Get Out of My Bed!!!

I just read a blog written by a Stay at Home Dad entitled (Co)Sleeping With The Enemy.

(it sounds funny already, I know...I was cracking up the entire time).  It actually inspired me to share my own co-sleeping story.  In order to give this story some justice, though, I have to dive a little bit into the past.  Yeah, I know you're probably saying blah, blah, blah, get to the meat of the story.  But I'll get to the funny stuff soon enough!

So...when I first decided to leave Micah's Daddy, we were actually all living together in his mother's house.  Yeah, I know...LONG STORY.  I decided to move both Micah and I into a room downstairs, while I got things together and made my plans to get my own apartment.  Due to the size of the room, I couldn't fit Micah's crib or even his Pack-N-Play, so the story begins here with my co-sleeping nightmare.

Fast-forward to the present...Micah is 17 months old and refuses to sleep in his crib.  He won't even take a nap in the thing.  He uses the crib as one of his toys and now shows me that he is talented enough to climb in and out of it at his whim.  There are a few select times that I remember him spending the night in the crib (it could have been a dream, though, I'm not sure) but he was up at all hours of the night screaming his lungs out to get out.  In no uncertain terms, Micah has made it clear that he will not sleep in that crib.

You see where his head is...that is where I sleep

Then again, my mattress was made from heaven...the mattress is so amazingly soft.  I could understand if he wouldn't want to sleep on the cardboard, which is a crib mattress.  But I even went out of my way to purchase a newer, softer mattress for his crib.  He'll lay in the crib now, but he will start smacking his head on the crib, like a caged bird or a prisoner.  Out of fear that he would one day hurt himself drastically, he returned to my bed.

Now, he is so happy and relaxed...I can turn off the lights and he'll just lay on the bed all wrapped around me, rubbing on MY ear lobe until he falls asleep.  I know...you must be saying Awwww, that's so cute.  Really and truly, it's torture.

I have never been good with sleeping with others in a bed.  I like having my own space.  So...guys tend to learn pretty quickly to give me my space once I fell asleep.  Everyone -- from boyfriends down to my ex-husband -- got this and gave me my space.

Micah, on the other hand, really does not care in the least.  His mission is to get himself comfortable at the cost of my sanity.  I love him dearly (don't get me wrong) but there's just certain times when Mommy needs to be herself.

Sprawled on my bed...

I've even gone to measures of sleeping on my sofa bed to get away from him.  I'll just wake up with Micah right next to me once again.  I don't even realize when he gets there, but once he's there, I completely sense his presence and I'm awake.

Needless to say...I haven't had a full night's rest in a LONG time.  I'm usually awakened by him yelling and screaming (laughingly of course) for me to get him something OR he's laughing at something on television (I need the TV on as white noise to fall asleep and stay asleep) OR he's running around my room trying to get the bedroom door open OR he's kicking me in the face and in the ribs at the same time.  There's always a reason why I'm awakened.

If I'm too tired, I can usually yell at Micah and tell him to sit still or stop kicking me.  More often than not, he'll just giggle (even in his sleep) and continue to do what he's doing.

What should I do to get that little boy out of my bed? Any tips? Please help!