For some time now, Alex, our eldest child, has been telling us that she already want her own bed. A pink one with a Barbie headboard. She even tells us that she will sleep on the top row and her sister, Maxyn, will be on the bottom row. We have kidding her that we will simply separate our one single bed from our double bed and that will be hers. As for the Barbie headboard, we will just hire someone who can hand-paint her desired design.
But we haven’t been taking it seriously. Alex and Max has been co-sleeping with us since they were born. And no, they haven’t sleep without one of us, the parents. If I am not there, like when I attended overnight company affairs back when I am working, hubby makes sure he is there. And now that I am a WAHM, I am always there when they go to bed at night. But the recent events kind of make me think if it is already time for the girls to sleep on their own.
Giving children their own room to sleep has its pros and cons, of course. I read that when children are given their own room, they learn to put themselves to sleep on their own, which is an essential life skill. But giving them their own room also means spending. If there is a spare room it is easy to convert it to a child-proof one as long as there are resources. Everything a child needs should be there, perhaps including their own toilet with nice faucets to encourage them to clean their hands after playing. Cabinets, shelves, beds and their other needs should also be there. What if there is no spare room, how do we do it?
But if we go back to my question, when should they leave the parents’ room? Is there a right age? Are there skills I have to look for to tell that my children are ready? Do your children sleep in their own room/s?
we only have 2bedrooms here at home way back my younger years. one for my parents & the other, for me & my siblings. my parents really did thought about maximizing our space, so they decided to have a customized king-sized double deck bed in our room. my brothers sleep next to each other at the top portion of the bed, while me & my sister, share the lower part of the bed. that set-up happened at such an early age as to our experience.
as for your case, maybe you might wanna consider doing the same set-up as what me & my siblings did experience, Alex will learn how to be responsible with regards to looking after her baby sister when they start sharing a new bed together or a new room.
I don’t think there’s a right age needed. Our youngest sister lexene wants to have her own room too. now that she has her own, she doesn’t want to sleep there anymore. Maybe kids want to have their own privacy during the day but will sleep with their parents at night because they are afraid of monsters! haha
I don’t think there’s a preferred right age for a kid to transfer to his/her own room. As long as she’s ready to be alone in a room, let her be. In that way, she will learn to be independent. Teach her how to clean up her room. My girl is 4 years old and she told me that she wants her own room too. But, our second floor is not yet finished and so I told her to wait. Hehehe!
We’re still co-sleeping Una and she’s pretty much dependent on me when it comes to sleeping time. She always have a hard time going to sleep early whenever I’m not around plus the people is usually not as strict as me when it comes to her sleeping schedule. I do wish Una can sleep on her now, so we can put her in her own bed. I can only imagine how clean our room will be kapag wala na yung toys niya dito hahaha!
Mine is still co-sleeping with me. We plan to move out probably before I give birth, so we could get a 2-bedroom apartment, but that depends. Or we can just wait until we can afford to buy our own house and that’s when he can just have his own room. I think the age of 4 or 5 is OK for them to start sleeping on their own, cos that’s usually the age they start going to school. It will definitely help in developing their independence!
Just try , when it works for your child, then it must be the real thing to do 🙂
Your girl have great thoughts , wanting to have her own bedroom 🙂 Hmm… if you really think she can sleep alone why not give her a try? 🙂 it’s costly indeed ,before I also told my parents that but at the end I go back on their room cause I can’t resist dreams and imaginations I’m so scared and was fearful when I was a kid 🙂