to think that back sleeping guidelines are taking the piss

[extrastrongnosugar]

on my third baby here, just got him fresh from the hospital and its day four. and night four with 1-2hr sleep totals for me. its 3am now and i had 45min so far. hes fast asleep after nursing on me but once i lay him to bed, nicely swaddled with rolled up tetras on the side for a lovely huggy feeling, he inevitably wakes up and starts crying. i am now rembembering that with number 2 i didnt even try. am just reading up on the guidelines again and tgey basically admit the reason back sleeping prevents infant death sybdrome is because it prevents deep sleep and that most babys prefer to sleep on their belly. i love it that they recommend back sleeping until year one, completely oblivious to the fact that a baby that wont sleep on its back will sleep on the mother - which is much riskier and also nice for pretending a person can go a year without sleep and not become homicidal. AIBU to think back sleeping is completely impractical advice that doesnt take into account other risk factors and follow a kind of stupid circular logic? i have another suggestion: if deep sleep is so dangerous lets just all wake up our babies every hour - at least that way well get a full hours sleep now and then!

This might be an unpopular opinion, but YANBU. The organisations that write these guidelines seem to wish they could advise both you and the baby just stay completely awake for the first whole year. And if they drop off, have them lie nude on a cement surface while you stand over them watching!

My baby loved sleeping on his back, so that was an easy decision. But he also liked the sleepyhead, and it was winter so I put on blankets.

But to be fair, they are guidelines, not the law. I think a lot of people do a combo of following the guidelines, and doing what works. If your baby can only sleep on their front, that's what people do - but they don't mention it for fear of getting judged.

My DD is just over three weeks now, I'd got her a baby box and she hates it at night, it's now downstairs for short naps in the day she will go in her cot for 1-2 hours on her back in her sleeping bag but we can do 4 (and omg cannot believe 5 hours!! ) co-sleeping on her side depending on which boob she's fed from. She's also slept on my husbands chest when she's been really windy because when she lies flat on her back she's sick and starts making choking noises (scares me silly).

I've tried really hard for the last couple of days not to co sleep at all and we've definitely been up more.

A friend of mine is a peadiatric Doctor. I saw her yesterday and she said that in the last 4 months they had two SIDS at her hospital (small local type), both from small babies being put to sleep on their front.

The guidelines may not have all the answers and are frustrating, I totally agree. I have a baby who has been a nightmare for sleep.

But if you're going to 'abide by' one bit of guidance, make sure it's 'back to sleep'.

(From a place of non judgement because I literally know the pain and have not followed the guidelines 100% myself, but front sleeping is so dangerous for little ones).

95% of the time our daughter will only fall asleep on her stomach, then we gently flip her on to her back.

I still worried about her on the belly time before flipping so we bought a purflo mattress second-hand.

The mattress cover and sheets are fully breathable and can be washed in the washing machine. Its frame is heavy duty plastic so can be wiped down otherwise I wouldn't have bought it second-hand.

I ff and it's the same with preparing the formula and bottles. If you followed all the guidelines to the letter your baby would be dead from starvation before you even got one bottle prepared. For example, it's suggested you use sterilised tongs to assemble the bottle - good luck with that!

Please don’t put your brand new, precious newborn to sleep on his tummy. I know you’re knackered but please don’t.

thursdaydreaming you are probably right...i will ask around what my friends did its been a while tbh. it really only occured to me how silly this guideline is: babies dont die in their sleep if they dont sleep! eureka! i wonder if sombody got promoted for that wonderful insight.
what really pisses me off though is that now- once (probably after a week or two weeks for superhumans) you decide its not worth falling asleep each night on top of the newborn only able to rest on your chest - now YOU are the once putting him at risk by going against guidelines that are just impossible to live up to.
i mean i dont even sleep on my back because it gives me bad dreams - its actually a known thing that lying on your back gets your spinal fluids all pooled up or something and that can give you aweful lucid dreams. why would anyone want that for a baby that was all crunched up just 4 days ago?
i wont dare to swap to front sleeping tonight because there is a problem with the baby sense, but ive just given up for tonight and made myself a huge coffee. hope i can keep it together till the morning...

francesco that just makes me cry right there. i just can imagine the horror. but im also really really scared of crushing him when i hold him in my arm and drop asleep. i havent slept more that 4 hrs each day and i mean this in chopped up segments never longer than an hr at a time. i was seeing double and not walking straight before the coffee...
btw i tried again- lasted 5 minutes. i just managed to get a pee out of it and now im mad at myself that i broke up his nice sleep for that

YABU.
The back to sleep campaign has halved cotdeaths.

@extrastrongnosugar

"nicely swaddled with rolled up tetras"

OT, but what are 'tetras'? Google says fish, but if you're rolling up fish next to him then I think I know why he's not falling asleep.

Exactly. Although I'm not recommending front sleeping, I can see why people do it. People often recommend co-sleeping to people with bubs like yours, but that's also dangerous apparently. Probably the biggest risk of an exhausted parent is dropping bub in a stuper, or falling asleep at the wheel - you could wipe out your whole family and soneone else's all at once.

Sleep deprivation is horrible but I don't think that it's true that all babies prefer to sleep on their tummies rather than their backs. My first slept happily on his back, we rocked him a bit in our arms, swaddled him and laid him down and he went to sleep on his own very quickly. My second didn't want to lie down at all, unless you held her upright and walked or jiggled her for hours she just screamed. Co-sleeping was as disastrous as putting her in her cot, and front, back or side made no difference at all. In retrospect she probably had reflux.

Its safer for baby to sleep on back, but a lot of things are safer - not driving in car, living in certain areas, not having pets, and people still do them. I bet there isn't one person here who followed all the guidelines exactly the letter. It's impossible. Ever drifted off holding baby? Ever walked out of the room during babys nap? Ever put a blanket on baby? Moved baby in to her own room when she was 11.5 months? All wrong. If you haven't ever broken a guideline then you very lucky to have a well sleeping baby, large house, no other children, no needs yourself, etc.

I don't think they are taking the piss, but they would be hard to stick to if you had a baby who simply wouldn't sleep in that position.

@Thursdaydreaming

Exactly, also no mental health conditions made worse by sleep deprivation.

Used to see more dead babies coming in before back to sleep took off. Now...I don't want to tempt fate, but can't remember the last one I saw that went to bed well and was sleeping on their back in a cot with no bumpers/pillow/pod. Of course, most babies will be fine. But for the odd one that isn't, it's 100%. So it all comes down to how you perceive risk.

I did put my three to sleep on their backs, but there were many other "guidelines" I didn't follow.

1. We didn't co-sleep at all. Baby in cot in own room from about 6 weeks old.

2. I didn't make up formula as needed. I made up enough bottles for 24 hours and (shock horror) they were stored in the door of the fridge.

As for using tongs to handle the sterilised bottle pieces, nope. Clean hands perfectly sufficient. I think the steriliser may have come with a pair of tongs, but I threw them out.

It was all a long time ago now, as my youngest is 16. They seem to have survived though.

I know the sleep deprivation of a new baby (and sometimes much older baby) is terrible, but YABU to think that the “back to sleep” guidelines are taking the piss - they have saved so many babies’ lives. It really is very risky to put them down to sleep on their front before they can roll back themselves. And I say this from a place of having had four kids! Only one of them (so far) has slept through before age 3, so I’m not talking from a place of smug sleep, but I would never ignore that advice.

Have you thought about safe co-sleeping? I don’t understand this idea you should just never sleep their first year, having that mentality is very dangerous - you must try and sleep when you can! But don’t put the baby down to sleep on their tummy.

The lullaby trust does give guidance on safe co-sleeping:
www.lullabytrust.org.uk/safer-sleep-advice/co-sleeping/

Mine only started to sleep well once they could roll over and they would choose to sleep on their front. They still do now as older kids. But if I was to go through it all again I would still put them to sleep on their backs and work though the sleep deprivation again. For me, it wasn’t worth the risk

One of mine was in hospital for a while where she was allowed to sleep on her front as she was heavily alarmed I guess, she didn't like being made to sleep on her back when she got out.

LeighaJ i mean muslin cloth folded and rolled below shoulder level on both sides- it locks in the swaddle and hugs the baby so it feels cosy...i learned that from the russian night nurses that saved me last time round;)

The two dead babies in our family meant that all subsequent babies were part of the SIDS prevention study. The evidence from dead babies and the ones that were monitored, studied, prodded and poked for months on end has saved lives.

So no, it is not "taking the piss".

How lucky you are to never have been woken up by the screeching of a breathing monitor.

Young babies who sleep on their front have reduced oxygen intake. That's not a good thing.

The numbers of SIDS deaths have fallen drastically since the safe sleep guidance was introduced. It works. Dead babies got us to this point.

If you think it's "taking the piss" that's up to you. If you'd ever seen a dead baby you might not think that. You might even consider what is SAFEST for your baby over what is easiest for you.

I would look into safe co-sleeping. On their back to sleep is the safest position, the absolute most dangerous however is unplanned co-sleeping or falling asleep holding the baby, if this is happening I would be looking into safe co-sleeping.

so what about all the many times that im almost falling asleep while baby is nursing- sleeping on me? i think its a serious risk that my current monster tits could suffocate baby as they are about three times the size of his head. no joke- how would you all go about mitigating that risk?
im considering drawing up a prisoners chart counting down the days to 4 months when the guidelines say its now ok not to put baby back on back if he rolls to front.
also: are there any more parents whose babies were happy sleeping on the back? i need evidence those unicorns exist!