The Moses Basket Retires

On Tuesday night, while Graeme was at the Liverpool match (4-0!), I faced the mammoth task of putting Francis to bed. Francis isn't great at settling for me at bed time - Graeme usually settles him - so I wasn't exactly thrilled at the prospect. At about 8pm Francis started yawning and, instead of settling him in the living room and carrying him up as we normally do, I decided to try and settle him upstairs. I also thought that the time had come for him to start sleeping in the nursery, because there is precious little room left in his moses basket.

I popped Francis in the cot and turned out the light, hoping he would get himself off to sleep like he does after his night-feeds, but he was having none of it. So I tried picking him up and pacing the floor with him - this didn't work either. I managed to calm him down so I put him back in the cot... at which point he started screaming and going purple in the face. So I did the only thing that settles him when he's in such a state - I breastfed him. Within seconds he was asleep. Even so, it was a good 5 minutes before I felt brave enough to attempt to stealthily place him in the cot. I was right to feel wary - he woke as soon as I moved and I had to pop him back on the breast to get him to sleep again before he roused enough to realise what was happening. Eventually, after another brief feed, I held my breath and, extremely slowly, placed him back in the cot and nervously slid my hands out from under him. After satisfying myself that he was sound asleep, I backed out of the room and closed the door, cursing myself for forgetting to spray the hinges with WD40.

Going to bed that night was an unpleasant experience. This was the first night that I'd slept in a different room to Francis since he came home from the hospital. I found it extremely difficult to settle. I'd become accustomed to looking over the edge of the bed and seeing Francis snoozing happily in his moses basket or reaching out and holding his tiny hand; now that Francis wasn't there I felt very uncomfortable. Every little snuffle and whimper over the baby monitor had me on edge; I couldn't help but wonder what each whimper meant. It was some small comfort to me that the baby monitor was so sensitive that I could hear Francis breathing.

I woke up at 5:30am to the sound of Francis grizzling for his next feed. He looked so pleased to see me when I picked him up, so I'm not convinced he likes being in a room on his own. As it was so early I brought him into the bed where he stayed until it was time to get up.

I still didn't feel any better about him being in the cot when we did it again last night, but we have no alternative. He is too big for the moses basket and the cot is too big for our room. I guess I'm just sad that this is a stark reminder of how quickly Francis is growing and his needs changing. It'll be his first day at school before I've had time to recover from all the sleepless nights!

Lisa xxx

PS - Francis was weighed on Tuesday and is now 11lb 10oz.