Bedsharing with your baby

[MBM18]

I’m a FTM and EBF my nearly 6 month old DD.

I used to always get up to do the night feeds and sit on the settee in the living room but around 4 months she started waking up for feeds more (which I now know was most probably the 4 month sleep regression but I didn’t know this at the time) and because I was so tired I started to feed her in bed with me and overtime now bed share with her every night (as safe as possible, I’ve read up on it). I’m happy to do this and we both sleep so much better, she sleeps for around 10-12 hours (mostly nearer 12 hours) and stirs in the night for a feed but doesn’t wake up fully.

Whilst some agree with it, I’ve been told all the usual never bring your baby into bed with you, I’m making a rod for my own back and I’ll never get her out.

I’m just wondering of other peoples experiences with bed sharing? How old were your baby’s when you started bed sharing and how old were they when you stopped? Is it really hard to get them to sleep on their own in their own cot/bed etc?

Thanks

Mine sleeps in her cot during day naps, occasionally she needs contact naps IE during teething/ colds. I play by ear to be honest. And not stressing about when she has to go into her own room, it will happen when she's ready and if that's not until she's 3yrs old or so then that's fine by me. The whole sleeping through the night and sleeping in own rooms is such a modern obsession pre-1940s no one cared if you shared your bed with kids it was normal.

My LO is 15 months and we've bedshared since about 6 months. He's started wriggling about a lot and shuffling away from me to get more room. This week we've started putting him on a floor bed in his room at bedtime (I lay with him and feed him to sleep). Last night he was in his own from 9pm until 1:30am, I had to go in to him twice in that time. After that he came into bed with me as normal and actually was a lot less wriggly than usual. It was really nice as OH came back in our room for the first part of the night which I've missed as he usually sleeps in the spare room. I also still got baby snuggles for the second half of the night.

Sorry, that's really long and I'm not sure if it's that helpful to the question!

both DDs had almost all their naps in a sling, on me or in car/pram... DD1 started to nap lying on top of the covers of my bed (with me feeding her to sleep) or in her own cot at about 6 months and I would slip off once she was down.

I just always played by ear tbh and went with my gut. It was frustrating not being able to just put them in a cot and have a break from all the contact but in the end it was over quickly.

oh and to answer about if it’s hard to get them in their own bed later on, I used controlled crying at around 6/7 months (ie going in after a minute, then 2, then 3) and it took about 3 nights total, very trauma free considering!

i totally get it’s not for everyone but DD has been an excellent sleeper ever since and slept right through since she was 10 months, and believe me she was a VELCRO baby