A first timer question about sleeping!

[moobaloo]

Hi all

I'm learning loads from the Maybies discussions, but wanted to ask a few dim questions without taking hijacking their thread!

I'm 16 weeks tomorrow - due 19th May 2014 it's my first. I have very little experience of babies although someone made me hold their 8 month old recently (she was so cute but I had no idea how to hold her!)

I'm currently confused and wondering about sleeping...

When it is born it is going to sleep in a moses basket in our room. Am I right to believe that it is normal to scoop them out of this, change them and then BF whilst lounging in my own bed in the middle of the night? What if I drop off whilst holding baby? If baby won't sleep and cries every time I put it back in it's moses basket can it sleep with me? If it does sleep with me do I have to do anything different with my bed (I'm worried about it rolling off the bed more than me rolling on it!) How does co-sleeping work and are there any age restrictions? are those little cot sized bed extenders any good? I like the idea because there are bars so baby won't fall out!!

Any advice would be gratefully received

OK. I definitely don't think I'm comfortable with actual co-sleeping with an infant as I can't imagine it working for us. Plus our room is cold and I need my duvet! I expect babies temperature will be better in own bed with appropriate gro-bag.

Moses basket can be right next to my side of the bed duing the night and pushed back to under window in daytime so I can walk past bed etc. I may follow advice and find myself a chair to fit next to it so I can sit up and out of bed to BF (small chair recommendations???)

Once baby is 6 months it can go in it's own room, in cot, I can take the chair in there too and go across the hall to feed etc. in night.

Thank you all for you advice, it's really interesting to hear different viewpoints and all advice is gratefully received It's quite hard as a first timer, with basically no baby experience! Thank God for MN!

Moo is there room for the cot in your room? The moses basket won't last 6 months - more like 3 at a push.

Yes, you might get to 4-5 months in a crib, but 6 months is pushing it in either.

Our cot meant I had to climb into bed across the footboard, so your definition of 'fits' does tend to change somewhat.

Be prepared to go with the flow when the baby arrives too - it's best IMO not to have too many pre-conceived ideas of how things will be because your baby may have other ideas!

My DD (DC2) is 4 weeks and despite being adamant that I would never co-sleep she's been in my bed every night as she just won't sleep in the Moses basket. DS slept brilliantly and we aren't doing anything different this time, so how you manage really can depend on the individual baby.

Yes, also bear in mind that 6 months is the earliest it is recommended they go into their own room from SIDS prevention. We didn't move either DD that early. Some babies sleep better in their own room, some don't. We found that 3-4 10 minute wakings were easiest to handle when you didn't have to go walking around a cold house at night. Others find that the baby sleeps better post 6 months in their own room and move them then. I would echo 'go with the flow'.

Equally (and I'm not doing down Penguin's experience) none of my friends with children lasted anything like 6 months with the baby in their room - more like 8 weeks, because the babies and parents were keeping each other awake.

At 7 weeks DS is still in with us and I have no current plans to move him, but he will have to move once he outgrows the basket, because the cot bed is in his room. SIDS advice is quite clear on the subject, but you must weigh it all up given any other risk factors.

I totally agree Horatio.

I am very personally not convinced about the whole 'we are both keeping each other awake' thing with very tiny babies because one of the theories about SIDS prevention is that being around the parents helps prevent the baby falling into too deep a sleep, and forgetting to breathe. So to me it seems that in some ways it can be part of the SIDS prevention working that they don't sleep as long.

But as you say, it's totally, totally personal and you are weighing a lot of different risk factors. If you are a non-smoking household with a breastfed baby who sleeps on their back, you have already massively cut your SIDS risk. Or you are so sleep deprived that you feel you are dangerous in the day, for example, then the 'in your room' advice may well be outweighed. Or if lack of sleep is affecting mental health. Or any of a million and one reasons we have for making parenting decisions.

It's just another one where I see "at six months they go into their own room" and I know basically no one who moved them at that age. Almost everyone did a good deal earlier or at least a couple of months later!