Single bed before 1 year old?

[JaneLynch]

My baby is 5 months old and we are thinking of preparing his room for the next stage. I know toddler beds are recommended and many people also use floor beds after overgrowing the cot. But we were considering to transition instead to a standard single bed sometime between 7m and 1 year old. The bed we have in mind is 55cm high and would have 2 sides aligned to the walls. We were thinking to add bed guards for the other 2 sides, a foam step ladder for climbing in/out and potentially pillows/mattress besides the bed in case he climbs and falls. Is there someone who tried a similar setup at this age interval? Is it such a bad idea that I couldn't find many similar discussions on this topic regarding babies younger than 1 year old?

Personally I wouldn’t. A bed guard to prevent rolling out is one thing but how are you going to stop him escaping? They don’t understand invisible boundaries & staying in bed until they hit 2-3 years old. My daughter is 15 months old now and would absolutely just climb out of a single bed.

What's the rush. You have a baby who isn't yet old enough to sleep alone in a room?Let alone in a single bed.

Just leave the baby in the cot he is currently in. I fitted them in the baby cot until they were two or older.

I wouldn’t, because I suspect it would make bedtimes a pain. It’s not a safety thing, more a ‘how many times do you want to tell them to go back into bed and lie down’ thing.

Not a great idea. Just keep them in their cot until they are 2 or 3 or when they climb out.

Bed guards are for children older than 18 months

From a safety perspective.standard mattresses are for an older age.
pillows etc aren’t recommended until over 1. 55cm is quite high for a bed if he were to fall out.

why not just move his cot into the bedroom?
we had a cotbed- took the railings off at around 2years.
he moved to a single bed at 3.

Why on earth would you want to do this. It’s so dangerous! You can’t have pillows around an under 1, a bed guard won’t be safe if they pull to stand using it (they’re designed for toddlers that understand to stay in bed but may not sense the edge when asleep) and since when can under 1s climb a ladder- it’s just something for them to fall down and hurt themselves. I wouldn’t even do a floorbed at that age which doesn’t have any of the above safety concerns unless you’re a cosleeping family because why would you want to add the battle of trying to get them to stay in bed.

Get a cot bed. Keep the sides until they either climb out or turn 3, whichever comes first. You can swap the sleeping bag for a toddler pillow and cot duvet after 12 months if you wish.

You cannot be serious OP? I’m baffled by such ignorance.

Bedguards are not safe for babies under 18 months due to the risk of entrapment, between a bed and a wall can be the same risk. Floor beds are great if you don’t want a cot (neither of mine ever slept in a cot) but wait for a higher single bed until at least 2.

You’re considering putting a 7m old in a single bed - are you trying to suffocate him? Yes. It’s a very very very bad idea.

Thanks everyone for your advice, I learned a lot from your comments. I might have crossed as ignorant or in a rush, but I'm actually learning. I'm pretty sure I'm not the first and last first time mom to underestimate the baby's climbing skills before seen in practice. We will consider the cot option for the following 2-3 years according to your advice. Thanks for taking the time to read my message and reply.

Wait until she can crawl and climb up on things and you'll see why the idea just doesn't work. They can do so much and they have so little sense 😂 once my DS learned to crawl (6.5-7 months), it was all he wanted to do. So even in the middle of the night, I could see him on the baby monitor wake up, crawl around a bit, pull to stand, then go back to sleep 😅

So you just can't trust them with anything other than a proper cot. They need to be contained.

Ds was in a toddler bed at 14m because he would climb out of his cot and he tranisitioned to a single bed when he was 28m when we moved from our 1bed to a 2bed and dd was a few months old.
dd too climbed out of her cot but we moved her to a single bed when she was 24m.