Heart attack.

So the other night I was putting Preslie to sleep, and she was very particular about me staying in bed and not leaving her.  She kept asking me if I was going to go upstairs, or stay and go to sleep with her.  I was explaining to her that Daddy doesn't always go to bed at the same time as her, and that she didn't need to worry about that.  She just needed to go to sleep.  At one point she even tried to get me to pinky promise that I wouldn't go back upstairs.  I refused of course, because I do not want to ever break a promise to her.  Especially when I just as well as she apparently did that I had full intentions of going back upstairs to watch a movie.  I asked her why she didn't want me to go upstairs, and she said because she gets scared because my room is so dark.  I told her that she could sleep in HER room if she didn't like it, to which she quickly stopped complaining and rethought her dilemma. 

Finally, after a good 10-15 minutes of snuggling with her, she was fast asleep and starting to snore, so I quietly snuck back upstairs and turned on a movie.  I guess that I was more tired than I thought, because I don't remember actually watching too much of it, and then fell asleep.

Next thing I knew, I was waking up on the couch upstairs to the sound of a very frightened cry coming from my Daughter. 

I don't remember how, or what went through my head, except that she was in trouble and flew off the couch.  Yes, I said flew.  I nearly missed the first flight of stairs and jumped to the bottom of the second set.  All I knew was that it was dark, and Preslie was crying and I didn't know why.  Before I could rationalize any further, I was in my room and had jumped into the bed with her to hold her.  My heart was beating nearly out of my chest, and I realized that I hadn't breathed out yet.  She said that she woke up from a bad dream and didn't know where I was, and was scared. 

I don't remember what time it was, but I do remember that I lay there for the rest of the night until I could see the sunlight starting to burn through my curtains.  I don't remember why it startled me so bad either.  Preslie has woken up plenty of times during the night before, and I usually just go back downstairs and then work on getting her back to sleep.  For whatever reason though, it scared the crap out of me that night. 

I wonder if it's just because I fell asleep upstairs.  Perhaps it was just waking up and being a little bit disoriented, and hearing my Daughter crying from a distance.  Yikes.  That was a pretty horrible feeling though.  It just makes me think that I need to work on getting her to sleep in her own bed again.  Why is that?  Because.