s working out for us. I’ve been a real cop about bedtimes lately though, and Daddy has the bedtime routine as his job. Sometimes it does take a long time to get N to sleep - he’s just not tired! Lots of times, Daddy just puts on his pj’s too and they go to bed - the newborn and I follow when he’s done nursing for the night and everyone else is asleep. I’m always the last to go to bed at night (about 10:00pm).
Last night we tried out letting N stay up to watch BSG with us and eat popcorn - he was ready for bed as soon as it was over and let us know he was ready by bringing his books and saying ‘books’ - that’s part of the bed-time routine. All in all it worked pretty well, and since the days are getting so much longer now I think I’ll just let it ride as long as we don’t start totally getting our days and nights mixed up. It would be nice if we could enjoy the summer evenings outside instead of struggling to get a toddler to go to bed while it’s still light outside!
Thanks for helping me loosen the reins a bit, Kim!
Christine said,
April 15, 2010 @ 8:26 am
Just popping over to cheer you on!!