What should my newborn sleep in?

[AlwaysLurking38]

I bought a swaddle blanket for baby to sleep in but I've read different things about it. Some sites advise that swaddling is ok where as others say it's not. But I'm worried if I just use a blanket the baby will wriggle and get smothered. Might sound daft but I can't help worrying.

Baby is due in 6 days!

I also have one of those baby sleeping bags but it looks huge and again I'm worried about baby wriggling down.

Sleeping bags are great and your baby might be big enough from birth

gro.co.uk/grobag-baby-sleep-bags

TkmXx often have them cheap!

Cross post! As long as their head can't get through the top they're fine

Oh good. My mum said if it's too big I can always stitch it to size as such. I'm just worrying myself over everything and I can't seem to stop. Thanks :)

If you do need to use a blanket (we did as DDs head was too small for the sleeping bag to begin with), just make sure baby's arms are on top of the blanket. They then shouldn't be able to get the blanket over their face.

I personally didn't consider swaddling, (I wouldn't like it) so I brought a couple of gro-bag sleeping bags from mothercare in the sale. A friend has since given me two swaddle blankets, so we will see what baby prefers. There are loads of sales on now so you should get a good deal in time for baby's arrival!

It's only natural to worry about something you've never done before. It'll all click into place.

Swaddling is great if you have a kid with a strong Moro reflex. They can jerk themselves awake, so swaddling helps reduce it & their arms flailing about. It totally depends on the kid. Mine liked it, some don't.

Tbh you can tie yourself in knots with all the differing advice of sleep (& everything else for that matter). At the end of the day it's trial and error, what makes sense to you & what works for your kid. You'll figure it out.

We used the cellular blankets with dd1 and tucked it around the mattress so she couldn't get tangled up, they're not very strong at that age and although she never moved much I worried about the cold draught as there was a gap down each of her sides where the blanket went from her chest to the mattress.

I've sorted all her baby clothes/bedding out today ready for dd2 in 8 weeks an am seriously considering putting this one straight into a bag, they're so much cosier and warmer, dd1 didn't roll or show signs of it for months and again she was a good few months old before she was physically able to shuffle down.

I was really looking forward to using the swaddle blanket. I got it from mother care and its got Velcro so it can be made smaller/bigger. But I've read that it can be dangerous for baby but I've also read that babies like it. Too much conflicting advice!

I think I will just try each one and see how baby likes them.

Can someone tell me why swaddling is potentially dangerous?

Another ftm (due in 10weeks) and just so confused and don't want to do anything 'dangerous'.

Re swaddling dangers - when I was pregnant with DS, midwives in 2 of the 3 pct areas I lived (the third said nothing about swaddling) said it was fine to do for day time naps when you can frequently check them and their temperature but that it shouldnt be done at night due to serious risk of overheating. Apparently the risk comes from baby not being able to use his/her natural mechanism to cool down if they start to get too hot - naturally a baby will spread arms and legs out to cool down and pull their arms and legs in to warm up.

As long as it's done properly (and using a Velcro swaddle blanket it should bed), it's fine to swaddle your baby up until around 14 weeks.

I used to put my baby in a bundler with little socks and then swaddle loosely.

I was told yesterday by mw when I brought DC2 home from maternity ward that it is a good idea to swaddle baby if that helps them sleep, then loosen/remove the swaddle and use a normal blanket once they have fallen deeply asleep.

I think the recent issue with swaddling is that it has been shown that tight, restrictive swaddling of the legs can cause or exacerbate hip problems in baby's. The simple answer is just don't tightly swaddle their legs, which is easy to do with most modern swaddle blankets which focus on the arms anyway. Both my dds had very strong Moro reflex, so without swaddling, we would have got zero sleep at night (didn't bother with them so much in the day). I haven't heard of a link between swaddles and SIDS, but as with all bed coverings, make sure they're light and breathable (the grobag cotton ones are excellent) and that you keep the room at a comfortable temperature (ie not too hot, but warm enough so that you don't need a blanket on top ). Mine wore a sleep suit for bed (hell, this is what they wore all the time for the first 6 months!), with a vest underneath if it was cold.
Sleeping bags are brilliant- we used them when dds outgrew their swaddles at 4-5 months. So much easier than faffing about with blankets! Cellular blankets are still useful for daytime naps though, but buy the cot or cot bed size ones (I didn't use the Moses basket ones I bought!).