[Eman'smom]

The catch is he wants it to be mommies and ds's room for both of us to sleep in and daddy and dd can sleep in mommies old room

Ok so the background ds has been co-sleeping, with us for about a year(we moved to a new house none of us liked him being down the hall), in his own bed pushed up against ours, they are roughly the same height so it's basically one big bed.

We've been talking about getting him bunk beds (that is what he wants for his room) and dh and I have been saying that we will get bunk beds when he is ready to sleep in his own room, when he hears that he normally says things like he can play on bunk bed ects, but will still sleep in mommies room. The thing is I don't want to get him bunk beds only for them to turn into a toy and then have them be "wasted" when we could have used the money to do something else KWIM? Am I making sense? I don't want to be the mean mommy that won't get her son a bed, but I also don't want it to be a big jungle gym and nothing else.

So 2 days ago he tells me he's ready for bunk beds and to sleep in his own room, he will sleep on the top bed and mommy will sleep on the bottom.

Now I'm totally fine with this as a transition, however I'm worried that when I "transition" back to my bed so will he. The other thing is, and I'm sorry about this but I won't find sleeping on a bottom bunk all that comfortable, we have a very nice bed, and as it is I don't sleep well even on that, a twin bottom bunk would be why sleep at all?

I'm probably worring too much, the only way to know what will happen will be to try it out it might be fine. Anybody done this ?

 

[lisalou]

I haven't done this. But it seems if you eventually want to transition him to his room anyway and were planning on bunk beds, I don't see how you can wrong in doing it. Just make sure your transition back to your bed goes at his pace. I think the fact that he's asking and if you respond positively to his request, it just makes it all that more amazing for him. As long as you don't mind doing it.

As for the comfort of the bed, what about your bed now makes it difficult to sleep? Since you'll have the bed to yourself, you could do things to it to make it just right. Starting with a good mattress, which you'd probably want anyway.

 

[nannymom]

I have no experience with this but what if you tried just putting him to bed and laying in the bottom bunk untill he was asleep and then moving back to your old bed?

 

[Ravin]

YOu could get a bunkbed set with a full bed on the bottom bunk.

 

[CookieMonsterMommy]

Could it be that he's just saying he's ready for his own room because he wants the bunk beds?

What about putting the bunk beds in your room for now, until he's really ready for his own room, then move them?

Kelly

 

[NatalieS]

We had a similar talk tonight in the bath tub. DD is almost five and i'm wondering when she'll be ready for her own room. I thought about offering to get her one of those cool beds she was ooing and ahhing over in the latest catalog. (OT- total catalog shopper I've created!!) But I recalled back to the MANY attempts and 'motivating' her to be done with the binkie (pacifier). How each time i'd offer a new toy or something and she'd gladly take it, throw the bink away, then be hystericall at night. We lamented over this for awhile (i gave her the bink of course!) and decided, with the help and encouragement of the onling AP community, that it just wasn't fair for us to ask her to choose between a toy and her beloved binkie. Bottom line, she wasn't mature enough to really be given that kind of choice. She wasn't able to grasp the reality of how she'd feel 6 hours later at bed time.

So, about 6 months later, when she had lost her last binkie for the hundredth time, we told her that was it. She was done. Then I told her that she could pick out any toy at the toy store (also an avid toy store shopper) if she gave up her binkie AND stuck to it for a week. Absolute success- we now live in an official binkie free house. (If you don't count me, the resident human bink)

So this is the deal I made with her tonight: When she was ready- she decided when she's either 6 or 16, not sure yet which- she'll be ready. When she's ready, and after a few weeks of sleeping in her own room, she can get a new bed. (BTW, we need a new bed for her room anyway

)

Long story short, the plan can be quite successful if he is really ready and you play it right. Sleeping in there with him is a good idea but you'll never know if he's really ready then. I like the idea of falling asleep with him and then going back to your own bed. Sounds like he's entertaining the idea but bargaining a bit before committing! Maybe he's not quite ready but getting there!