does your school-age kid still crawl in with you?

[mandalamama]

whenever my daughter's felt stressed during the day, she asks to fall asleep in my bed. i love coming to bed at my bedtime and looking at her sweet face sleeping and dreaming :) sometimes i tuck her in myself and fall asleep along with her. she moves to her own bed shortly after i'm asleep. the longer she stays with me, i can tell how stressed she is. if she has a nightmare, she'll climb in with me and snuggle.

is this normal at 6-almost-7 years? i know she won't be in my bed in college, so i'm not really worried about it. i just wondered if all kids do this.

[Cavy]

DD is nearly 10yo & would still like to sleep with me (impractical with the other kids, but sweet although irritating because she is a constant wiggler & chewer).  So I let her cuddle up a for a while & then nudge her out.  I think anything up to 12 is pretty normal.

[contactmaya]

We still co sleep anyway,with myself, 3yo and 6yo. Feels normal to me :-)

[4Marmalade]

My almost 9 year old would love to sleep with us every night but for the most part we'll get him into his own bed.  My 6 year old would also love to sleep with us every night and she does come down 1-2 nights/week.  Our two 3 year olds come into our bed half way through the night as well so even though we do have a king size bed it's not really do-able to have everyone in there.  We do encourage the older two to sleep together if they need a bit of company one night.

[verde]

My soon-to-be 6 y/o still sleeps with us. She has shown no interest in leaving yet. :)

[LynnS6]

My 7 and 10 year old still like to sleep with me. Our bed is too small for them to be there when dh is home, but when he goes out of town, they both crawl in with me. Though, they've both grown since the last time they both slept with me, so I'm not sure we'll all fit.

[Flor]

My 8 year old has a bed in his room (hardly used) and a twin be in our room.

[savithny]

My older child (now 11) was always a much better bed-sharer, and even up to the last year, if he woke around 5am to go to the bathroom, he'd crawl in with us rather than returning to his own bed.  He'd just slip in on DH's side and we wouldn't even realize it until later.   But of course, it was only the last hour or 90 minutes of the night.

My younger child was coming in with us sooner and sooner, and is not a good bedsharer (she kicks and sprawls and pulls hair and kicks and no one gets good sleep if she's in with everyone else).   We did eventually work to tell her that if she woke up after 4am, or if she had a bad dream or didn't feel well, she could come to us -- but that she needed to start the night in her own bed and give it a good college try (so to speak).

I don't mind if they spend some time with us in the wee morning, and I will often lie down next to one or the other at bedtime if they ask.   

[whozeyermamma]

Normal in our house anyway. My now 8 year old has been in and out of our bed for her whole life. I loved the phase when she would fall asleep in our bed and then I'd crawl in with her whenever I was ready to go to sleep. It was so soothing for both of us ... she moved to her own bed after her brother was born.

Of course, now I'm at the point where I'm going to try to nightwean my 14 mo old and get the  8 year old to fall asleep in her own room without me or Daddy laying with her for 2 hours ... *sigh*

I think your situation sounds just fine. I think it's lovely that she knows when she needs a little extra love and knows that she can get it. What a wonderful feeling!

[Endellion]

i can reply to this from the perspective of the child, don't worry. it would be one thing if she still could not sleep with out you it's another to want to lay with her parents every now and again. i'm 27 and will sometimes cuddle next to my parents for a nap.it's just a closeness a comfort that you can't get any other way. it's love. 

[incorrigible]

That's developmentally appropriate behavior, and a sign that she's independent and learning to monitor and attend to her own emotional needs. You should be a proud mama. =D

We've always coslept.

Dd10 mostly sleeps alone now. She comes in about once a week on average. She snuggles and falls asleep, but moves back to her bed in the middle of the night.

Ds will be 13 next week. Maybe once a month, he'll ask if he can sleep in our bed...but he doesn't. lol He'll stay in my room for a little while and snuggle...then go sleep on the couch or back in his bed. More often now, he's started just asking if he can hang out a little before bed. We all read before bed, so he brings his book and we lay in bed reading. After a while, he gives me a hug and goes back to his room. That happens on average about once a week, too.

It's not like one day they are suddenly completely independent adults, you know? If you allow them to transition naturally, it will be a slow and steady change. The kind you don't realize is happening until you look back, you know? =D It sounds like your dd is maturing in an emotionally stable and nurturing manner.

[sraplayas]

DD falls alseep in our bed alot, esp. since DH started going to school at night. Sometimes he brings her to her room later in the night, sometimes, he doesn't.:)

[Pepperdove]

My son is 6 and comes into our room every morning to steal a little extra sleep. He'd probably still be cosleeping if I hadn't totally run out of room in the bed! :)

[Learning_Mum]

6yo DS falls asleep in my bed every night and I move him to his own bed when I go to bed. In saying that though, his bed is in the same bedroom.

[Justmee]

My 7.5 year olds and 6yo still crawl into my bed several times a week (along with their 3yo brother).

Lucky it works out that usually only 2 extras are in my bed at any time, otherwise we get totally squished....

[tccandlsccmom]

My kiddos (6&9) spend at least part of every night with me -- I am single parenting (and have been for the past year) and they seem to really need the special cuddles that bed-sharing can provide.  They are actually in therapy (with a pretty main-stream therapist) and she has told me repeatedly that this is normal and fine....