Absolutely, Virginia. I wake up many times every night. I have mentioned
on Lactnet before that in my husband's Aboriginal culture being able to
sleep lightly is considered a quality; it keeps the rest of the people
out of danger. When we are pregnant, it is our whole bodies and minds
and not just our bladders that keep us waking up; other mothers-to-be
may have experienced the same thing as I did during pregnancy: vivid,
fascinating dreams. Pregnant (and menstruating) women are thought, in
Aboriginal cultures, to have special access to such vision dreams.
Sometimes breastfeeding mothers experience the same thing in early days,
although I haven't heard any teachings about this. So light sleep may be
a way of letting us wake up, remember the dream, and tap into their
special language.
Remember, too, that the baby / child a mother *thinks* is sleeping
through the night probably isn't. We know this because we have older
children in our room, too. Nighttimes are very active times, even though
it is a fairly rare night that each child needs any particular help from
us to go back to sleep comfortably. This is true for both the "lifelong"
(all *their* life) co-sleepers and those who spent much less time in a
parent's bed.
What is the problem with night waking anyway? As a LLLL, I take my lead
from the Leaders I talked to when I was having trouble with this: "So
the important thing, Jo-Anne, is to try to meet your own sleep needs."
That, of course, is when I still had real needs for sleep. These, too,
go away with ... age? large families? practice?

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