why do people seem to think your risking harming your baby if you cosleep, yet if you put baby in there own room thats totallty acceptable?

[robinredbreast]

just wondering?

I think that co-sleeping is outside the norm for most people, so it's seen as odd. Odd is often translated into bad. Whereas whether babies sleep in the same room as their parents or another room seems like just a practical arrangement for most people, so not very contraversial. I guess the other thing to bear in mind is that SIDS deaths are only these that are unexplained, so the research can only look at patterns. Also the numbers (thankfully) are very small, so conclusions can't be drawn very fast or very reliably. Finally you can never have a high quality study because that would require consciously doig differnt things with different groups of babies, which would probably never get ethical approval (nor would it be possible to control for other factors unless you had very large numbers).

In some countries cots are virtually non-existent co-sleeping is the norm and the cot death rate is virtually nil. Told to me by an Indian doctor who said she had coslept with all her babies.

I loved having the bedside cot with DD2 it's like an extension of your bed although some of the time I would have my bum in it and DD2 would be stretched out in the middle. I am sure as she got older she would feed and I didn't wake up.

I only coslept with mine when they were very very tiny and I couldn't get up because of my c-sections. Then they went into another room because I could not sleep with them at all (how could such a tiny thing be so noisy!). They were like the vast majority of babies just fine, but of course I would have been devastated if anything had happened. On the other hand I don't think six months of broken sleep would have done any of us any good.

I completely have a thing about people putting small babies into their own rooms under 6 months. Personally find it massively irresponsible.

SIDS advice is there for a reason

The reason we couldn't stand DD in our room was not because she woke up and cried btw, it was because all night she never stayed still! She seemed to even move in her sleep, making quite loud bangs in her cot (her arms waving and hitting the mattress). She is lovely but such a wriggler!

How much of that variation is about recording though? Death certificates aren't the best filled out forms in the world. I wonder also whether in countries with high infant mortality possibly there is a higher acceptance of babies dying of natural rather than unexplained causes? Might be totally wrong, but country to country comparisons are always a bit tricky for a whole load of cultural and beaurocratic reasons.

And I couldn't care less if someone thinks I am irresponsible. Big farking deal.

Whatever.

I just couldn't do it - simply to get more sleep

Poor you, HMC.

Eh?

I agree with hmc but I think among my friends and family I am perhaps in a minority. And yes nicker, there was the floor. Our alternative sleeping arrangement at the time (I never made use of it, DH did) was a really uncomfy sofa bed that openeed onto the floor and had a wooden baten across where your shoulders lie that we used to try and pad out with a blanket. I am not a saint. I have been desperate. I have driven up and down the M1 wearing my nightie and various other clothes on top to get both DS and DD to sleep. Then come home and inched them slowly into the cot.

I find there is huge resistance to the idea in antenatal classes. and people just don't want to listen to the research and the advice.
I think it is part of the whole "babies need to be independent" thing, getting your life back.
and I think morocco's point is a good one.

actually, yes that is the point isn't it?
on the very rare occasions, VERY rare, that a baby is smothered when co-sleeping, the co-sleeping is blamed, and we don't always hear of all the circs.e.g. often they take place on he sofa or when one of the parents has been drinking or taking drugs.
but if a baby dies in his cot in his own room, no-one says "oh well that was because eh was in his own room, wasn't it?"
interesting, never thought of that before

There was the floor, but we decided she could sleep in her cot, in a seperate room (where we could hear her from, but not enough to disturb our sleep). I am not sorry, and we are a much happier family for it. We had enough problems with her to deal with, without ading more problems. Good God woman, do you know how difficult it is to sleep on a hard floor?

But these things are all about risk factors aren't they? So if you had a healthy pregnancy and have a healthy baby, if you don't smoke and never let smoke in your house / near your baby, if you make sure that they are not too hot and they are sleeping on their backs with their feet touching the bottom of their bed, if you breastfeed, if you are not drunk or taking drugs, and the baby has a new mattressand no cot bumpers then you have eliminated the vast majority of known risk factors. Then having them sleep in the room next door, with a monitor is hardly irresponsible is it? What is the current increased risk factor for SIDS associated with sharing a room anyway?

Oh and has anyone seen that the SIDS website now includes both advice to use a dummy and sponsorship from a dummy manufacturer? I think it deeply dubious (what were they thinking of?)

Both my babies slept wih me and dp until they were 16 months. At the moment we have 4 yr old and 18 month old sleeping with us as we are decorating their room. I love waking up with them!

It does sound lovely to co-sleep! It's very natural.

VeryLittleCarrot, you're right. I know a few Japanese people and they were horrified to find out that little babies are put in their own room in this country. I have co-slept with my 3 DSs (still do with DS3 who's 2.4y)and would have been more nervous not having them beside me than in my bed. I also found that the breastfeeding hormones make you sleep very easily but very lightly, so I would wake up at the slightest, so not a chance of rolling on top of them. MInd you, I also felt a bit of relief when they started to roll themselves, which meant they could "protest" or roll away, if something happened.

I have co-slept with both of my children, they slept between us in a gro-bag on top of the duvet - I don't actually see how they could slip under it to be honest.

lol at the caveman and the HV
very good

I believe babies were meant to sleep with their mothers, it's in our nature, in order to BF during the night but also to keep warm and away from predators. Until very recently whole families used to sleep in the one bed area. It's only in the last 150 years or so that the idea of baby sleeping in it's own bed has become fashionable.

My baby will be sleeping in his/her own room at night from the get go. Unless my hormones dictate otherwise. We are having a night nanny for 6 weeks after the birth and she will not be in the room with us. During my afternoon nap he/she will be in a moses basket in my bedroom

I think we have to respect other peoples choices in this matter. The scientific evidence IMO has not eliminated sufficient other variables to explain why the SIDS rate is 2 x when baby sleeps in their own room. This could be, as someone else has suggested, temperature, environment, baby's position, breastfeeding etc etc. WE just don't know what makes the difference here. But all of those are bound to be factors.

The co-sleeping deaths are very simple to explain, which is why co-sleeping has developed such a bad reputation. I respect other's choice in the matter, but would not co-sleep myself. I woudl be terrified of rolling over/ baby getting under duvet/ baby being pushed out of bed and that would completely stop me from sleeping. This has happened and caused deaths.

Nooka - my dd was breastfed, we are non smokers, I am an ex hv and followed all the temp/bedding/positional advice to the letter. My dd died - in her own room at 2 years old, of a form of SIDS.

I am pg. I cannot not follow all the advice again - to the letter - and will be giving this child a dummy - again to minimise risk.

I could not have prevented my daughter's death - but that is a small comfort to me amidst the overwhelming grief. I could not imagine how I would have felt if I had done something that increased the risk, and I had been left with all the guilt and 'if only' that that would entail.

I had more chance of winning the lottery that losing a healthy two year old to sudden death, two weeks after her birthday. That does not mean that with her brother or sister I will play the odds.

I cannot understand, with all the medical and empirical statistical evidence that has led to current advice given by agencies such as FSIDS and SUDC, that anyone would CHOOSE to ignore or go against it. Why?

Forgive me if I''m saying what someone else has already said (but I don't think I am)...

The reason the FSID advice on co-sleeping has changed - from absolute no-no to only do it very carefully and in full knowledge of potential dangers - is that we now know from research that breastfeeding is easier to establish and contine if you co-sleep.

FSID does not want to be seen to be against breastfeeding.