Baby swaddling

[morrison1976]

My was is only 40 days away from giving birth. We have got the cot and mattress, and now we are trying to figure out what to use when she sleeps. We heard that swadding was good, so i checked the internet for information.

Its annoying because experts are saying different things. On this site www.makesachange.co.uk/gbu0-display/ste_swaddling.html on this site it says that it is safe, and reduces the risk of cot death. Then this site
fsid.org.uk/page.aspx?pid=426 it says the complet Opposite and says studies show that it could increase the risk of cot death.

Its really annoying hearing all these different opinions. I would just like some advice from the mothers on here.

i would follow the advide of FSID personally.

another thing to consider is that a baby naturally wants to suck his/her hands and it's an early feeding cue which will be missed if you are swaddling your child.

that said, some children do seem to prefer being wrapped up snug.

I would say not to bother with swaddling unless you have a particularly unsettled baby and doing it helps.

The evidence FSID refer to is an initial study that indicates other factors linked to swaddling, such as inadvertently covering a baby's face, are likely to cause the increased SIDS risk. It is worth reading the study if you're concerned.

Having said that, some babies like it and some don't. Our LO would have her arm out of the swaddle in about 20 seconds so we stopped trying and used a cellular blanket until she was big enough for a sleeping bag.

My DS hated being swaddled, he liked to sleep frog-style with legs and arms spread, so we went straight to sleeping bags.

Yeah, we looked at sleeping bags too. That might be a good choice. Or maybe we will just use blankets.

Cattleprod my DS was the same :)

When he was newborn we used blankets, then much later moved into sleeping bags because he's such a big kicker and blankets went all over the place.

yeah we just used blankets... and then if you DO need to swaddle you can just do it with a blanket. so you're good either way really...

I swaddled my first and she found it a huge comfort, my second preferred to sleep spread eagle and ultimately ended up co-sleeping.

As others have said it will very much depend on your baby.

An almost surefire way of stopping the garklet crying, when his nappy was okay and he wasn't hungry, was to swaddle him in his shawl. He'd quieten down as soon as you started to wrap him up.

However that was usually just during the day for naps, when in his cot we used sleeping bags although we used blankets when he was small enough to be in his moses basket.

DS hated being swaddled and always kicked his legs out, even as a newborn. He loves his grobags though.

DD1 liked being swaddled, especially for naps. It helped her not scratch herself raw, as she has eczema (she used to wake up sometimes with her ears full of blood where she had scratched). DD2 hated it, wriggled her way out almost immediately.

The guidance I got from my NCT class is to swaddle with a lightweight sheet, and bend baby's elbows as you wrap, so that he/she can still self-soothe by finger-sucking, but can't flail about and scratch too much.

My bub hasn't arrived yet though so I can't tell you if it works, only passing on the advice I've been given...

Taffybird - that advice worked brilliantly for my 2nd. I made a swaddling blanket out of a metre (I think) of 100 per cent thin t-shirt cotton (cost about £2); so not too hot. It's in my hospital bag, pending the arrival of DD3.