I took her to bed in 3 minutes flat

My daughter and I recently moved to London, from a small town on the East Coast in Virginia named Saltville. To let you know how small it really is they pride themselves on being "The Salt Capitol of the Confederacy". I thought after her first four years in a small town with so much green. We lived on a working farm. That she would be upset and maybe have some behavioural issues, but everything had turned out fine. She was the ipitamy of happy. She loved being around Marco (my Dutch fiance), and hates to see him go to work during the day. We live pretty far away from the city centre thank the gods because I am sure I could not handle the bustle of that part of town. I took her into London's center to see Marco at work, she had a wonderful day and looking at his office and sitting at his desk made her day. Even the lack of green and all the new foods didn't seem to bother her.

We got her a little Jack Russell puppy for her to love and feel like this is really home. The get along great and although the puppy can't sleep with her they don't mind that much. I am enjoying watching them interact as they learn each other!

Then came bedtime. She was literally terrified of going to sleep in her room alone. You see when she was born she had some medical problems that prompted me to do the wrong thing and sleep with her until now. As I mentioned before she is 4 years old so I let it go on a bit too long. I have been accused quite a bit of over mothering the child. Marco had done her room beautifully in copius amounts of pink and Hello Kitty. She played there all day and absolutely loved the design but still refused to sleep there alone. So for the first two weeks I was content on sleeping with her, sneaking off to my bed, coming back when she woke up screaming and doing it all over and over again.

I was seriously getting fatigued with this new arrangement. Three nights ago she was sleepy decided to go up to bed herself. I found her asleep with her lights on, and she only woke up once that night. Instead of me going to her, Marco did. She went immediately back to sleep and we heard nothing else from her the whole night. So the next night I put her to bed read her a story and told her she was a big girl now and had her own room, she had to sleep there alone her bed was too small for the both of us. She said "Ok Mommy" went straight to sleep only woke up once.

I began wondering to myself "WTF, how long has she been tricking me into sleeping with her here", my guess is about a week, thats when the waking up screaming bloody murder had stopped.

Last night I took her to bed again and she woke up only long enough to ask Marco to turn her night light on. I am super proud of the way she adjusted to these life changes and just how amazing it has been for her. Of course children are flexible, and can make it through many things and adjust well but my child is slightly neurotic like her mom.

I guess the moral of this blog is I wonder how often we inhibit our children in life? I was inhibiting her independence by sleeping with her when she really didn't need me too. I wonder how many times a day I do something for her that she can do herself?