Bedroom temperature too cold for a newborn?

[missmargot]

DC1 is due any day and I set up the thermometer in our bedroom last night to check the temperature overnight. At midnight it was 18 degrees, which is fine, but it dropped to 15 degrees in the early hours. Is this going to be too cold for a newborn? It's hard to get the temperature right on our bedroom and even with the heating on low it gets warm very quickly.

I haven't bought any Grobags yet (I wasn't sure about using them with a newborn) but I have two different weights of swaddle pods and lots of cellular blankets. Do I just add extra blankets at 15 degrees?

Apologies if it's a silly question but the baby being too cold or overheating is one of the many things keeping me awake at night at the moment.

It's going to be fine. Remember once upon a time there was no central heating, single glazed windows (no glass at all in Tudor times, just open windows) and babies survived.

I was given a guide as to what togs different blankets and clothing were and wrapped both dc up according to the weather. Ds was born in 09 and it was a terrible winter. I used to worry but he's still here.

15 degrees will be fine provided the baby has the right number of layers on. Ds is 3 now so I can't for the life of me remember exactly what I used to do regarding layers but I do know I was at my wits end because of the house we were living in used to get down to 8 degrees in the middle of the night. Hopefully someone else will come along who can remember - I think the rule is one more layer than you if it's cold and one less layer if it's hot.

Thank you, I'd hoped I was worrying over nothing. I felt quite warm last night (although I am warm most of the time at the moment) and we've spent a lot of time draught proofing the bedroom to make it as cosy as possible. I will make sure we have plenty of blankets and go from there.

temperature/blanket guide

We bought a thermostatically controlled heater so we didn't have to have the heating on.

Just remember that newborns can't regulate their temperatures, you will need to check to see if your baby is too hot/too cold.

We checked by feeling babies chest - too cold & we added a layer, too hot and we took one away.

Baby's feet at the bottom of the cot to ensure that if they wriggle any extra blankets won't cover their face. We also tucked the blankets under the mattress (not too tight) which keeps the blanket put and acts as a swaddle for baby.

If you are using blankets you can pop a cardigan on the baby to keep top half warm dd2 was born last March, (just after all the snow) and she had vest + sleepsuit then knitted cardigan on top and knitted blanket. We had the thermostat set at 15/16 but this didn't make the room too hot at all in our house.

Great advice, thank you.

Just wanted to pop in and say DD was born at this time last year and I'm convinced that one of the reasons that she had trouble sleeping was that she was too cold - I used to have her in a short sleeve vest, cotton sleepsuit, and swaddled in a giant muslin; meanwhile I was in fleecy PJs, wooly socks and sometimes a cardie, with a 13.5 tog duvet! And I used to wonder why she wanted to snuggle in bed with me..... Obviously I was terrified of her overheating, but honestly the poor thing must have been perishing

I can see my falling into that trap as I do worry about overheating. At least the nights are relatively mild at the moment, certainly compared to the freezing weather and snow we had last year.