Am I a Bad Mommy Because...

[justbishop]

I'm ready to move 3.5 mo DD out of our bedroom? DH thinks that I'm being selfish. It was great to have her right there in the bassinet when she was still waking up for a feed at 5 am, but now that she sleeps a good 10-11 hour stretch overnight, it seems like we'd all be better off sleeping seperately.

DH slept on the sofa for prety much my entire pregnancy (I was so sick that him moving in the bed made me pukey), and has continued to do so because he snores and we don't want to wake Claudia. She's become a light sleeper lately too, and I'm terrified of waking her every time I rustle the sheets any more! Also, our only full bath is our master, so DH comes in in the early morning to take a shower and get ready, and she always stirs from that noise. I've also been putting her down for naps in there during the day (since she decided that she hates the swing in the living room), so that blows any chance of ME getting a shower during the day. So yeah, not only am I in a constant state of anxiety when I should be relaxing, but I feel like her sleep is being interrupted as well.

We haven't built her room upstairs yet, but it's a matter of putting up a wall and a door, so it's not too far off. The crib, mattress, and bedding are all sitting up there in their packaging, so we're ready as far as that goes, and I'm on the hunt for a video monitor. How do I convince DH that we're all quite ready for her to have her own space?

[LilyGrace]

I don't think you're a bad mom. May I add a suggestion to your shopping list? If you don't have a white noise machine, I'd seriously consider getting one. It might help everyone get more sleep.

[Lisa_delo]

Each to their own. But it doesn't make you a bad mum.

But personally I wouldn't want my 3.5 month old baby sleeping by herself. When my LO was just a few months old we ran into the same problem that Daddy was disturbing him in a morning. So I moved into the spare room with him until he was about 5 months. We have been back in the master bedroom ever since. Now he is a little older he doesn't sleep no were as light as he used too. Some days when my hubby as to be at work at 6am and will be up real early he will spend that night in the spare room. That's so he doesn't disturb me lol

It is a personal choice. I just hated the idea of my little baby being by himself, he was so small. I know I wouldn't sleep if he was in another room.

But if your ok with it and you take all the safety measures to keep your baby safe, monitor next to your bed so you can hear if anything happens.

You should be fine.

[Terra]

Originally Posted by LilyGrace I don't think you're a bad mom. May I add a suggestion to your shopping list? If you don't have a white noise machine, I'd seriously consider getting one. It might help everyone get more sleep.

Yes this. My second son was a light sleeper until we started running a fan and a humidifier. Now he's great and sleeps right through my husband's snoring!

[justbishop]

We have a humidifier, but DH thinks it's too loud for DD *sigh* Maybe I'll look into a white noise machine so that we can adjust the volume.

And yes, we will definitely be making sure everything is safe whenever we move her into her own room. I won't do it until I have a video monitor, no matter how old she is and what state of readiness her room is in.

[MT_ranch_mom]

No you're not a bad mommy at all! I will say though, that my kids sleep best when the white noise is *just* louder than we think it should be. My babies all slept in their crib pretty early. They sleep best it their own crib. The only time we co-sleep is when one is sick or when DD2 wakes up around 4:30-5 am to nurse. DH gets up to go to work at 4:30am so I just bring DD2 in the bed with me and nurse her and we both go back to sleep.

Mainly they sleep best in their own rooms because one is always being loud..LOL! DD2 could never nap in the living room for her 2yo big sister being so loud and DD1 could never nap on the couch cause DD2 is in that high pitch screaming phase.

If you move her and it doesn't work out, you can always move her back down. Nothing is permanent.

[justbishop]

Ahhh! Why didn't I think of posing the "nothing is permanent" argument?! Thank you!

[EmmaLaurel]

I think it's absolutely to each their own. My DD is 3 mo and we had never decided one way or another where we wanted her to sleep - we figured we would just do what worked, keeping in mind that we wanted to always be really in tune with her and available to her. So for the first 6 weeks or so she was in a co-sleeper thing between us in the bed. She outgrew that and was being woken up by our movements, so we moved her to a Moses basket on a huge ottoman at the foot of our bed. She is getting close to outgrowing that, so we were looking at either needing to buy some type of sidecar/bassinet arrangement or move her to her crib to sleep (we wanted to be able to transition her to a new sleep space IN the basket before she outgrew it completely). Her crib in her room is about 8 feet from my side of the bed, we sleep with the doors open, and we have a monitor - she is now sleeping in her basket in her crib at night and it works wonderfully. She sleeps harder, DH and I can actually have a conversation before we go to bed. I kind of thought we could co-sleep longer than we did, but this has just ended up being the best thing for all of us. She is happy and we are happy.

She does usually wake up @ 5:30 to nurse and I just bring her to bed with us. She stays there until we all get up @ 7:30. I adore the morning cuddles!