To co-sleep with my baby?

[goldensangria]

He’s five months old and I have never co-slept at night. We will have naps together in the morning though in my bed but it won’t be for long.

Anyway it’s now nearly 5am and I haven’t slept at all, not even 10 minutes! He’s been quite grumpy today and tonight just can’t seem to sleep. He’s laying on me at the moment and sort of drifting off but then he’ll wake up again.

Now that he’s five months is it safer to co-sleep? I don’t want to move him now!

Just out of interest, what are you meant to do if your child was prem? Mine wasn’t massively so, born at 36 weeks, and had no real issues other than being a bit jaundiced and slow to gain weight. I did cosleep with her because I couldn’t get her to sleep otherwise. Thankfully she was fine. Does the advice mean while they’re still before the due date, or always? Are you not meant to cosleep with a big, bouncing six month old because he happened to have been born a few weeks only?

Are you not meant to cosleep with a big, bouncing six month old because he happened to have been born a few weeks only?

I wondered this. DS was 38+3 and just about a healthy birth weight (5lb8oz), but he was a big chunky 8lber pretty soon after.

I did co-sleep a few times, when DS was big enough for me to feed on my side and latched on himself. It was fine. King size bed, DH on the other side, no duvet. It was the difference between 6 hours broken sleep and nothing at all sometimes. It doesn't necessarily form a habit either as DS is nearly 2 and does 11 hours in his cot.

But all the published peer reviewed literature that these various websites get their information show that the risk of SIDS is still higher when cosleeping compared to when the child is in their own bed.

All the literature doesn’t say this. There are several studies that very clearly show no significant increase in risk from properly planned cosleeping. The increased risk appears when you don’t differentiate between different cosleeping situations. Falling asleep exhausted on the sofa is not at comparable to planned cosleeping in a bed but the two get lumped together in one category in a great many analyses.

I would look out the papers but that would involve getting out my laptop and disturbing a breastfeeding baby.

@AmyandPhilipfan I have no idea. I think it’s about balancing risks and thinking about your particular circumstances.

It may also be that there is no increased risk for those big, healthy 6 month olds despite being born at 36 weeks. But there would have been an increased risk if you’d coslept with them at birth.

Which studies? I’m looking via pub med on my
phone and I haven’t seen any yet that don’t show there is at least a small increased SIDS risk when cosleeping.

I’d have to look up the lecture I give on safer sleep to give you the references.

Co sleeping cot, all the benefit, little risk..

It was THE best baby related thing we ever spent money on

@PomBearWithoutHerOFRS

I expect I'll be shouted down and lots of people will say "I did and it was fine" but when I was at university, I did a module of Forensic Medicine, and we had a guest lecturer from the Coroner's office. He was vehemently against co-sleeping, the number of infant deaths where the baby was sleeping with an adult were a huge % of the overall figure. No matter how tired you are, it's not worth the risk.

I would hazard a guess that a tiny to negligible number of those deaths were in cases where the safe cosleeping guidelines were being followed.

I personally hated cosleeping - I don't understand how people can say 'you don't go into a deep sleep' and 'you feel more rested' in the same breath, or how anyone can sleep in one position for a single night let alone months on end - so I'm not advocating from a position of being particularly pro, or indeed of having done it more than a few times, but the evidence is pretty clear that done following the guidelines it is very safe.

@Zippy1510

Which studies? I’m looking via pub med on my phone and I haven’t seen any yet that don’t show there is at least a small increased SIDS risk when cosleeping.

Because the studies lump co-sleeping into one big category, which include all the many ways you can co-sleep, including sleeping on a sofa or armchair (unplanned co-sleeping). This of course massively raises the risk factor of co-sleeping. As other PP have said, if safe sleep guidelines are followed, for planned co-sleeping, the risk is not raised. The studies don't differentiate between planned, safe co sleeping and unplanned co-sleeping. Most guidelines recognise this now. The NHS will catch up soon!

But if all the studies clump co-sleeping into one big category then how can it be determined that co-sleeping in what is perceived a safe way doesn’t have an increased risk of SIDS compared to sleeping separately? Where has that data come from?

It isn't safe.
Those who say they've done it and it's fine are just showing survivors' bias.
There is a wealth of evidence-based information available.
I know how hard it is. I have a 20 month old and a six week old, so sleep is in short supply here too.

There isn't good data which definitely suggests it as far as I am aware, but in meta studies and smaller scale studies it has been found that there are protective aspects to Co sleeping which when combined with the very limited data we have which suggests guidelined cosleeping is safe or comparable to cot sleeping, and this is about as good data as we're going to get on the subject because sids is now thankfully very rare.

Look at the stuff done at Durham University by Dr. Helen Ball et al. She's done some fantastic work over the last couple of decades and really opened up the discussion. The Bradford sleep study I found really interesting.

I have a book with some other sources which I might look up in a bit - depending how tired i am.

This is where I first learned of Dr. Ball. She's done even more in the past 10 years since this chat.

www.mumsnet.com/webchats/helen-ball

@Whatelsecouldibecalled I co-slept with my BF kids. I think that's a self-fulfilling myth, maybe? Because formula takes longer to digest so FF babies can last a bit longer between feeds. If you're being woken to feed more often, you are technically sleeping lighter... But only because you're not being allowed to sleep for longer. Of course, lighter and longer are subjective. Some kids are terrible sleepers no matter how you feed them! I feel it's luck of the draw. x

As long as you are following safe co sleeping guidelines from Lullaby Trust, yanbu. End of.

@laudete my FF baby didn’t get the memo about going for longer 😂 I think you’re right. Luck of the draw!