When did this become a contentious topic. I always thought of it as a do what works for you as parents, your kids and your living circumstances. And luckily that’s what the article also seems to conclude.
Weird how they lump cosleeping as both the same surface and same room. Very different situation for the safety of the child, especially when they are under 2.
Both my kids slept in the crib in our room for their first year. Mainly because we all slept better. We still got woken up the same amount but because we responded faster, the kid went back to sleep sooner after being changed and fed. 30 minutes versus 2 hours makes a big difference in how we felt at work that day
Weird how they lump cosleeping as both the same surface and same room. Very different situation for the safety of the child, especially when they are under 2.
They do that because in both cases, the child can hear the breathing of the parents so is unlikely to succumb to the part of SIDS where they stop randomly breathing during the night (happens to all children as brains learn to brain) without restarting (this part doesn’t happen to all children). Apparently hearing breathing is good for reminding a new brain to do the breathing thing.
That said, bedsharing and roomsharing have been studied separately under their own titles.
When did this become a contentious topic.
When people decided to make the perfect the enemy of the good. I don’t know what concise term it is that is happening here, but it is the same as Time Out. So before Time Out was a thing, parents would assault their children simply because they, the parents, felt upset or frustrated with their children existing as new people who were still learning. In order to keep children from being hit so hard they’d welt or bruise, the public health authorities convinced parents that Time Out was by far more effective – go sit in a corner by yourself! The only thing it was more effective at was getting that child out of the walloping range of an emotional parent; the goal. But if the public health authorities told those parents that, they’d keep hitting their kids. Time Out is not actually an effective teaching tool and for parents who aren’t inclined to beat children, it’s actually a poor choice to make vs taking the teachable moment to teach. So it isn’t really A Good Thing as it has been branded. But if it saves even one child from harm, let’s spread the good word.
Same with this one. Some children were overlaid by inebriated parents. Saying that children in the bed is A Bad Thing will save the lives of children whose parents are prone to inebriation and would otherwise have bedshared with them. And since it saves even one child from harm, we spread the good word. However, much like the parent who isn’t going to beat their child above, there is also the parent who avoids intoxicants.
Yet people like hard and fast rules and like sanctimony. So they’ll stan No Kids in the Bed under all circumstances without noting the nuance.
Personally, we follow the Safe Sleep 7, though baby spends more sleeping hours in his own bassinet than in our bed. Yet sometimes, only proximity to parents will do at night and so we make it as safe as possible so we can all get some much needed sleep.
That makes a lot of sense. I noticed with my partner and me we wouldn’t ever come to lay on our kids during sleep. Subconscious simply avoid them it seems. Which makes absolute sense when you think about it from an evolutionary perspective.
But of course being inebriated might change that.
I never slept lighter than when I had babies. I slept through an earthquake before having children but after I would jolt awake at the sound of their pajamas rustling on the sheets.
There are studies which show that usually only one parent will develop this extremely light sleep to care for the baby. The other will be able to sleep through. Often it is the woman who will wake up easier. But it isn’t tied to gender.
Interestingly when homosexual couple adopt infants one of them will develop the same light sleep while the other won’t. Usually the parent who spends more time with the child will be the one to wake up iirc. Thought that was super interesting.
We never did co-sleeping, which is good because my daughter basically squirmed all night in her sleep even though we swaddled her- we had a webcam monitoring her while she slept, so I could watch her doing it. After a while, she had completely gotten out of her swaddling cloth by morning and we just gave up.
I’m reading this from my laptop in my bed with my baby tucked up in his bassinet within arm’s reach (which, amusingly enough, is the product name of the bassinet as well). My goal is to co-sleep in the roomsharing sense for the first year since I am breastfeeding.
Have I fallen asleep with him in the same bed as me? Absolutely. Did it the first night after he was born, in the hospital, even. I was in labor for over 24 hours and was knackered. The nurse came in and gently took him from me and put him back in the plastic box by my side. Hospital was big on “rooming in”.
So, because I knew I absolutely could involuntarily head off to slumberland while breastfeeding, I took care to set my bed to be as safe as possible should this occur. It’s like wearing a seatbelt in a car – no plans for an accident, but just in case.
And let me tell you, my mental health is great! I know enough about me to know that my mental health would be far worse if I had to trudge down the hall in order to breastfeed at night or chastised myself for sharing a bed at such times as my body desperately needed sleep so took it. And with me sane in the membrane, I’m the kind of parent kiddo deserves in terms of personal quality. He doesn’t deserve me loopy from sleep deprivation; so I’m not, mostly.
If anyone reading this is co-sleeping, don’t lie to your pediatrician when, during every visit, they ask you about sleeping arrangements. Tell them the truth.
If you don’t tell the truth, ask yourself what kind of parent lies to their baby’s doctor.
(Y’all’re using doctors, right? And not barn spirits or your Aunt Cookie’s facebook blog?)
The kind of parent that doesn’t vaccinate, has a med cabinet of essential oils, and eats horse paste fits the criteria of your question. Probably also homeschools, has a photography “business” side gig, and deals heavily in Amway and bitcoin.
But that’s just a wild guess.
I’m a nanny. I provide childcare in the child’s home. I’m hired by the parents. And those essential oil, antivax, homeschooling parents? They PROUDLY tell the world that they bedshare. In fact, during interviews they quiz me to find it out if I’ll cuddle their child for the child’s naps because that’s the only way kid knows how to sleep.
I’m pretty sure the ones who lie to their pediatricians are those who are much more mainstream, based on how many times I’ve gone searching for a child’s sleep sack only to find it in the parent bed, the parent bed unmade, and a clear impression of a sleeping child still in the pillowtop. But they won’t even admit it to me, who doesn’t care and just wants to know where the sleep sack is.
Ah yes, the age old “safety of my child vs inclusion of cultural values” debate. Long unsettled.
Live baby > parental feelings IMO, but if you’re counting same room (and not same surface) as “co-sleeping” I guess you can say it doesn’t matter.
