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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to give my 4mo baby the coldest room in the house?

50 replies

BettyButterknife · 15/11/2010 09:38

There isn't exactly much choice, unless we give him our room and we take the garret attic room. Just after the heating clicked off this morning his gro-bag thermometer said 15 degrees.

That's cold, isn't it?

OP posts:
InkyStamp · 15/11/2010 09:39

Can he not sleep in with you? Or you could put a little air heater in there?

meltedmarsbars · 15/11/2010 09:40

Yes thats quite cold, but as long as he is warm in bed, can it do much harm? We all grew up in cold houses

Damp is worse, imo.

I'll wait for someone with a better grasp of modern day life to come along...

lucy101 · 15/11/2010 09:40

why you can't you put a small electric radiator in or something like that? Or keep him in with you?

whoneedssleepanyway · 15/11/2010 09:40

that is pretty cold, i remember staying with my grandma and we put DD1 who was a baby at the time in the box room, it said 14 degrees in the morning and he nose was bright pink and streaming.....can you keep the heating on longer?

WowOoo · 15/11/2010 09:43

I'd worry that I was putting too much bedding on to keep him warm or that he would wake up because he was cold.

Does he seem happy and sleep well? Does he have a cold nose?

Original poster
BettyButterknife · 15/11/2010 09:44

We could keep the heating on longer... Wish there was a way to keep just his radiator on rather than the whole house.

I just moved him up there yesterday because while he was in with us no-one was getting any sleep! I think we were disturbing him, he us, and when he woke in the night we both woke which seemed ridiculous for both parents to be exhausted every day.

OP posts:
5DollarShake · 15/11/2010 09:44

When I was home in NZ last year in the middle of winter - no central heating there - I put DS, then 4 months old exactly, in a warm sleeping bag with arms and then swaddled him. He was warm as toast, and slept just fine.

Pannacotta · 15/11/2010 09:44

Why not put him with you, that is too cold for a small baby.

CaurnieBred · 15/11/2010 09:45

DD's room is the coldest in our house - on the gable and windswept. I was paranoid about her being too cold when she was a baby (and me being freezing when I had to go in and see her through the night) so got a thermostatically controlled, oil filled radiator that would switch itself on and off to keep the room to around 18 degrees.

PMTeepee · 15/11/2010 09:45

Our bedrooms are freezing. I put an electric heater in DD's room on a timer and on a very very low setting just to keep it around 18deg.
HTH

PMTeepee · 15/11/2010 09:47

X-post Caurnie. Great minds...

SoupDragon · 15/11/2010 09:49

Would you be prepared to sleep there?

ShatnersBassoon · 15/11/2010 09:50

I'd put a tiny oil-filled radiator in there, to keep the chill off without having to heat the whole house.

emptyshell · 15/11/2010 09:51

Spent my childhood in a house with no heating upstairs at all, as did many of us - we survived.

Get a free standing radiator thingee if you're desperately worried. I don't know if that funny polystyrene type insulating wallpaper's still going or not - but my mum used that on my room when I was a kid too. I'd rather have a colder room in winter for one that's not a sauna in summer to be honest - easier to make a cold room warm than a hot room cool.

FindingMyMojo · 15/11/2010 09:52

I second the small oil filled radiator idea - you could put it on a timer & it will raise the temp by a couple of degrees - I believe 18 is recommended so it's not like they are ment to sleep in overly warm rooms

BollocksToThis · 15/11/2010 09:53

The current SIDS advice is 16-18 degrees. You're not far off this so why not just an extra long sleeve vest, or turn the heating up a tiny bit? Hot rooms are much worse for a baby (for anyone IMO) and they soon wake up grumbling if they're cold.

ShadeofViolet · 15/11/2010 09:57

What SoupDragon said.

RumourOfAHurricane · 15/11/2010 10:05

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Original poster
BettyButterknife · 15/11/2010 10:14

We used to sleep up there before we had kids, and there was no radiator installed back then. But we did have each other to keep ourselves warm!

I do have one of these sleeping bags with arms which I could put him in... He sleeps on a baby lambskin, and there's a bumper in his cot plus one of these around to keep out the draughts.

Will have to think about a plug-in radiator - we're doing up the bathroom at the moment and the electrics in the attic are on the same circuit which is currently disconnected. Argh.

OP posts:
SoupDragon · 15/11/2010 10:32

Why did you change rooms?

2rebecca · 15/11/2010 10:42

We borrowed a plug in radiator for ours when babies as we like a cold house at night and live in Scotland and both winter babies.

Original poster
BettyButterknife · 15/11/2010 10:45

SoupDragon We changed rooms because MIL said we couldn't be at the top of the house with the children on the floor below. What would happen if someone broke in/there was a fire etc, etc? I'm not usually one for scare-mongering but I can't get it out of my head.

It is the nicest room in the house and the reason we bought it in the first place.

OP posts:
ilovemountains · 15/11/2010 10:54

Only overheating is believed to put a baby at a higher risk of SIDS, there is no research connecting being cold with SIDS so please don't worry on that score.

IMO fifteen degrees isn't that cold, in Winter all of our bedrooms upstairs are less than that!

Boobalina · 15/11/2010 10:55

Can you just have a radiator installed in the bedroom? A proper one, not a plug in one....

petisa · 15/11/2010 11:02

Our rooms go down to 12 degrees at the coldest part of winter. I live in the south of Spain where there is no central heating and houses are all tile and marble and drafty windows. My dd is fine with winter grobag, long sleeved vest, babygro, and armwarmers I made for her! I did throw a blanket over her last winter too, but 12 degrees is cold! And she was 18-24 months old.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is long sleeved sleeping bags or make some armwarmers and he'll be fine!