Co-sleeping

There seems to be an uptick of conversation on the blogs I read about attachment parenting. Discussions about wearing your baby hours at a time and the benefits of co-sleeping are frequent. It’s funny, but the co-sleeping in my house has been of a different sort.

The summer that Big Girl was 5 and Skater was 3, they started co-sleeping — with each other. They had already had “sleepovers” in her bed, a double, but that summer it was pretty much every night. I didn’t mind: it was frankly easier to give one tuck-in than two. And I hoped it would bond them in a way my sisters and I never had. I love my sisters, but it still amazes me that they speak to me at all after the way I treated them growing up. We were not close until we were adults. And we certainly never had sleepovers in each other’s rooms voluntarily.

Bulldog has gotten into the act since he was old enough to be able to “sleep over.” He has slept in Skater’s lower bunk bed (I didn’t let them sleep up top till they were each six) alone, right in Skater’s twin bed with him, and in Big Girl’s double with her. In the summer I don’t mind the musical beds. During the school year, it is mostly confined to weekends.

Last night was an exception. Both boys were in A Year with Frog and Toad at the JCC, and yesterday was their big final performances. Then we pizza’d and ice cream’d at a friend’s house, and tried to get them to bed early. Skater and Bulldog layed in Bulldog’s bed while I read a Junie B. Jones book. (Big Girl never loved Junie, and I put her on a long hiatus subsequent to Big Girl cutting her friend’s hair after reading about Junie doing it to herself. That Junie had gotten in trouble  didn’t occur to her; she just thought it would be fun. The friend didn’t.) The boys thought Junie was hysterical. Maybe it was the carbs kicking in, cause I don’t find her that clever, just naughty. But they were cracking up, and I ended up reading for half an hour instead of ten minutes.

Then, they were so warm and already snuggled in that I let them sleep together. I went in later just to stare at them: I know it won’t last forever, but I value their co-sleeping much more than I valued any night I let a baby fall asleep next to me.