To want DS in our room FOREVER.....

[InFlames]

....Well, not quite forever.

But DH (who is lovely and a fantastic Dad) is completely unmoveable on his view that DS should go into his own room dead on 26 weeks.

I can't BEAR it yet (note dramatic use of capitals). No idea why, no logic to it, just not ready to not have him in our room yet.

Not about wanting to keep him a tiny baby, and not concerned about SIDS (think other factors are probably bigger i.e. overheating / smoking around Bub etc). But can't bear thought of not hearing his snuffles as I fall asleep.

Have had several 'discussions' on the subject and DH seems to be in the 'You were unwilling to compromise on smacking, I am unwilling to compromise on this' kind of camp.

AIBU and WWYD (or, what have you done)?

[ilovedora27]

Our DD coslept til 2.6 and we had loads of sex. We have, and always have had every since a week after birth, sex 3-4 times a week. We just used to do it on the floor on the living room with a duvet on the floor and call it the love nest. Then after that and sitting and chatting go get in bed with DD and all cuddle up.

We both loved it and we both have a very close bond with DD. I think its lovely when a dad wants to do that to, and cant understand anyone not wanting to do tbh. Its the most natural thing in the world and what they do in other countries. I think it all depends on how close you are as a family.

[muminthecity]

YANBU. DD slept in my bed until she was 4, when she decided she was ready to sleep in her own room. This suited us both, but I'm single so didn't have anyone else to consider.

[VforViennetta]

I don't really see the big hoo haa about moving to own room if you are not co-sleeping, obviously the 6 month thing for sids is a consideration, also if they are still night feeding it's more convenient.

We room shared with the first two until 2, purely circumstance based. Think we put ds2 in his own room and moved ds1 in with dd, around 7 months. I think with older babies you disturb them more than they disturb you, plus it's nice not to have to creep around, getting into bed, and to be able to read if you so wish. Our bedroom shares a wall with ds2's room though, so if you live in a 4 storey Victorian terrace or a stately home YANBU .

[Mooncoup]

YANBU Every family has to find what they feel most comfortable with

My youngest is still in our room at 18 months. She doesn't have her own room or even her own bed, as she's not ready yet.

DD1 moved out gradually starting around her 2nd birthday when we sorted out a room & bed for her. It was a v gradual transition and now at 3.10 she spends many more nights in her own room than ours, but still comes through I guess about once a week.

We moved DC1 out at 7 months because we thought that was "what you did". I was very uncomfortable with it and it took ages to get used to. It was a load of faff getting up to him until he got big enough to come through under his own steam.

My aims overnight are not to lift my head off the pillow and for everyone to get as much rest as possible. Until DC3 is able to get out of bed, walk to our room and climb into bed with us unaided these aims are best achieved by keeping her in our room .

[edwardcullensotherwoman]

YANBU to want him there, but I'm afraid I can't agree. DS was in his own room by 6 weeks, and in his big cot by 8 (outgrew the moses basket a lot quicker than I thought!). He's always been settled in his own bed, even the basket when he was tiny. He's now 3 and we've never had bedtime issues. I did, however, and still do have a monitor so I can listen for him at night. We even used a sensor mat until he was 18mo

But I couldn't wait to have my bedroom back!

[lilolilmanchester]

I was like you (and DH like your DH - they just don't get it, do they???) , but in both cases, once DCs were sleeping through and we were getting used to the unbroken sleep, the snuffling & shuffling kept waking me up and that was that!!

Your OP made me laugh.. it's bad enough having a teenager coming home at all hours without having him come into your room ... You're very welcome to borrow him for the weekend if you want to know what it's like to have them in your room forever!!!! (I know you were joking but it did make me laugh)

[InFlames]

On iPhone- DH c

[InFlames]

On iPhone- in bed- listening to DS sniffle, snore, suck thumb and wiggle sideways so legs are trying to poke through bars.... Will be very strange when he's not in here!

Decent monitor sounds like a compromisable point, and there's a sofa bed in DS's room too if he's ever unwell - touch wood not even a cold so far.

Would be lovely to have 4 storey Victorian house tho #wistful look wondering if that'll ever happen# ....

[InFlames]

And chuckling at lllolllmanchester - DH has 2 sons in their 20's now, we've been together 6.5 years and had MANY a night of drunken teen boys coming home.... Forever hmmm maybe not :-)

[Joolyjoolyjoo]

YANBU, although your DH is, of course, entitled to a say.

One thing I will say, though, is that with dd1, I believed all my aunts etc telling me that unless I moved her out at 6mths, she would get clingy, it would be impossible etc. So I did, and it was HELL. She became far far more clingy, and refused to sleep unless I was in the room, preferably holding her hand. I was so sleep deprived I was sitting there half the night weeping. Even when I did creep into my own bed finally, I lay on tenterhooks waiting for her to cry out. No way was DH getting near me anyway- I was alert to every creak of the cot, every snuffle, every little noise she made (she was through the wall- sometimes I had such a strong desire to cut a hole in the bloody wall, just to be near her!) I spent many nights lying awake crying, and that and my sleep deprivation affected our relationship more than a sleeping baby in the room would have done.

When dd2 was born, dd1 was only 17 mths. I was too shattered to go through the whole thing again, and didn't want her waking dd1, who remained a "bad" sleeper. So dd2 came into our bed for feeding and sometimes stayed there for a bit, and sometimes went into her cot in the room. My God- soooo much easier! I was so much happier, she was so contented and we all got so much more sleep! When I finally moved her in with dd1 (when she was about a year), she continued to sleep well (better than dd1!) and the transition was really smooth.

Repeated same thing with ds- we had to build him a room, so he stayed in with us (in cot/ bed whatever) until he was around 15 mths. Again transferred to his own room with no trouble whatsoever.

When I look back, I feel awful about how we tried to "teach" dd1 to be in her own room, because it went against all my instincts and made me a jittery unhappy and knackered wreck, and she never settled as easily as the others did anyway, so pointless in the end, for us.

That's just my experience, though- i'm not saying that that is how it would be for everyone! Obviously several people on this thread found it no problem, I think it is because it went against my gut and it wasn't a natural transition that it went so wrong for me. But I'm just trying to point out that your own instinct is more important than other people's experiences!

[JellyBellies]

OP, i wOuld recommend the book 3 in the bed. Can find it on amazon. Its amazing and you will understand why you want ur DS in you room :)

Sorry, on the ipodnso hard to link!

[Morloth]

Personally I wouldn't move him in your situation. I would expect DH to just suck it up.

Is he going to get up at 5am, go into the other room and feed the baby?

No? Didn't think so.

Thank fuck DH is very keen on our babies, we would have had huge clashes if he had tried to move my babies away from me at 6 months.

If he absolutely insists on the baby out of the room and you insist on sleeping near the baby (which makes sense to me) then you will need to set up a bed in the baby's room. But that just seems stupid, why would a grown man put his needs above that of a small baby's?

DS2 now shares with DS1, they both got kicked out at about 12 months because we were waking each other up, however if he is having a rough night I just bring him into bed with us and DS1 often turns up as well.

When we are on holiday I prefer it if we are all in the same room, just feels snugger and 'safer'.

We bought a bigger bed for just this reason.

[exoticfruits]

It has nothing to do with how close you are as a family-you can be very, very close with your own rooms. It is personal choice, you can upset your DH and insist that you are having him in the room, but I hardly see how that benefits your DS-much better to have two loving parents and his own room than to be in with mother and a resentful father.
It isn't important. I had a loving childhood, a very good relationship with my parents and that is all I remember. I have absolutely no idea how long I was in their room and have never thought to even ask.
Now that mine are older I can look back over friends- and their adult relationship with their DC has nothing whatever to do with sleeping arrangements when they were young.
The important thing to a DC is that the parents have a loving equal relationship-not one where the mother lays down the law! It would be nice if your DH thought the same but he doesn't. He gave in to your ideas on smacking (way, way more important than sleeping) so it would seem, that as this is very important to him, you give way. Marriage and parenthood is give and take-especially important as you will have decades with just DH when DS has flown the nest!

[lynehamrose]

Agree with exotic totally.
I don't get families where the mother seems to think she should lay down the law and the father is some kind of second rate parent who has to defer to her. I cant see how that is a recipe for a successful partnership or good parenting - and is probably less likely to lead to healthy family dynamics long term than a partnership where each parent feels valued and equal.
Op- your dh's desire to have your room as your private space, and to get his child used to his own room and JUST as valid as your desire to keep him in your room.
Start talking to your dh about how to compromise. If you were hoping to simply get more people backing your view on AIBU so that you can overrule him with numbers, then you're missing the point that this child is your husbands as much as yours. It doesn't matter whether most MNers agree with you or him- it's not our child!

[catwhiskers10]

I know how you feel, I hated the thought of DD going into her own room (luckily DH didn't mind her being in our room).
She slept in a cot in our room (and occasionally co-slept) until she was 9 months before moving into her own room as we realised that the noise of us moving in bed (and DH snoring) was waking her in the night.
As for the idea of too much contact making them clingy-I don't think that's true. I think it's natural for babies to be close to their parents and it gives them security.
We have now reached the stage of DD shrugging our hands off her and biscuit crumbs trailing and I miss being able to be close to her in the way we were when she was tiny.
If it begins to cause a problem in your marriage having your DS in your room I think you should at least try moving him out and see how it goes. If he's sleeping through the night and you are asleep, you might find youre not as bothered as you think you might be by the time he gets to 26 weeks.

[sunnydelight]

YANBU, but neither is your DH, you just have different ideas so need to work out a compromise somehow.

[Chandon]

be honest to yourself.

Is it about YOUR needs, or the baby's needs, the family's needs?

[Morloth]

See I have never understood why it is such a bad thing when a woman says 'I want this' it is OK to do things for our needs sometimes, we don't always have to put everyone else's before ours.

Even if it is about the OP's needs, why does her husband's wants/needs trump hers?

It is bullshit that keeping your baby close makes them clingy, my anecdata suggests the opposite, both my boys now have far better things to do than to want to snuggle with me, that is exactly as it should be, so I am glad I got in all the cuddles I could when they were tiny.

It is such a short time in our lives that our babies want to be close to us. What? Lets say 10 years out of 85 (assuming average life span and 3 children). If it makes you happy to snuggle up with your baby and listen to him sleep then do it, because he will be gone in a blink. If your DH can't indulge you with this then why not?

[exoticfruits]

I don't get families where the mother seems to think she should lay down the law and the father is some kind of second rate parent who has to defer to her

This is the bit that I really don't get-the attitude 'DH doesn't like it-tell him to lump it'.
Probably goes on for 18yrs, in some cases, and DC goes off to university leaving 2 people who are parents, but not a couple. Lots of couple break up at this point-their parenting role is gone and they are left with nothing-but never mind 17yrs ago DC was made secure by co sleeping!
It is one of those things that parents ought to discuss before DCs, I get the impression that OP did-or at least sometime ago-and they came to the agreement of 6 months (I may be wrong)
It is lovely if you want to do it, but not if you both don't. It is no big deal, not smacking is a much more important issue-that is one that really matters to the DC.
(I don't think I would like a system where mother is the senior parent and father fits in-under the direction of 'the expert'.)

[exoticfruits]

OK to do things for our needs sometimes, we don't always have to put everyone else's before ours

ours in my book is me, DH and baby. No ours meaning me!

[RitaMorgan]

If the mother is doing night feeds though I do think she should have final say over sleeping arrangements.

[exoticfruits]

Why? I bf in the night-pointless us both waking up. DH had to get up at 5.30am-I could sleep on. It wasn't difficult to get up. The first cry did it-never needed more. I was all cosy, so was the baby, we stayed in the dark. No problem and we all got enough sleep.

[Morloth]

Sometimes I do things just to please myself and everyone in the family has to suck it up.

Not all the time, not most of the time, but sometimes I want something a certain way and that is the way it is going to be.

Personally, I think most women spend too much time always worrying about what everyone around them wants and don't spend enough time thinking about what they might want.

For me it would have been quite distressing to have my babies in another room at 6 months, DH loves me, therefore he doesn't want me to be distressed. Very simple equation.

We have an excellent relationship that doesn't solely revolve around the children, but in that first year in particular I want my babies close, as close as I can keep them and everyone else can just fuck right off if they don't like it and that would include DH.

It isn't forever and it makes her happy to have her DS close by, why is it so important for him to have the baby further away?

[exoticfruits]

It seems emotional blackmail to me 'if you love me you will do it my way'!
OP hasn't come back-but I bet from the post that she originally agreed on 6months.
Discussion and compromise are needed in any relationship.

[WoTmania]

if she has to get up out of bed, go to another room, get the baby out of cot sit nad nurse of course it's going to impact on her sleep. Her DH isn't waking during the night feed and seems to want the baby out of the room (not bed) for some kind of tit-for-tat reason. Just because the OP doesn't want to smack in later years.
If his sleep was being impacted then it would be different (although in my case DH just slept in a different bed - we're still very happy) but it's not it's just form the sound of it, him being bloodyminded. It isn't as if it's going to be forever.