Bed Bugs

Along with dropping naps and being overly tired, one of the sleep situations we've been dealing with over here is that Max has not and refuses to sleep in his bed. Mostly, I've been making a little bed for him on the floor with a big blanket. But, he's also fallen asleep on the rocking chair. He's tried to sleep on the changing table and the shelves under the changing table. He's said he is going to sleep on the ottoman. Or, just randomly someplace on the floor of his room with no pillow or blanket.

The best explanation I can come up with is that he's worried about bed bugs. He woke up crying several weeks or a month ago insisting there were bugs in his bed and wanting to sleep in my bed. When I ask him why he doesn't want to sleep in his bed, I get some crazy reasons that I can't even remember right now. The two most common reasons is that he doesn't like the safety bar that acts like a guard rail covering half the toddler bed. The other reason is that there are bugs in his bed. And, no amount of showing him otherwise, changing the sheets, or talking about it was changing his views. So, I just haven't been making an issue of where he sleeps as long as it was someplace in his room while I've thought about what I wanted to do/how to handle the situation.

I've seriously thought about converting back to the crib again. I rethought that again after this weekend when the house we visited had a crib still up and he wanted to climb in and make himself at home, of which I wouldn't let him because he was filthy dirty. But, once again decided against that because I can really use the crib for the twins and he is tall and lanky and awkward and more weight than I should be lifting. Plus, it is very hard for me to reach down and get things from the bottom of the crib and impossible if it is on the back side because I'm so short and now have a big belly in the way of a good reach.

What I decided to do is get a twin mattress and just put it on the ground for now until I can figure out what bedding situation I want for his room and the babies room, especially since I'm loosing my spare/guest room. I just ordered it on Sunday and got an email yesterday saying it would be delivered today. So, I sent Max and Noemi off to Target this morning for a mattress pad and twin sheets and we broke down the crib today. Max seemed excited and wanted to help/do it/have a turn with the tool and "we need to share momma!" until we started carting out the crib parts and putting them into the other room for now. I got a bit worried when he came in crying like he had been really hurt only to find out that he wanted his "little bed back". We talked about it and I asked why he wanted it back when he never slept in it to which I got no response. I asked him if he wanted the big boy bed and he said yes. We've been talking about this for some time and he has said he wanted it, but I guess he thought he was going to get both. I'd actually do that except there is absolutely no room for that.

Tonight at bedtime, he climbed right in and didn't get off it once. We are only slightly over 2 hours in to this "new first" of sleeping in the big bed, but so far things are looking good. Let's hope this is just what is needed to get us back on a good sleep cycle. He's been getting there, but not there yet by any stretch of the imagination.

As far as the bed bugs go, as near as I can figure, I think I heard my sister when she was here from NJ a few weeks/a month ago, tell Max "night night, don't let the bed bugs bite" and he's been worried about it ever since. Again, hopefully the new bed/mattress will do the trick and put that concern and the resulting sleep situation behind us.