She Did It!

Update to Baby sleeping in her own bed:she has officially completed her first goal, seven stars!  

    I am beyond impressed by her.  She picked her own goal, selected a prize and worked her little sleepy head off to get there.  Many of the nights resulted in her waking and crying in fear because we weren't there but she was very adamant that she had to stay in her own bed (despite this tired Mama's assurance it would be ok to come cuddle and let us fall asleep faster) because the original agreement was to stay until the sun woke up.   Despite the fact that I really wanted to get lunch elsewhere, she was adamant that the entire Chuck E. Cheese experience included pizza.  I think it might have just been the fact that I was starving, but I was pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed my lunch.

When we arrived, I asked Boyfriend how many tokens we should purchase.  I wanted to spend the extra $10 since I had a feeling he would want to play as well but he was adamant that he wasn't in the mood to play games.  Well guess who played a lot of games?  

  I know that a (nearly) four year old sleeping in their bed doesn't seem like a big deal, but for her it really is.  She has spent all of the life she can remember always being within reach of her parents to cuddle at night.  She can never remember waking in the middle of the night from a scary dream not knowing where she was.  Despite the fact that she was (and still is) a little unsure and nervous each night going to bed, she is so brave to face the challenge face on. I also feel really confident that we did the right thing in waiting this long.  I know that we could have forced the issue much earlier, I know that we could have let her cry in her room each night mad that we weren't giving in.  But my gut told me that emotionally she wasn't ready until now.  Just like potty training by waiting until we knew she was ready-it was such a more pleasant experience for both her and us.  Also, it makes me feel good that we can see the trust that Baby has in us. We let her pick one more goal to keep the momentum going.  Her next prize is going to be a trip to the "trampoline park" aka Jump Street or some variance.  After that I think we are going to still celebrate each successful night and praise her but we need to move onto our next milestone-brushing our teeth without a fight Every.Single.Time.