Night Light, good idea or not?

Some days you get worse sleep than others. One would hardly believe that my lack of sleep is all due to a little train shaped night light, but that is the cause for my sleepless night. The purchase of the night light and the return of daddy coincided, making mom and dad think that Matthew was waking up because he was excited to have daddy home. It took me over a week to determine that the waking up had to do with the night light.

Matthew doesn't sleep soundly by any means. He tosses and turns, moves, and wiggles all night long. When I first shared a bed with him I was surprised he got any sleep at all. It didn't take me long to learn the trick many parents have learned... DARK curtains. I put up a blanket over the window and all of a sudden the 45 minute naps became 2 hours. And waking up in the middle of the night crying and screaming stopped.

My theory for this is that Matthew wakes up during the night or nap. If it is dark he just rolls over and falls back to sleep. If it is light out, he thinks it's time to get up.

So... what about the night light? It's cute, it's shaped like a train, you'd think it would give him comfort during the night. Over the past few weeks, I wake up multiple times during the night. (my room is next to his) Sometimes I get him water, give him a hug, assure him that there are no monsters, but then there was a streak that I put him to bed a few nights in a row. Amazingly he slept through the night without waking up. Granted my story reading and song singing is amazing ;) but it wasn't until one night of waking up every hour and finally out of frustration I unplugged the night light, and he slept the rest of the night that I figured this out. After that I would try to remember to go into his room and unplug the nightlight before I went to bed. But there are nights, like last night when I forget. Waking up hour after hour I was too asleep to remember the night light. Finally around 4am I went into a screaming Matthew and unplugged the nightlight.

For whatever reason his crying that usually only wakes up me, woke up mommy this time. She came in, and when I followed and told her that he was crying because he wanted the night light back.... SHE PLUGGED IT BACK IN! Even after explaining that he would wake up and scream again until I went in later and unplugged it. BUT mommy went off to sleep, and I woke up 20 minutes later to Matthew screaming again. The nightlight is now unplugged and hidden, at least until Matthew's mommy reads the blog or asks about it and I give it back. But I hope I get a few good nights of sleep in between now and then. I personally, am now AGAINST night lights!