At home we cosleep with Helena since day one.
It was the only way I could sleep… we tried to put her in her crib but for me it was a nightmare: I was scared, I feelt guilty and sad, I didn’t want to sleep away from her (just a few centimeters, I know), I needed to feel her and to know that she was breathing.
Crazy, right?
Later I learned that those were really my instincts and that all the rationality that I tried to give to the situation was impossible: they were instincts and nothing more.
She’s now 2 and we still sleep together and it’s the best option for my family. Sometimes I feel tired but we still want to do it this way.
Everyone always has an opinion about how you should raise your baby: how you should feed your kids, how much tv they should watch, at what age you should start with potty training, how many words your baby should say at his/her age and of course, where and when your baby should sleep.
It’s terrible because as mothers we ALWAYS feel guilty for anything and there’s so few people who is there to tell you how well you are doing it.
We fight against our maternal instincts to accommodate what society wants us to do and added to that, we have to fight with our own internal monsters that sometimes make us feel exhausted, with the desire to scream because we sleep poorly, with NO desire to play cooking imaginary food with a toddler and then to paint the same flower for hours with the same color because another pencil is not reasonable for that toddler who rules us.
That mom that you are about to advise to do something else IS DOING THE BEST SHE CAN AND SHE’S DOING WELL.
And you, mom, if you want to sleep with your baby, DO IT.
If you can not sleep if your baby is not against your chest, it doesn’t matter what they say: DO IT.
Be happy with your motherhood, it is hard (believe me, I Know!!) but it is also beautiful and you will be wrong more than once, yes, but YOU ARE DOING WELL.
