How We Moved On from Co Sleeping

I've mentioned a few times before that I've been wanting to move Kaelyn to her crib. We've been co sleeping since she was born. I've been told constantly that it's a bad idea because of SIDS and many other reasons. It's what worked for us though. Although I wanted her to sleep on her crib, I can't just force a change that isn't working. It's nice to sleep beside her and know that she's okay. I was breastfeeding as well so that made it a lot easier for me. But things change and as she grows up, we're starting to find co sleeping harder than before so we had to do something.

When she was a little smaller, I wake up every mornings and get cuddles from her. Now that she's a toddler, I wake up with a foot on my face. Not only that, we only get 1/4 of the bed and the rest are hers. I woke up in the middle of the night once because I nearly fell off the bed. That made me think that it's time for her to sleep on her own bed. One afternoon, out of nowhere, Patrick decided to let Kaelyn take her nap on her crib. He couldn't stand her crying so he went inside the crib and tried to cuddle with her. It took almost two hours before she fell asleep. Whenever he tried to go out of the crib, Kaelyn wakes up. It was really hard but she managed an hour of sleep on her own bed. 

That night, we tried to make her sleep on her crib again. Patrick tried to cuddle with her until she slept which took an hour or so. She was crying the whole time too. We slept on the floor beside her bed just in case she wakes up in the middle of the night and get scared. Some nights are easy, some nights are too stressful. It's hard for me to hear her cry herself to sleep but I'm trying to tolerate it. As long as she's well fed, freshly changed and not thirsty, there shouldn't be other reason for her cry. One of the things that I do to stop her from crying is hold her hand while I lay down on the floor and wait for her to sleep. I think she thinks she feels much safer when I hold her hand. We hold hands and she stops crying and starts chatting. I try not to answer her just so she knows it's quiet time. Eventually she'll fall asleep. It's been a month since we started that routine. 

It does get a bit easier each night. Her crying is starting to lessen. Some nights, when I put her down on her bed, she knows it's time to sleep. We still sleep on her room though. I couldn't risk leaving her on her own just yet. Maybe after we install the gate at the top of the stairs then I'll be able to sleep in our room but not now. She seem to be sleeping better on her own bed too which made the switch a lot better. She has also been waking up in a good mood lately compared to the time we started this routine.

It's definitely a good move for the both of us. Did you co sleep before? How did you manage the transition? Any other tips that you think might work with this change?