Pregnant and Cosleeping?

[sunnylady303]

I have a 22 month old who is a very cuddly, easily disturbed cosleeper. We put a bed down beside ours for her (which she was excited about) but she only stays for three hours tops. I am getting to the point where it is hard to get comfortable sleeping and having her on top of me doesn't help. Does anyone have any suggestions? Is anyone else dealing with this?

[jplain]

Almost 2yo DD currently sleeps most of the night in a crib with one side removed that is sitting side-car to our bed. She likes to flop over onto our bed (and onto me) during the night, usually around 3 or 4am. I can't blame her; the crib mattress is not comfy.

We're about to get an XL twin and put it alongside our king-size bed. An XL twin is the same length as a king, and DH and I are tall, so we know she'll eventually grow out of a regular twin anyway. I'll be adding a modified twin-to-king converter to make it into one large sleep space. Hopefully that'll solve the problem! Even if she insists on moving over to our bed, I could always hop over to her bed and be happy (or at least happier) over there.

DD has also been getting more cuddly at night, and it keeps me awake. If adding extra bed space doesn't make a big enough difference, I'm hoping to get her to accept DH as her new cuddle partner.

:) Carolyn

[zonapellucida]

I dealt wiht this--Ella is 2 yrs 6 months and TJ 9is 8 months. I just said, when she was all over me that I needed space andI oculd sleep like that--on my back wiht her head on my arem. The other thing is DH was really good about doing the cuddling. Now we have towo in our bed...Time for a bigger bed!

[MamaFern]

we are in transition from our bed to his own little bed.. he is almost 3 though, so i think it helps that we can really talk about why its a good thing that he starts sleeping in his own bed. he is VERY snuggly, but also kicks and takes up most of the bed,.. i end up feeling cramped and sore in the morning..and plus i wanted him to be in him own bed when baby comes.. i love the family bed though so its hard! he comes into my bed sometime in the night usually and depending on how i feel i put him back or let him stay. our beds are about 2 feet apart in the same room, so i feel like it shouldnt be that big of a deal, but for someone so small and so used to being in bed with momma it is hard, so you have to give it time..and be compassionate. sometimes i get frustrated about it, but i really try not to..
good luck with it!

[Rach]

We bought a king sized bed. :LOL
I think putting another bed [twin] up against yours is a good wya to give you guys more space.

[liz217]

We only have a queen (need a bigger bed :LOL ). Most nights its just me and ds (2 yrs 4 months) since my dh works nights during the week. But on weekends it gets pretty crowded.

I find that if i put a small pillow in the crook of my arm, ds usually settles there while i lay on my left side, he sweats while he sleeps, so skin to skin gets kinda warm with him directly on me. I sometimes put another small pillow between my belly and him also (in case he kicks, which he tends to do some nights). That keeps us both comfortable for most of the night, We end up all over the bed eventually of course :LOL .

And it just gets harder to turn over the further along you are. I feel like a beached whale whenever i need to turn on my other side, lol.

Oh, and we are using the crib as a side car for when new baby gets here :throb .

[Naughty Dingo]

I am watching this thread closely looking for advice.

My 3.5 yo sleeps with us and she is a huge wiggler. I have no idea what I am gonna do as I get huge and exhausted, or when there is a newborn sleeping with us.

ND

[megpaw]

I don't have any advice, but I'm there right along with you. Dh & I co-sleep with our 27-month-old twin dd's, and things are getting a bit cramped, even in our king bed. This is one thread I'm definitely going to watch!

[spruce]

BTDT, got the t-shirt. We're expecting our THIRD cosleeper very soon...

What we did was to trade our full-size for a queen after Ds1 was born...then add a twin mattress (given to us) on a platform which Dh built for next-to-nothing after I discovered Ds2 was on the way. It really is very simple to make one, and if all you have is a hammer and nails, you can do it for under twenty bucks. Plywood for the top, cut to fit the mattress, and 2x4s or 4x4s for the legs, cut to be as tall as will make the platform equal with the top of your box spring. In our case, we made it a little taller as our queensize is a deep-pocket, pillow-top mattress and is taller than the twin mattress. (I hope this makes sense...It might sound complicated, it's really not!!) You don't need a shop or special tools to build a platform, really! :)

Now Ds1 sleeps about half and half the time in his bed (he rooms w/ his sisters, who have Mayan hammocks instead of beds), and he likes to come to our bed in the middle of the night. When Dh is at work, I generally put both boys to bed in our big bed, then transfer Ds1 if I want to in the middle of the night (usually I don't bother).

When this new bean comes, we plan to sleep both boys on the twin, next to Dad's (inside side) of the bed, and see what works from there. Our other plan, if the boys are too rolly, is to offer Ds1 (who is now 4) a "nest" on the floor, but I'm not sure how that will work since he wants to sleep NEXT to us, not just in our room.

If you decide to transition to a bed, we found the hammocks our girls requested are PERFECT for our family...no bed-making, no chance of rolling out (they're Mayan hammocks, the kind people sleep in all over the world, not the mesh type we are used to here in the US) and they're easy to unhook from the wall if we want extra space for something during the day. The only reason Ds1 doesn't have one is that he got the "cool" bunkbed set that used to be his sisters'. ;) Google "fair trade hammocks" and you'll find lots of options...ours were about $55 each w/ shipping to Alaska...I think we bought them from hammockjungle, IIRC.

I hope you find a solution that works! For a little while there we considered putting everyone on the floor and just using the mattress, no bed frame, for us grownups with bad backs. ;) That might work, too.

Love, Penelope