Thursday, February 19, 2009

Is she sleeping through the night?

Wherever we go the 2 questions I get are "How old is she" and "Is she sleeping through the night?" Why do people care if my baby sleeps through the night? If she doesn't are they implying that they want to come over and help out? Does it define your parenting skills if your baby sleeps through the night? What exactly constitutes sleeping through the night? I mean some people only get 5 hours of sleep while others get 9 hours of sleep. Well anyway, to answer the question Bailey sleeps at night as much as she needs to and for as long as her little belly allows. This translates into usually a 4 or 5 hour stretch a feeding followed by another 3-4 hour stretch. To me the question should be "Does she go back to sleep after you feed her" because if she doens't that is when the night is tough to me. I actually enjoy feeding her in the night time. I go in there and get her while she is all swaddled up. I cuddle up with her on the couch while she feeds and we both doze in and out. Someone told me when she was first born that when she sleeps through the night I will miss this time. When she was getting up every 2 hours I thought this statement was insane but now I get it. It makes sense. It is wonderful. It is just me and her and silence except for her little milk guzzling sounds. So, I guess I should throw people off and when they ask I should say, "Why would I?"

2 comments:

Kelli said...

That's so sweet, and very true. Even already, Corgan is almost four months old, and growing so fast, and I miss when he was needing me more in the night. *Sigh*

Our Legacy Portraits said...

Janet - you WILL miss her waking up at night. My last baby didn't totally sleep through the night until he was 8 months old. Getting up and nursing him was our alone time and I loved every minute of it. Enjoy it! She'll grow up so fast.