Please help - baby cold at night but don't know what is ok

[MiniMarmite]

Hi Everyone,

My six week old sleeps swaddled in a jersey sheet wearing long sleeved sleep suit and short sleeved vest underneath. If it is cold we put a cellular blanket over the top. He is quite big and very long so the sheet doesn't go round many times (and I also put a muslin round it all to stop it all coming undone)...

He wakes up in the night very cold so we put another cellular blanket over the top. Even now that doesn't seem to be quite enough and I'm not sure what is ok to do as it gets colder. DH and I are feeling the cold under our duvet and the two of us sleeping in the same bed so I feel like he must be freezing.

Also, some advice says to stop full swaddling at 8 weeks to reduce overheating and the risk of cot death. Does this still apply if it is winter?

I know the principle of reducing cot death risk is that they will wake if cold and not necessarily if hot so being a bit cold is better but I do want him to be warm enough to sleep!

Any advice you can give would be wonderful, thanks...

What about using a sleeping bag?

Grobag?

What temperature is your room? That will influence how many layers to put on him. Cold hands and face aren't a problem but if his core is cold then he will need more layers.

If your room is really cold try a cotton or knitted cardigan over his sleepsuit, and a blanket or two so you can remove them if he gets too warm. When DD1 was born (in December) I found putting a pair of socks on her feet over the outside of her babygrow helped, as I think cold feet wake them as well.

Remember a folded blanket counts as two, and be careful with fleece blankets as they can cause overheating.

Is your DS waking from the cold? Or are you not sure? Took us a few weeks to realise it was definitely cold and then we added a vest and blanket and he did sleep better. My mum was the one who did this - I was a bit obsessed with the guidelines. I ended up swaddling DS until he was 7 months. Think the advice recommends blankets in natural materials only for swaddling, cellular should be fine.

my DD hates the cold, and tbh i soon diregarded guidelines about blankets etc as she wouldn't sleep (winter baby, born in december) or would shuffle about snuffling

it took us a long time to get it right, but we made sure we eleiminated all draughts (not easy in a victorian house) and added blankets

people say it's fine of their hands and face are cold, but frankly DD actually only sleeps well when she feels warm all over

i think some are more sensitive to cold than others - i'm sure people who live in hot countries don't all manage to have baby rooms at 17 degrees

We had the heating on all night in the winter when ds was little - mostly because I was spending hours breastfeeding and couldn't bear the cold though.

A nice thick grobag and some scratch mittens.

I'm not sure what the current recommendations are about cot bumpers, but they do keep the drafts out.

Thanks for your replies everyone. We aren't sure exactly what the room temp is as we decided we should base it more on how warm or cold we felt rather than actual room temperature (although we might get one now that I'm feeling paranoid!) but it probably goes to 12 degrees if it is 2 degrees outside (like it is likely to be tonight).

I might try a sleeping bag in the next few weeks. At the moment he is still having the moro reflex quite a lot, hence the swaddling.

We're pretty sure it is the cold that's waking him (although he has had a cold too so sometimes he is unsettled because he has the sniffles) but he doesn't tend to wake other than for one night feed on warmer nights.

From what everyone is saying it sounds like we would be ok swaddling him in a cellular blanket and then putting another one or two over that on a night like tonight so we'll give that a go. I think I'll try him in a sleeping bag too.

Thanks again