For most of our relationship, Ian and I had heard people say that the key to their long marriages was having a full bed rather than something bigger. “Ha,” we thought to ourselves, “We also have a full bed. We. Are. Set.” A small bed is perfect for cuddling and spooning and it’s a lovely sort of coziness. We patted ourselves on the back for our cleverness.
But then, enter Lily. A few weeks into our lives as new parents it became apparent that whoever made such grand claims about having a small bed never tried to fit three people, including a squirming baby, in it. Oh sure, Lily had her own bassinet by our bedside, but more often than not she ended up being fed and cuddled and rocked in our bed. Our cozy bed had now become cramped.
We pictured the life ahead of her crawling into bed with us the way we had done with our parents when we were sick or scared or lonely. The poor full bed was not long for our house. Having resolved to upgrade to a Queen bed, we packed our baby in her stroller and set out for an evening of mattress testing.
At the store everything was going well and we had narrowed down our selection when Ian said, “I might want to try a Tempur-Pedic bed.” Oh, the famed Tempur-Pedic bed. You know, it’s the one in the commercials where they put a wine glass on one end of the bed and jump around on the other without spilling the wine. The one with the heavenly memory foam that cushions and supports you without springs. Yeah, that one. I gamely said, “I guess we can try it,” not thinking it would actually come home with us. Looking back, it’s clear that we were doomed.
The Tempur-Pedic showed up at our house a few weeks later and we have been enjoying it ever since. We spend a lot of time in bed, and in addition to the extra inches the Queen size gives us, we have been loving the mattress benefits. On the weekend mornings Lily wakes up at 6 o’clock, and since I only get two days a week to sleep in, I bring her in bed with us for a morning bottle and cuddle. But within thirty minutes she’s jumping all over the place, working on those crawling and standing up skills. And while the mattress is great and dampens the vibrations for a lot of things, when a seventeen-pound eight month-old baby imparts the force of her will on the bed, you feel it. But maybe that’s just my Lily.
No Comments