How am I supposed to stay in the same room as the baby for all naps?!

[Luertiak]

Just that really. I understand I am meant to be in the same room as my newborn for all daytime sleeps (obviously they are in the same room as us at night). But if he falls asleep in his moses in the living room am I then seriously not allowed to go for a wee or get a cup of tea or answer the front door to the postman? He sleeps for 2-3 hours solid sometimes. If you have a second DC then how do people work it then - surely you need to move around the house during the day?

I know people will say "the sling" but I can't believe that absolutely everyone with a newborn has them nap in a sling.

Nothing wrong at all. But I personally would not leave a baby for a few hours without checking on them if I was in the garden.

Do you take everything in life so literally OP? I'm imagining you staring at your baby the entire time they're asleep in the moses basket.

You are allowed to leave the room while baby sleeps 😂 otherwise you'll never get anything done and probably go crazy after a while.
I used to leave mine asleep in their basket in the living room and vacuum the carpets, cook dinner or just relax. If I wanted to shower I'd move the moses basket to just outside the bathroom door so I could still keep an eye on them whilst showering.

No, I was questioning the advice I'd been given because it seemed mad.

This is ridiculous. Ignore such bonkers impractical advice. It’s been written by some office nerd who doesn’t have to think through the real life practicality of this. My youngest is only 8 and no one did this. It must be some new ‘advice’ to make new Mums anxious over.

You’re being daft, OP. The guidance does not mean be welded to their side every second of the day. It’s to stop parents putting very young babies in completely quiet environments for extended periods because this increases the SIDs risk. It’s pretty easy to have the baby sleep downstairs and close to you during the day, and share a room at night. No-one in their right mind thinks this means don’t even go to the loo.

Make the most of having just one and have a sleep for one of theirs. I used to sleep in the middle of the day with my eldest - lie on the bed with them and breastfeed them snooze together. It was lovely.

Yes you can go for a wee and make a cuppa, just keep checking on them. You've misinterpreted your HV and MW. What if you had a toddler and they fell and bumped their head or needed something from the kitchen, would you say ah let's just wait to sort first aid until the baby wakes. No, you'd get on with it.

I'd pop in and out to have a wee etc... but if going in another room for a long period to cook/ fold laundry then I'd carry the moses basket in the other room.

I don’t think the advice is meant to be taken as literally as many people on here do. It’s just meant to mean that babies should do their main overnight sleep in the same room as a parent. They just phrase it in a rigid way to make it easy to understand. The scientific evidence behind the UK advice is pretty weak in this case. The main things that have reduced SIDS is putting babies to sleep on their backs and lower levels of smoking.

It’s fine to leave the room to shower, make lunch etc or even hang out washing quickly if they are in a safe place. As others point out it is common for babies to nap outside alone in Scandinavia and their SIDS rate is no higher than ours.

I'm so jealous, when mine were babies they wouldn't sleep unless I was holding them or pushing them in a pram.

My dds first nursery had an open shed with a row of old silver cross prams in, all the babies went in them for naps rain or shine, they slept like logs!

Absolutely this.

People giving out such bonkers impractical advice, give not one thought to the impact on Mothers.

I had five children. The first one slept in the pram in the living room while I went on and did things around him.

By the time number five came along, she'd fall asleep on the floor, on the cat, on a cushion, quite often being sat on herself by one of her siblings, and occasionally in a room on her own.

They are all just fine. Honestly, some of this advice might be 'best practice' but it's absolutely impossible to carry out except in an ideal world. You just do your best and generally things turn out perfectly all right.

A thousand times this! We are stressing new mums out to the point of complete depression and then wondering why!

Exactly. Rates dropped massively on the back of the ‘Back to Sleep’ campaign and haven’t budged much at all in the past 25 years. I’m sure this recent guidance is just a hypothesis. If they were sure that sitting next to your child 24/7 would help to regulate its breathing, surely a mother could record herself breathing for five minutes and play it on a loop while they’re out of the room and it would have the same effect? Is a baby’s hearing to sensitive that they can hear breathing from the other side of the room?

Absolutely. It makes me really angry.

I think some attachment parenting fanatic has been writing the advice for the NHS.

Just trust your instincts OP. If the baby is poorly with a cold or has been sick, obviously they will need closer watching. A healthy baby can be put down for naps in another room as long as you are sensible about pets etc as pps have said. When/if you have a second or third newborn you'll look back and wonder why you were so anxious!

Wow this is crazy. I've had 3 babies, each time they slept in moses basket downstairs during day, and I would get all jobs done, going all over house doing bits and bobs. The house was fairly quiet during day, could hear if they were stirring. What is it that you're worried about happening?

Only used monitor at night.

Yes but that doesn't mean you can't move OP!
And these are guidelines. They are not the law. It wasn't a recommendation to have baby in with you when mine were born, so they slept in their own room from day one. Daytime naps were generally in a travel cot downstairs or in pram while out and about.
I mean do people go to bed at 7.30 these days? I loved my time child free with my husband in the evenings!

I'm quite old and I survived being put in the pram outside in the garden for an hour or two at a time to sleep in the fresh air.

A lot of these new rules seem to have been devised by incredibly over-cautious and unrealistic experts — probably men — who think that by telling women that if they leave their baby's side for a moment they'll be responsible if something bad happens they will make the world a safer place. Bollocks to that. If you're baby's well then go to the loo when you need to, go and get a cup of tea when you need to, do what you need to do.

I hate all this stuff that makes women's lives harder. Don't take your eyes off the baby. Don't give your child anything but home-made fresh food. It's oppressive. Men would say no to it but women react by feeling guilty if they can't do precisely as instructed.

I'm not a mother but I've read on here the usual "sleep when the baby sleeps". How can you keep watching the baby when you're sleeping? I think a 2 minute wee over an half an hour sleep is fine. You can't sit there having a vigil. How do single mum's cope when they don't have anyone to watch the baby whilst they nip to the toilet?

Are you sure you haven't misinterpreted them? Took them too literally?

Yes, exactly. Advice changes. New mums can only be their best when their own needs as human beings are met. I remember being so stressed and worried about my baby's safety, breastfeeding, rashes, certain vaccines, this and that. It's so important as new mums to take care of yourself and get support.

How is your baby safer if you're simply in the same room as them? Are you supposed to be listening to them breathe every minute?

I'm glad this advice wasn't around when my dc were babies. Sounds excessive to me.

Nope. See what they both said to me upthread, quoted word for word.

New mums are vulnerable and exhausted. It's so easy to be hard on yourself and try to live by other people's unrealistic expectations. My best advice to new mums is to be kind to yourself.

It isn't me being daft, I'm well aware the guidance as presented to me by my HV and MW is bonkers. That's why I started the thread, because I found it difficult to believe that others were doing this.