The Great Escape

It has been awhile.  Far too long since I have taken the time to put our story into words.  I guess I have been waiting for the perfect time to have enough time...and well, that is never going to happen, who am I kidding!  And, while I wait, impatiently, life continues to happen.  So today I figured I can't wait anymore, before I know it I will have so many stories, moments and pictures to share that I won't even know where to start and I will end up leaving something out.


We are co-sleepers.  There, I said it.  Yep, we sleep with our children from time to time...in the same bed!  And yes, we also did it when they were babies.  I know there are dangers, really I do, but now we are past that point and frankly there is no going back.  We are blessed with two very healthy and happy children that quite honestly, I think they hung the moon.


When Paige was born I could not get her to sleep anywhere other than my arms, or on my chest.  The second I would set her down she would wake and cry, I would pick her back up again to snuggle with her and she would quickly drift back to sleep.  And so it began, for weeks I tried.  I could never bear to let her cry it out in her crib, I refused.  I simply am not built that way.  I just am not.  It sounds crazy I know to tie your self down, pinned to the couch or rocking chair just to let your baby sleep when there is so much to be done.  But really, at the end of the day I didn't care.  For her first 6 weeks of life I slept on the couch, with my sweet baby girl on my chest.  Her "awake" time was usually between 2 & 5 in the morning anyway, and since I was home on leave we would watched movies while Daddy slept.  Unfortunately our couch started to resemble a nest, we had our comfy little spot carved out amid a swirl of blankets and pillows not to be tampered with.  Eventually it was time to move as the couch had also taken on a permanent nest-like form.

After those first six weeks we started to get on more of a schedule and Paige was sleeping through the night much better, I tried moving her to her crib.  Nope, you guessed it.  Not going to happen, we tried...not that hard, but we did try.  Remember, I am not built that way.  So what was the next best option?  The swing!  Perfect!  Almost as good a Mommy but we each get our OWN space.  The swing worked great until Paige was about four months, it was then that by the time she had been sleeping awhile she would sort of begin to lean to the side so much that I would worry she could slip out.  Really there was no way, but first time Mom's worry.  Oh, and then at her 4 month check up I was informed that the swing was making her perfect little head, well not so perfect.  It was time for a change!


Again, we tried the crib.  It was a no go. What a bunch of wussies right?  So into our bed she came, I put up a nice bed rail and there she slept until she was nearly three years old.  Yep, three.  Every time I would tell someone that Paige would sleep with us I would get a look, but I got used to it and was comfortable with our choice so what did it matter what other people thought.  Looking back it sounds so crazy, but I don't regret it for a minute.  When I was pregnant with Quinn, having Paige nuzzle up to me each night wasn't quite as comfortable as it used to be so we decided it was time to transition Paige to a big girl bed.  We had tried over the years not only the crib of course, but also the toddler bed that the crib converted into.  The only thing Paige did in the toddler bed was jump up and down as if it were a trampoline with a handle, or play with her toys there.  That was where her stuffed animals and babies slept, no way , not her.


After looking at quite a  few places we settled on a captain's bed that sat over a set of 6 drawers and thankfully matched the existing crib and dresser.  You see, our kids share a room, the room is pretty big but they do share.  Paige was hesitant at first of her big girl bed but very quickly became excited about it and eager to sleep it.  Oh, did I forget...she still had to sleep with Mommy.  It was "our" new bed..yippee!  Just what I had hoped for!  So for the next few weeks I slept with Paige, once she was accustomed the new bed  it was great and it was all hers....thank goodness, that only took 4 years!


That being said, when Quinn was born I had learned my lesson.  I did not sleep on the couch.  Quinn did not sleep in the swing overnight (unless absolutely necessary for the sleep deprived mommy), but he did not sleep in his crib either.  Quinn and I would bounce back and forth between our bed and Paige's bed.  Quinn was up often and I wanted to sleep.  So, more often than not for the first five months Paige would sleep with Jeff and Quinn and I took her bed so everyone could get the best sleep possible.  Talk about musical beds!


Well, Quinn took to napping and sleeping in his crib quite well and without any heartache on my part thankfully.  He cried a bit at first but nothing too dramatic...and then he slept.  And he slept in a crib, a real crib.  At my house!  Who would have thought.  We all began to sleep in our intended place every single night!!!


So this is all leading us up to the story behind this post.  I don't know why I thought I had to rewind four and a have years to set this story up but I did.  And now it is written down so Paige knows why she needs a therapist one day.  Thanks to Mommy and her "co-sleeping".  Actually, I know without a shadow of a doubt.  Paige will be perfect, and may a bit more confident and secure because of it.


Now back to the other one, the little one.  My sweet, determined accident waiting to happen Quinn.  For some time now we have been really enjoying everyone sleeping through the night in their own beds, it really has been wonderful and took a long time for us to get there.  Well that all came to a screeching halt Saturday night which also happened to be the day Quinn turned 18 months exactly.

It was 2:30 in the morning early Sunday and we were awakened by a babbling baby.  You would have thought there were a few babies in the room for how much chatter was going on.  We laid in bed listening for a bit and then decided since he wasn't crying, he would eventually fall back asleep.  We were wrong, for the next 2 1/2 hours the babbling and chattering continued oblivious to my daughter who slept merely a few inches away.  My husband and I would drift in and out of sleep making note of the chatter, and the fact that he wasn't upset in any way.  We thought if we went in, it would encourage the middle of the night behavior and clearly...he wouldn't be interested in going back to sleep from what I could tell.  He was safe, in his crib, and we could sleep.  It was about 5:00 in the morning the last time either of us recall hearing him and when we got up in the morning, he slept a while longer...as he should.  I asked Paige if she hear her brother talking all night and she frankly said to me " No Mom, I didn't hear Quinny.  When I go to sleep I put my listening ears away."  Well there you have it.  I guess one advantage of having two kids in one room is that they learn to sleep through just about anything!

Sunday evening rolled around and I hoped that Quinn would sleep through the night.  There is nothing like not getting a good nights sleep that will ignite a nasty case of the Mondays!  Well, my hopes were smashed, smashed by a steamroller that decided to destroy our new found sleeping arrangements as we knew it.  I was woken up by Jeff at about 1:30 in the morning whispering something that sounded much like "Holy Schmidt! Quinn is standing in the hall!"

Did I just hear that right? 
Quinn in standing in the hall?  What?!!!

Aside from the fact that it is nearly pitch dark, I am also blind as a bat without my glasses so my first instinct was just to call out his name.  My heart was racing as if we had heard the front door open.  It must have just been a middle of the night thing.  Once I called his name it was immediately returned by a "Da!"  filled with excitement and a quick scamper of little feet running towards the bed.  Once he reached me I scooped him up pulling him safely into bed with us, my mind racing with thought of what just happened.  How did he get out?  Did he fall?  Did he get hurt?  How did we not hear him?  How long was he awake?  Was he wandering around the house? Gasp! What could he have gotten into!  My mind swirled with all of the "What ifs".  Thankfully he was safe and sound and incredibly pleased with his escape.  He was so wound up it took nearly an hour to get him back to sleep, in our bed, where he slept the rest of the night.

Monday night we decided that if this was going to be a new thing..we needed to know how he was doing it.  And make sure he was safe.  The only way he could safely get out without falling would have been to climb from the crib to Paige's bed which is maybe a little too close in hindsight.  I was sure though that his escape was due to the fact that I still had the bumpers in the crib along with a myriad of blankets and stuffed animals which could easily be piled up to give him a lift.  The only way to know was to do it again.  I removed all of the "stuff" from the crib leaving only a mattress on the lowest setting and lowered Quinn in.  Then Jeff, Paige and I sat anxiously on the bed to see what happened next.  It didn't take long.