Chasing Sleep

We took a weekend trip to Lake Arrowhead this past weekend. Our accommodations presented us with one king-size bed for the the three of us: me, Kadin and Sabine (I hate that their names rhyme but that's another story).

In case the co-sleeping thing didn't work, I came prepared by bringing a super soft cushion/roll-up bed for Sabine. I've never understood how other parents co-sleep. I've tried it multiple times. And every time, it ended in Sabine waking up and crying every hour and a half; Kadin tossing and turning and snoring in ways that resemble an earthquake experience; and me getting absolutely zero sleep and wanting to poke my eyes out the next day.

The first night, I set up Sabine's portable bed on the floor next to the king-size bed. She, of course, wanted nothing to do with it and everything to do with our bed. So I happily scooped her up, forgetting who she really is: a solo sleeper since birth. I had romantic notions swimming around in my brain--thoughts of cuddling with her all night long and smelling her sweet baby breath and knowing what it's like to have my two favorite people safely snuggled next to me in one big bed all night long.

But instead, my three peas in a pod experiment resulted in this:

...and Sabine waking up and crying every two hours.

So on that first night at about one in the morning when Sabine was silent and sleeping for a moment, I picked her up and plopped her onto her little bed beside us. Suddenly, Kadin stopped shaking things up, Sabine was shockingly quiet and I went to sleep. We survived the following two nights by letting her fall asleep in our bed and then transferring her to her "special bed."

And even though little Sabine clearly needs her own space, I did get some delicious cuddling in. Each night as she lay with me in our bed to fall asleep, she clutched my neck and and pressed her lips to my cheek. I felt her tiny heartbeat slow down, listened to her sing songs to herself and watched her eyelids grow so heavy that they had no choice but to fall closed. Her skin was buttery soft and her coconut-scented curls tickled my forehead. It was pure heaven. And being able to sleep once she was in her own little bed was just as heavenly.