Co-Sleeping

I'll be honest.

 

I cannot get out of the habit of letting my daughter co-sleep with us. Everyone has always told us not to do it because they do not think that it's safe, because it will create a bad habit, because my husband and I will lose out on intimate time.. There are a multiple number of reasons why there are individuals that do not believe in this. And I completely see where they are coming from. 

However, we have co-slept with her since she was born (and she's almost 10 months old now). Not EVERY night. There are some nights where she was sleeping peacefully in my arms and I laid her down in her crib and she slept her little heart away. But you know what? Some nights, I am completely worn out and she is not asleep yet. 

And there comes the beauty of Cry It Out. I know that it absolutely, positively works for some parents and that is great! If you are able to do that and your child self-soothes and sleeps through the night, I give you major props. I just can't bring myself to do it. I hate hearing her cry. I tried CIO for like 3 nights and it was too much for me. 

So, we (meaning my husband and myself) find it easier if she just sleeps with us. We were blessed with a big bed.. we don't even feel her most of the night, but it's nice because she's right there beside of us. She sleeps good with us.
 

Like I said. We don't co-sleep every night. Sometimes she'll fall asleep downstairs watching a movie and I'll carry her up to her bed and she sleeps in there until she wakes up for a bottle (and I know if she didn't wake up for a bottle at 4AM, she would sleep all night in there.) She loves her bed. But she loves sleeping with us too.

Honestly, it hasn't created any problems with us. We still have our 'alone time' and we don't feel like she 'takes over the bed.' Of course, when the next baby comes along, then what? Do we let that baby sleep with us AND our daughter? Will we be confusing her to make her start sleeping in her own bed? We figured we she understands that 'You MUST sleep in your bed means you MUST sleep in your own bed...' then she'll start doing it. Right now, I just enjoy her being next to me. She'll be 17 one day and think I'm the weirdest person on earth. She probably won't even want to ride in a car with me, let alone sleep next to me. So, I'm enjoying that time while I have it. But am I confusing her?

Seriously. I knew parenting was full of decisions, but I didn't know this many. I am always worried that I'm making the wrong decision. And I worry WAY too much about what people think about how we parent. In the back of my head I'm thinking, 'What will people say about this? Are they going to talk about me or it behind my back? Will they think I'm a bad parent?' It's tough. I need to thicken my skin up though and know that I'm doing what is best for us... and Tayler. But I'm still wishy-washy on that. I enjoy doing 'our own thing' but I also worry about the future and the consequences of actions.

Do any of you out there practice CO-SLEEPING or have practiced co-sleeping? How old did you co-sleep with your child? When did you stop co-sleeping with your child?

And please, I'm not trying to be rude, but no negativity about all of this. I'm asking for opinions, obviously, but lets be adult about those opinions. Nothing downgrading. Thank you!

Getting Fit!

Is anyone else out there struggling to find motivation like me?

It's winter, which is the first difficult thing about pushing myself.

Second, I'll just go ahead and admit it-- I'm lazy. I hate even saying that word, but I'm serious. When I think about exercising, I'm already exhausted. I know it will help me, but I just can't find the 'push' to actually do it which is REALLY frustrating.

My daughter is almost 10 months old... and while I can say that I have lost ALL of my baby weight from having her, I have yet to get this body toned again. When I first got pregnant, I weighed 136 pounds. When I walked into the hospital the day my water broke, I weighed 176 pounds. 40 pounds! AAAAHHH. But, a week later I was back down to 150.. and a few months later, I was down to 136. That was a good feeling, but clearly not good enough....

It bothers me when I sit down and I can see that 'pouch' of skin that just kind of lays there. Any of you moms out there know what I am talking about?? It's that extra skin... and it just haunts me. I'm not saying I'm upset about having a child or anything like that! Tayler was worth every stretch mark and stretched out piece of skin that I have...

BUT

now that she's here.. and ornery as ever, I think it's about time I get this body in order! Which leads me to this:

I FOUND MOTIVATION.

I found it in being absolutely tired of the way I look in the mirror... and now, I want to push myself! Now, I want to start watching what I eat. Now, I want to start exercising and toning this body. I want killer abs by the summer. Last summer, it was frustrating to wear a two piece. This summer, I want to be excited about it! When we go on vacation, I don't want to wear a one-piece because I'm embarrassed.  I want to be proud to walk into the store and buy a TWO-PIECE. I want to put it on with confidence that yes, I had a baby, but I have bounced back from that. I want to have a fit body that is prepared to have another baby in time. I do not want to be 'behind' going in to having this child, you know?

Is there anyone else out there that wants to join me in exercising and being accountable to one another? I plan on attempting to post my progress once a week (or once every two weeks depending on how things are going) and I would LOVE if you shared your strengths and weaknesses with me. My biggest problem is eating. I am addicted to fast food. I am SERIOUS. That habit has got to stop... and stop immediately.

Thanks to my friend Kat, I joined 'My Fitness Pal' online and it is helping me keep track of my calories. It also tells me how many calories I can have a day to reach my goals which is awesome! If you want to add me, my email-address is:

alyssadbay@yahoo.com

I hope someone out there feels my pain and wants to join me in this journey. I am not good at keeping motivated when I'm doing something alone, so it will help if others are motivated with me!

Love you all!

The Baby Question..

(via Nutrition)
I'll be one of the first ones to admit it: I have baby fever.

For those of you who do not know too much about me, let me give you a little bit of a background story.

My daughter is almost 9 1/2 months old (the 15th of this month!). We recently purchased a home (December 20th) and I recently accrued a great amount of debt. (Got to love graduating from college... and realizing, 'Holy crap. How will I EVER pay this off?') Not to mention the fact that I'm not exactly working right now. We decided that it would be more beneficial for me to be a stay-at-home-mommy for the time being and that I would search for a job after our kid/kids go off to school. It is just more important to us that I be home with Tayler right now. Plus, we are fine with the financial situation (or at least we were until this darn loans started to have to be paid off... but fortunately, I baby-sit and sell Scentsy, so I can at least make that payment!)

The house we recently purchased is two bedroom. The bedroom downstairs is on the smaller side (plus it's downstairs.. I don't want my baby all the way down there without me.. Yes, I'm on the protective side ;) haha) And the bedroom upstairs was converted from 2 bedrooms to one uber large room. We aren't complaining-- we LOVE it. For as long as we've been together, we've always had a small bedroom where everything was crammed in there, so this is perfect for us for the time being.

Well.... if you haven't gathered what I'm about to say from this blog, I'll go ahead and say it:

We are SO not ready for another baby.

I know, I know... everyone says there's no perfect time to have a child, but I seriously can't help but think it would not be smart for us to have another one right now.

Of course, I have two sides pulling at me. On one hand, I'm almost 25. I'm not getting any younger... We wanted to have 3-4 children (Oh, don't look at us like that ;) We have always wanted a large family!) So, it would be smart for us to have another baby (or at least get pregnant some time this year!) Plus, I love babies. If I found out I were pregnant today, Tayler would be almost 18 months old when the next one graced us with their presence. I think that's a good age, right?

Then, there's that other side that pulls on me that says, "People are going to think this is a bad decision and terrible timing." And not only do I worry about people, but I worry about the welfare of our family. I have a huge student loan debt, we just purchased a home... Do we really need to bring another life into this world when we don't know what kind of life we can REALLY give it? We've always wanted our children to have a 'good' life. We never wanted to have to worry about being able to afford their needs or their wants... Plus, there's the room issue. We would have to save money and add on to our home or at least convert the upstairs back into two bedrooms which is, of course, going to take money and work.

...then the baby-wanting side pulls on me yet again with things like: "You're not getting out of that debt any time soon, so you might as well just do it!" And that's true. We have a 30 year mortgage... it's an estimated 30 years to pay back my student loans. We can't very well wait until I'm almost 55 to have another child. Good heavens, Tayler will be 30 years old, haha!

It's just a tough situation where we are not exactly sure what we want to do.. or for that matter, what we SHOULD do. I see both sides of the situation. I see where it may be selfish of us to reproduce so soon... but then I see where it also will be selfish of us not to. We feel Tayler deserves a brother or a sister. We feel that we want at least one more baby to make our family feel complete.

Do any of you struggle with having a larger family? Do you have these conversations in your head as well? (Please tell me I'm not the only one!! haha!!) What are your thoughts?