Wednesday, May 6, 2009

Wanting to get it right

I am FINALLY feeling better from my wisdom teeth surgery and so I thought it was time to get back to blogging. Here goes. The girls are not doing well at sharing a room. Actually, to be more honest, Gabe and I are not doing a good job at training them to share a room. We've been taking the easy route. Here's the truth. Every day Grace takes her morning nap in her crib in the room her and Maddie share. That's an easy one because Maddie isn't in there at that time. But, since Grace was small (born) she has enjoyed sleeping in her pack-and-play in the basement. It's super quiet, totally dark and there aren't any two year old's talking her ear off while she drifts off to sleep. She is now 8 months old (in 2 days) and my fear that she has become so accustomed to the basement and therefore won't sleep in her bedroom has become a reality. Here's the point. When the day is long and I'm counting the minutes until peace comes over my home (bedtime), the last thing I want to do is listen to Grace cry while Maddie simultaneously talks to her and yells for me. It's exhausting. I've been doing some reading tonight and it seems that the only way to solve this is to stick it out. Let the baby cry, let Maddie yell. But that seems so daunting because there are days when my whole day feels like I'm "sticking it out." To think that I have to end it that way seems like torture. Gabe has a whole other perspective. He thinks it's fine that Grace likes the basement for bedtime. He thinks that she'll sleep in her crib at night when she's ready and the fact that she takes a loooooooooong morning nap in it means that she can sleep there just fine.
So, what is it then? What is it about me/my personality that desperately wants to get things right? I cannot leave well enough alone. I have friends who are talking/blogging about not getting any sleep and I'm complaining because my kids get an abundant 11+ hours only in separate rooms!?! Any advice or thoughts would be much appreciated. Am I worrying about something that is nothing; meaning, Grace will eventually sleep in her room when the time is right? Or, is it best to try to break the basement habit now and just deal with the growing pains of sharing a room?

2 comments:

Laura said...

Speaking from a new mommy... ;) what I've been doing is going with the easy route, not sure if it's the right thing to do but it makes us all happier doing it. Sure I don't let Lucy cry it out (just yet), she's a newborn, but I do think that babies/kids will mostly cry for a reason so if you know what that is and it's fixable then go with it. Less pain for the parents.

I've stopped reading online what my child should be doing (i.e. sleeping patterns, feeding, etc.) and I'm just going with what makes her (and us) all happy. So far so good, she's a very happy and calm baby. I'm just going with my motherly instincts.

I think if Gracie is happy sleeping in the basement then that will make the household more happy. She'll grow up so fast that you'll forget that it was even an issue one day.
But I'm only 4 weeks in... my opinions could change. haha :)

Oh, and my other suggestion is to move out here and buy a 3 bedroom house!! ;)

Anonymous said...

Hey Sarah I am logging in on this one. I vote for the basement. Grace is happy there and sleeps well and I can guarantee she will at some point prefer to sleep with her sister. Alex once spent almost an entire year sleeping in Patrice and Janie's room with Patrice having to switch to his room. There was no apparent reason for this except some mutterings from him regarding aliens coming. We opted with the "go with flow" don't want to deal with it method and one day he just decided to go back to his room. Don't sweat it honey she won't stay down there forever.
Love ya,
Sandy