We've just hit the 4 month mark, and decided it was time to transition the little one from her co-sleeper into her own bedroom. Seems easy enough, so we started last night. She has a fairly predictable schedule each night: go for a walk, finish a bottle, change into sleepy clothes, and then go to sleep. The only diference now is that she would be twenty feet away in her crib rather than next to our bed in a co-sleeper. Shouldn't make a difference, right?
As with most of my stories, I was wrong. Something about moving twenty feet into a separate bedroom triggered my daughter's insomnia and vocal chords. We all went to bed at 10pm, which is normal for us. Well, she normally sleeps until 5am, but not this time. She work up the first time at midnight, then again at 1am, and I finally caved and put her back in our room when she woke up at 3am. Too late, she was done with trying to sleep, even if I wasn't.
One of the issues we have with her sleep is that she's a flailer. I think of the comic book villain Dr. Octopus because it's like no matter what my daughter's body is doing, her arms have a separate agenda. I've watched her go from a dead sleep to crying instantly because she punches herself in the eye or knocks her pacifier out of her mouth. So, we swaddle, and that generally works, but now she's become Houdini. At one point, I waasn't even able to get her from the bed where I swaddled her into her crib before her arms were free and flying around. After a half dozen attempts, I said a few select bad words that I save in my special occasions arsenal and debated using duct tape instead of a blanket.
Long story short, this is harder than I imagined, and we've been up since 3am. She seems happy as can be since she's had my full attention for hours. It's like a few extra hours of playtime for her as I sit in drone state staring at an empty coffee cup. Perhaps tonight will be better, or maybe I should invest in another set of earplugs since the wife stole mine.
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