Several times in the past few weeks, feeling nostalgic, I attempted to lay down on the futon with Kate in my arms. We used to sleep on said futon mattress, and it is still located in her room, directly beside her bed. But she would have none of it. Even tired and sleepy from nursing, content with her paci in her mouth, she still immediately flips over and pushes to her knees and then her feet, rushing off in a very toddler excitement, not really sure what she is doing or why. So frustrating. That’s why I finally had to move her to her crib, this inability to lay still and settle. I don’t really know when it happened, sometime between 8 months and 11 months. I remember (too vividly) when it just became too much for me, when she would attempt to crawl on top of me for an hour straight in the middle of the night, me struggling to remain calm and patient, repeatedly laying her back down, and then sobbing with frustration. Now I just put her in her crib. With no alternatives she lays down and goes to sleep without much fuss. In fact there are days when she’s fidgeting around in her crib for half an hour or more, babbling quietly and peeking over the side of the crib, when I realize that my presence is hindering not helping. I leave the room and she cries for a minute or two and then falls soundly asleep. (I discovered that by accident, when I had to take a break from her room for my own mental health after she toddled laps around her crib and alternated giggling while throwing her pacis out of the crib and then bawling when she realized she no longer had any pacis. I got up and left, frazzled as all hell, and she astounded me by falling asleep only minutes later.)

In a way it’s kind of ideal. It wasn’t easy by any means, but she transitioned from our bed to her room to her crib on her own time, when it was clear that she needed to. It just happened – not by itself, it still took time and effort to make the adjustment, but it was certainly easier than I expected it to be.

But. I still miss her terribly. Not quite as terribly as I did at first – her transition to the crib was much harder on me than it was on her – but still it aches. I enjoy having my own space in bed, being able to roll over and rustle without worrying about waking her up, and being able to read at leisure in bed (or type, as I am doing presently). What bothers me most, though, is that it seems to have been an all-or-nothing deal. When she was in our bed she needed me next to her at all times, and she needed to nurse all night long. Now that she’s in her crib she needs her space to flop around and grab her pacis and put herself to sleep. I can’t have a little of both. It makes sense logically: once you get used to going to sleep a certain way you rather like to do it the same way all the time. But there are days when I just want to hold her. I want to press my lips against her forehead and curl my body around hers the way I did when she was little, when she clutched me at night like a large mama security-blanket. It was tough being there 24/7, but it was so very special to me.

It’s true, what they say – as a parent you spend so much time wishing for things to move forward, then when they do you wish you hadn’t been so hasty. I wanted so much for her to sleep better at night, and yes I am absolutely thrilled that she is indeed sleeping better. But I think what I really wanted is more just the reassurance that some day she would sleep better. I remember feeling so panicked that she would be like that forever, waking up every 2 hours for the next 3 years. I worried that it was unfixable, a permanent problem. I worried that I had done something terribly wrong. Now? Now I look back and realize I didn’t. I did what was best for her and for me, and it worked out just fine. Hindsight, right?

I take solace in the thought that we will hopefully have another little one in the future. That’s what keeps me from hyperventilating when I realize Kate is growing up so darn fast. It’s not that I don’t enjoy who she is now – I do, in so many ways – I just wish I could have all of it at will: the newborn snuggles and little baby coos along with the funny, active toddler I have now. I need a little time machine so I can zip around at will to my favorite moments, reliving them over and over. I suppose that’s what journaling is supposed to do… but it’s not quite the same as experiencing it, needless to say.