Co-sleeping and BF

[islandbaby]

A few people have mentioned thar co sleeping can ease the need for night feeds... how so, please? I am struggling a little at night and on't co-sleep so would like to know more.

I found co-sleeping a god send in the early days especially. It doesn't ease the need for night-feeds but it makes them easier as you don't have to fully wake up. This article has some brilliant info on different ways you can co-sleep safely- www.askdrsears.com/html/7/T071000.asp

You don't necessarily have to have the baby in your bed, a sidecar cot is often a good compromise if you don't feel comfortable with a baby in your bed.

Basically, your baby sleeps with access to your boobs and latches on and helps him/herself!

I never got the hang of it though - I found it impossible to fall asleep with the baby in the bed.

I find it much less tiring than getting her in/ out of the moses basket, but it just depends, sometimes dd will settle down fine, so i put her in the basket. If she's fretting I find she'll settle to sleep next to me.

Whilethey are really little I'm a bit twitchy about dh squashing her so I really like her to be in the basket.

when ds got big, he would just attach himself and we'd not wake up in the night.

Well, I never got the hang of being able to snooze while the baby helped themselves, (breasts a bit too large I think) but co-sleeping did help me be a lot less tired second time round. I got the hang of lying down feeding much more quickly and used to be able to at least rest if not actually sleep. There was no agonised trying to settle back in the cot after a feed either. When small DD seemed to sleep better cuddled up with me.

I didn't "cosleep", but sort of did...
Basically at night when DDs needed feeding I'd bring them into my bed - my duvet on me, DDs blanket on her. Once she stopped feeding I either changed and put back into cot or just straight into cot - can't quite remember.
It doesn't ease the need to feed, just means you can shut your eyes a bit while baby feeds. I couldn't spend a full night in that semi alert state, but found being ONLY semi alert when dd feeding helped me rest better.

We found ourselves cosleeping with DS from when he was tiny - I was so shattered that it was safest to feed him in bed, so we just made sure it was safe for us both to fall asleep there. I'd have gone mad with sleep deprivation if I'd been getting out of bed, feeding him then spending an hour trying to get him back into his cot again. When DD came along I had her in bed from the start. We have a cotbed with one side removed, pushed hard against my side of our bed. She sleeps in a grobag but when she wakes for a feed I roll her over, feed her, then plonk her back there. She's within easy reach if she needs a bum pat but she doesn't take up any room in the bed (just as well cos DS still joins us in the night!). I'd heartily recommend it to anyone - superb for maximising sleep, and also really lovely :)