Transitioning from bed to crib. Co-sleepers to cribbers... -

Transitioning from bed to crib. Co-sleepers to cribbers...

Since my daughter was born, my wife and I practiced "the art" of co-sleeping about 95% of the time. We always thought that by the time she was a year old, we'd figure out a natural transition from the bed to her crib. Well she's almost 11 months now and we've started trying different things. Like sleeping next to her and once she falls asleep we move her to her crib. That works once in awhile but not always... and she always wakes up in the middle of the night wanting to come to the bed (which is right next to her crib). She won't stop crying unless we put her back in the bed and by then we all end up falling asleep together again. Any suggestions?

Written by JC

Posted on 03/24/2008

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Answers:

I don't mean to tell you about parenting skills, but you started in the beginning with co sleeping and now you are dealing with it. My best friend had her daughter co sleep with them until she was almost 4 and now her other daughter is doing to and she is almost 1 1/2. It's hard to do but just keep at it and what ever you do, don't go back and forth. It would make things harder for both you and your daughter. I wish you all the luck.

posted by Chelle on 03/25/2008

Interesting comment. Appreciate your input! I apologize if my posting made us come across as unstructured, and un"skilled" in our parental abilities ;) I did write that posting rather quickly.

As parents we all develop our own individual boundaries for our babies. And since they aren't old enough to verbally communicate to us, we look to our child to show us the signs we need to determine whats best for them. As society and so called "experts" provide their opinions (based on relative yet arbitrary research), its ultimately up to the parents to take what applies to their situations and make it work. We know our daughter is very smart, very brave, and we believe she can make this transition because she is ready and we can support her correctly. It seems as though you're implying that there is no timeline to how long you should have them co-sleep? Are there any expert opinions that suggest a structured timeframe? Will your best friend be sleeping with her daughter til she is 8? 10? In highschool? Joking...either way, we find that it will be much easier to work through this now, so we don't have to compromise with what would be a much harder situation when she's older.

posted by JC on 03/25/2008

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