When I was well into my third trimester, I remember people telling me that I should “enjoy my sleep while it lasts.” Little did they know, sleep was a sore subject already. I was itchy, impatient, and terrified of accidentally going into labor at home. Also, I had a fully formed tiny human kicking me from the inside at 3 am. It couldn’t get worse than that, right?
Wrong. When my daughter was a newborn, sleep became a thing of the past. This time, I was waking up at 3 am for a new reason — the early morning feed. Plus, people failed to tell me that I’d be wide-awake even when she was sleeping soundly, out of fear that something would go wrong. SIDS is a rare yet scary possibility. For paranoid parents, it’s enough of a threat to wake up every 20 minutes just to look at the monitor.
These days, I’m 2.5 years in. My daughter can talk to me, tell me how she’s feeling and has a better idea of her sleep routine. Gone are the days of complete paranoia. She knows that if she needs anything, her parents will be there.
But, there’s been one bad habit that’s been really hard to break when the 3 am wakeup is now based around a nightmare or due to loneliness. Other parents might assume that I’m nuts — but, I have no problem letting her sleep with my husband and me for the rest of the night.
Source : https://www.littlethings.com/soothe-my-toddlers-sleep-issues/