To let our baby sleep in a guesthouse in the garden

[Zipfer]

We are in between moves and staying with family. Our family has a guesthouse (a kind of extended shed with a bedroom kitchenette and bathroom) in the garden about twenty metres at the end of the garden. The guesthouse is visible from the house.

In the evenings we have taken to putting our baby (6 months) to sleep in the guesthouse while we stay in the mainhouse. We have a baby monitor and the house is door is locked. We know the area. We are also sleeping on the guesthouse.

DW and I both agree that this is safe as the risk is low. However, thinking about other famous cases (not drawing a parallel), we think it might be odd to let our baby sleep in a different building for part of the evening. Would you consider this sufficiently safe to allow your baby sleep in this situation?

Hells no

@peonyrose87

My baby is five months old and I've only just started putting her in our room with the monitor at night and then going to the living room (which is through the wall from our bedroom). I'd absolutely not have her across the garden in a separate building

Well, technically you're not abiding by NHS safe sleep guidelines (all sleeps in the same room as you until six months) and OP is. I actually also put my five month old up to bed at night while I'm in the living room, and I think the dividing line between doing it with a five or six month old is a bit arbitrary - but I also think it's a bit arbitrary to think a separate room is fine so long as it's physically attached to the same building.

No way. Not worth the risk.

@rainsometimes

It doesn't make sense? Why would you want to put the baby away in a guest house? Just put her upstairs in the room your sleeping in?

Read the op. They are sleeping in the same room overnight.

Wouldn't bother me. I'm probably further away when I'm doing the garden when they've been in bed

Ever?? So they don't do dishes in the kitchen, homework with another child, have a shower etc? Baby is NEVER alone?? Come on, seriously??hmm

I never did. We have an open plan downstairs so the kitchen and living area are together. I only showered when H was home or I took them in the bathroom with me. (When I had ds1 and ds2 we were in a flat and I left the bathroom door open so I could see them and then when we had dd our bathroom was 4 flights of stairs up and there's no way I'd have been that far away from her so waited till H was home to shower). They were so close together there was no homework with another child as none were at school yet. I wore them in slings round the house till 6 months as they had terrible reflux and wouldn't lay on their back and it meant I could keep them close and play with the toddler(s). The idea of them being away from me feels very alien. Even now we still co sleep and the oldest is nearly 9. I know that is unusual tho. But I think 6 months it's still quite normal to keep them with you as much as possible.

I think it's risky, and that feeling is to do with it being in the garden and not a proper structure. If it were the afternoon and you were in the garden, you'd somehow feel changes in atmosphere, your senses would pick up sounds and smells and sights, and what's going on in the environment. Nighttime and you inside another building is something different.

People can get into gardens. It doesn't feel safe. And that is coupled with the fact you are indoors, your senses and concentration focused on the telly or talking: you're in a different zone to your baby - a different mental zone.

It's not like you even live in that home all the time, and are familiar with every detail of the neighbourhood; vicinity, recent developments - risks you just can't think of. You're not informed to really risk assess.

I think you need to b near your baby to be tuned into them.

I'd be ok with it with the monitor on constant loud.

Never would I do this. It's ridiculous

I would definitely be fine with this - it’s no different from being in a separate room in a big house. My own parents house has a similar set up. I’m surprised my children have made it alive to their teenage years.

I wouldn’t leave an toddler though or a mobile child in an annexe/separate building in case they escaped from their cot and started to play with knobs on kitchen appliances etc - but I’d have no problems with a six month old baby.

It is a risk, however minuscule you feel it to be. I personally would not risk it for the sake of a chat, no.

No i wouldnt. This used to be quite common, my own dm used to go to next doors house whilst i slept and i wouldn't judge people for doing it as much.

However i do think its wrong. Its not the same as baby being in a different room. For a start you wouldn't have to exit a building, run across a garden and fumble unlocking a door if the baby is in the same house. Secondly you are more likely to hear the baby in the same house and are more likely to check on them more regularly if they are in close vicinity.

For arguments sake, imagine something awful happened, eg choking, sids, a fire etc. If you had to explain to the emergency services that you were in a totally separate building to your small baby do you think they would report you?

Also a baby monitor isnt foolproof. Often they can glitch, break down, lose signal or become delayed. So on the basis of too many things can go wrong i honestly personally wouldnt chance it at all.

Not a hope in hell. You have a false sense of security there. Perhaps more people would have done this pre the abduction of Madeleine McCann. But not anymore.

I don't think you're wrong to do this; I think it depends upon the exact circumstances - I have an uncle and aunt who have a bungalow in the garden, and if your set-up were pretty well exactly like theirs, in a rural setting very like theirs and with neighbours like their, then I would do it. Otoh, I have a friend with a set-up like that, but the entire rest of it is different and I wouldn't dream of it.

Never. Are you crazy?

@mediumbrownmug

It is a risk, however minuscule you feel it to be. I personally would not risk it for the sake of a chat, no.

But where does that end? Today I drove 30 minutes to go for a coffee with my mum - or, to put it another way, I exposed my baby to the risk of a car accident just for a chat. Clearly he'd have been safer if we hadn't left the house, so was I wrong to do so?

I think quite a few posters haven’t really understood the set up you are describing.

Lots of the arguments don’t really make any logical sense. Of course you couldn’t smell smoke from a fire but there is a smoke alarm and you would hear that over the monitor as quickly as you would if in the same house. You wouldn’t be there if the baby started choking but the same would be true if they were sleeping upstairs in another room. And none of the posters who are having a flap about this have explained why it is worse than sitting in the garden while a child is upstairs sleeping which is pretty common.

It still doesn’t sit quite right with me for some reason though-I don’t think I would do it and I’m not quite sure why. I think it might be the locked door and the possibility of having to get the key and unlock a door while panicking in an emergency situation makes me anxious. But I will admit to being overly cautious about these things. I wouldn’t judge anyone for this set up (and definitely wouldn’t be calling social services!!)

I'm fairly relaxed and both mine slept in their own rooms early on.

But no I wouldn't do this. I think if you were outside then it might be ok.

I think you have to accept that you can't have the social life you want when they're tiny.

It seems pretty unanimous tbh.

OP, I think it is becoming clear that about 90% (at least) of the replies here are from people who have not fully understood the set up you are describing.

Not at all. It's rude to dismiss people and say they only disagree because they don't understand. I understand the situation perfectly. OP's wife's childhood home, properly built small building at the end of the garden, visible from the house, baby spends up to 2 hours in it alone (with monitor and smoke detector) with door locked and then parents go to bed.

I just still think it's absolutely 100% unacceptable parenting and not something I would ever, ever do. Or even consider doing.

Also 'knowing the area' is so weak - that doesn't mean you know everyone in or passing through the area.

Lots of the arguments don’t really make any logical sense. Of course you couldn’t smell smoke from a fire but there is a smoke alarm and you would hear that over the monitor as quickly as you would if in the same house. You wouldn’t be there if the baby started choking but the same would be true if they were sleeping upstairs in another room. And none of the posters who are having a flap about this have explained why it is worse than sitting in the garden while a child is upstairs sleeping which is pretty common.

In an emergency every second counts, so deliberately doing something that delays getting the baby help in an emergency, eg, exiting a building, getting across a garden and fumbling for keys will take a lot longer than simply running upstairs.

Not a chance.

Lots of the arguments don’t really make any logical sense. Of course you couldn’t smell smoke from a fire but there is a smoke alarm and you would hear that over the monitor as quickly as you would if in the same house.

How much smoke do you think baby might have inhaled by the time the smoke detector is triggered and the adults get out of one house, across 20 metres of garden and into a locked and burning house?

Never in a million years!

I happily go into the garden when baby ds is sleeping in the house. I'm not sure why this is different tbh. I don't think I'd be happy about the locked door between us though.