I thought we were doomed for sure. What had been a “once-in-awhile” thing had turned into a “once-a-night” thing. You toddler parents know exactly what I’m talking about: At around 4 a.m. you hear those tiny footsteps sneaking across your bedroom floor. There’s a tug at your covers as your kiddo pulls himself up and over your body and finds a spot right between you.
Some nights, he’d turn perpendicular to us and — no matter how many times we tried to nudge him back into place — his feet would end up stomping my husband’s chest and his arms would slap around at my face — all. night. long. Most nights though, he slept soundly between us. And for some reason, he always woke up really happy, peering his beaming face over my shoulder: “Mama! Why are your eyes closed, mama?!”
Because… I’m sleeping. But how could you not mirror that little smile? Even running on five hours of heavily interrupted sleep.
Sometimes, my husband and I would wake before him, our eyes meeting over his still body.
“I kind of like this,” he’d whisper.
“Me, too,” I’d say.
After we got a couple weeks into this routine, I worried about what we should be doing. Should I be getting my giant pregnant body up and out of bed and marching him back into his at 4 a.m.? Should I wait until he falls back asleep and carry him in there? How will we sleep like this when the new baby is here, and wailing every other hour to be fed? Will we have to sleep in different rooms? How are we going to manage that when we have friends and family staying with us early on? I really need to get this figured out now… and then I realized, wait, no I don’t.
That’s for a few reasons: I wanted more sleep (and giving him a hand into bed and then passing right back out was way easier than 4 a.m. toddler negotiations). The baby also won’t be here for another two months (that’s forever in toddler land!). And… yeah… I really did like the extra snuggles with my little baby boy (who’s turning out to be less and less of a baby as the days go by). It won’t be long until he’s not actually “the baby” anymore, and I’m wanting to soak in as much time with just the three of us as we can before everything changes completely. So — bring on the 4 a.m. snuggles!
And then… he didn’t come into our bed the other night. Then it was two nights in a row. And now, it’s been a whole week that we haven’t seen his face until well after daybreak. Just as quickly as the whole thing started, it ended. Which reminded me… everything in parenthood really is a season: The diaper changes, the middle of the night feedings, teething, tantrums. And just like the seasons, things are always changing. And here I am now, getting up every two hours to hit the potty, missing how just last week my little man was tugging at the covers to snuggle next to us in bed.
At least I remembered to snap a few pictures 😉
