Milestones

I  find milestones to be bittersweet.  It's great and exciting  when your baby rolls  over for the first time, when they learn to sit, eat, get their first tooth, say their first words and take their first steps but they all signify a change that your baby is growing up.

4 days old

We reached one of those milestones tonight.

Since Sebastian's birth we have always remained  with him while he drifted off to sleep.   We co-slept with him for the first 7 months of his life and then once he was transferred to his crib there was a bit of time in which we would put him down to bed in his crib drowsy and he would drift off to sleep.

Once Seb transferred to a toddler bed and he began to get up from bed the moment we put him down for the night we decided that we would remain in the room with him until he fell asleep.  We would always take turns, with Jamie remaining in the room one night and me the next, and we would hold his hand and/or gently stroke his forehead and sing him lullabies as he drifted off to sleep.

When we moved to our new home this continued, but now that he was in a regular sized twin bed  we would crawl into bed with him and remain with him, even having a nap ourselves at times, while he fell asleep.

I know a lot of people who frown on this and believe that children need to learn how to fall asleep on their own, but we naturally follow the path of attachment parenting.  We always took this time to cuddle and to talk about his day as we listened to lullabies.  We have had friends scoff at us and eyes rolled when one of us has slipped upstairs for 20 minutes to stay with Sebastian while he falls asleep but I would never have changed it for the world.

7 months old

You see, I knew that one day we wouldn't be needed.  That one day Sebastian would feel secure enough to drift off to sleep on his own.  I firmly believed, and still do, that it was important that he knew we would never leave him alone and scared.  The dishes could wait.  The tv shows could wait.  Everything could wait if it meant that our little boy was learning that he could trust his parents to be there for him, and we were.  And I also knew that getting cuddles from your baby is something they may possibly out grow and that once a moment is past, you can never get it back.  That is why it is so important to cherish these little moments now and appreciate the time you do have with your child because you never know when those moments will end. 

For us, that moment ended tonight.

I'm glad that Sebastian came to this on his own terms.  Another milestone for Sebastian and another bittersweet moment for a mommy who is so proud of her boy growing up but so sad that these little moments are passing us by.