Exhibit A

We always thought it was funny when our friends would tell us about their children sleeping in the parent’s bed.  We never understood how that could happen.  We had the perfect child (don’t we all).  In fact, we used to try to bring our toddler into our bed when she was sick or scared.  M would lay in the bed about 5 minutes and then she would ask to go back to her own bed.  We had it good and those other parents were suckers.

That was then.  In recent months our three-year-old daughter has started to infiltrate our bed.  At first it was once or twice a week.  She would wake up from a bad dream and would come to our room crying at three o’clock in the morning.  We would of course scoop her up into our bed for comforting (with the knowledge that she would be heading back to her bed soon).  After waking up a few times with a small foot in my face, or rolling over and bumping heads with her little head, I noticed that M had decided to stop going back to her own bed.  No big deal, right?  I mean, it’s only once or twice a week…

I couldn’t have been more wrong.  Now, it is commonplace to wake up in the morning with two women in my bed.  M’s sleeping in our bed has gone through a process of evolution.  At first, it was the five-minute visit every now and then.  Now it has evolved into a nightly occurence.  She even brings her pillow, blanket and Haiti (her stuffed Monkey).  It’s like she’s slowly moving into our room!  Which brings me to the most recent stage of her sleep evolution.  Skipping her bed and going straight to ours… 

Yep, last night we put M to bed in her bed like always.  We read the stories, said the prayers, fetched the water, applied the band-aids, and assembled the sleep brigade of stuffed animals.  She was down for the night.  The wife and I were in watching television and M had allegedly been in bed for about an hour.  My wife went back to our bedroom to get ready for bed and she got a nice surprise when she walked in the room.  There was M all tucked into OUR bed.  She had her blanket and Haiti.  M had herself all  propped up on the pillows like she was about to watch some Letterman…wide awake.  When questioned about why she was in our bed her response was, ” I just wanted to snuggle”.  As hard as was to turn down that snuggle, we shuttled her off to her own bed…in tears.  Not to worry, she was in my bed this morning as if she had never left. 

I now find myself calling out for help to those afore-mentioned suckers…  HELP!