The art of co-sleeping.

There was a knock on the door, and a wave of anxiety came over me. I gave Hubby the look, to remind him of the conversation we’d had just moments before. I cradled my newborn in my arms as Hubby opened the door and let the nurse in.

“Good morning,” she chirped. I watched her eyes glance quickly over our house, landing eventually on our baby.

“Let’s have a look, shall we?” she said as she perched next to me on the lounge.

I showed her how I was breastfeeding and she looked the baby over. She weighed her, measured her, and watched her carefully. The whole time I felt so anxious, as if I’d be handed a mothering score-card at the end.

“Can you show me where she’s sleeping?” she asked. I immediately shot Hubby a look.

I took her downstairs to the baby’s room and showed her the cot. She showed me how to settle her to sleep.

I knew the deal. I’d made the bed up perfectly. No bumpers or toys. No bulky blankets, just a sheet down the bottom half of the small bed. I knew what she wanted to see.

She told me I was doing a great job, and I breathed a sigh of relief. It was as good as getting an A+ on my week-long career of being a mother.

The only thing was, I was lying. She wasn’t sleeping in her cot, she was sleeping in bed with me. I wanted to save myself the lecture, and further anxiety, so I lied.

Co-sleeping seemed like a good idea back then, and turned out to be not such a great idea down the path. Babies grow into toddlers who like to move around. A lot. It’s like a badly rehearsed dance, with arms and legs flailing everywhere. One minute they’re settled in snugly, and the next they’re down the bottom of the bed lingering on the edge, on the verge of falling out.

There’s never a perfect night’s sleep, always conscious of that extra little body in the bed, careful not to move in case she’s squished or worse still, woken.

And then, just like that last breastfeed, that I never realised was going to be my last, there’s the last official night of co-sleeping.

We set-up the cot whilst on holidays {and filled with hope} and asked if she’d like to sleep in her own bed. And she did. She slept like a… well an exhausted mama on a night off. She slept well. And so did we, and have continued to ever since.