The three door theory...

I'm not the helicopter mummy I started off as. So says I. No, really. But I am still more of a protective parent than many understand. I had an impromptu lunch with a friend today. I use the term loosely, not because of any dislike, but rather because we don't know each other like BFFs. She came into our lives a year or two post Ciaran. We are, or we're before Shane and I moved, from the same rural community. I remember the first time we met though. She probably doesn't. Her children were with her. A girl. And a boy. I knew straight away that her boy was "Ciaran's age", and I was entirely distracted for the entire conversation. While she was seeming oblivious I saw him crawling on ground that I would consider (still) unhygienic. I watched him drag his dummy through the dirt around the working dogs cages. Where they poo and pee. And just pop it back in his mouth. Ugh. But she wasn't concerned in the slightest. Our parenting styles were obviously different. But how much of it is because I was parenting an angel baby? What sort of parent would I have been had my son not died? The situation I just used to illustrate was extreme. I don't think any of us would consciously let out child play in tha sort of hygiene, but perhaps the difference is more around having a heightened awareness of the dangers that just might lurk. So, lunch today. The three year old who turns four just days after Ciaran does. I actually asked this little man today... "how old are you now?. Knowing full well the answer but needing to hear his three year old voice tell me. How clever Ciaran would be by now. Biased mummy that I am. My friend and I chit chatted. She oohed and aahed over Toby and how cute he is. We talked like two mummies. It's a different world for me now. An opportunity to try on yet a new "normal", although three normals in three years is a bit much, and the cloak will be wrinkled for a while yet. She commented on how big he is now. She told him he needs to let mummy sleep at night, as he still has two wake ups on a good night. One thing led to another in tha conversation and somehow an admittance of "my bad" slipped out. That Toby is still sleeping in our room. I can give you all of my reasons and excuses, such as the fact that the ready-ing of his room, draught proofing, decorating, and all of that, is a work in progress. The fact that even though he will probably or possibly sleep better in his own room, so I'm told, is in no way a guarantee, and I don't want to spend the cold nights trotting between our rooms when I could be sleeping, and barely waking to feed him as I sit on the edge of my bed. The fact that I'm not ready. That I..we... Like him being beside us. Near us. I've stressed over it, but then came to the conclusion that it was only because I was feeling the pressure of other people's conventional parenting techniques. At least, thinking like this makes me feel better. My slip up, in telling my friend, was met with a fast instruction to get him into his own room. That way I won't hear him until he really calls me, she said. I laughed and said the monitor would let me know. Throw that thing out. You don't need it. He's a big boy now, she told me. The answer on the tip of my tongue was " but that way, I won't hear my child dying". I didn't say it. She wasn't expecting an answer anyway. She continued on by saying that her father was a GP and always told her to use the "three door method" - close three doors between you and them. If you can't hear them, then no problem! I'm not even going to go into my thoughts on that old train of thought. There will be none of that here, and rather than throw the monitor away when he goes into his own room, I will be investing in a video monitor. I only have one Toby.