Co-sleeping Options

[Babieseverywhere]

Ok

We normally have left to right...dh, toddler, me, baby.

Baby (now 9 months old) has decided in this hot weather (no sleepsack) to spend the night climbing over me, as he wants to sleep between me and his toddler sister.

After a couple of hours of pulling him back over me, I gave up and let him sleep peaceful the rest of the night between his sister and me (giving me and her kisses before he fell asleep...awww)

I am concerned as his head was on my pillow (but he was using the light flat sheet which is the only bedding on the bed at the moment.) Is it harmful for him to use a pillow at his age ?

Will my toddler roll over him ?
Bearing in mind that she is small for being 2.9 years old and he is massive for his age. He is not far off her weight and height.

Thanks

What does your daughter think of having her brother climb all over her? Is she happy with having her baby brother between her and her Mummy?

Otherwise I think you are fine and I would not worry too much about the pillow as your son is strong enough to climb all over you.

He climbed over me, not his sister. But yes he is very strong. Glad, you don't think a pillow is a problem (normally he sleeps under my arm lower down the bed in his own sleep sack

She was half asleep when he kissed her and she didn't seem to mind that she woke up and her brother was between us, she thought it was funny.

I would be interested to see if it worked OK again tonight.

Just curious, how do you all fit in the bed??? LOL

And is this a regular arrangement??

Just wondered, I couldn't stand to share the bed as a regular thing.

Pillows should not be used until 1 year old.

And also with that many people sharing the bed they may be an increased risk of the children overheating. Are you and your husband light sleepers? Do you ever worry that you will roll onto them etc. I assume if either you or your husband have been drinking you don't share the bed with the kiddies?

Oh knew I wanted to say something else. I don't want to scare or worry you, just inform you, there was a story in the news a year or so back, 2 children sharing a bed or sofa or something, one of them being a smaller child, got suffocated by the elder rolling onto them.

It is a kingsize bed with a three sided cot on one side which gives us slightly more space and sometimes the toddler will sleep in the cot.

Yes, it is a regular thing since DS was born. DD was in her own room between being 5 months and 2 years but when she saw that daddy, mummy and baby was in one room and her in the other, she decided to move in with us.

I felt it was a bit unfair to insist on her sleeping alone when I didn't...LOL

That said I would look forward to the time when I can wake up to just DH. But I suspect that will be several years away.

When my husband drinks he sleeps in the spare room of course.

tommypickles, Sofa deaths are not co-sleeping though they are often reported as such.

I wouldn't sleep on a sofa/chair with my baby it is far too unsafe. I have let my children sleep together on a sofa whilst I sat on the end of it and watched them but would not leave the room.

But I don't undersatnd that, surely it's because one child has rolled onto the other rather than where it is they're sleeping?
Do you know why it's different?

Babieseverywhere, The dangers of co sleeping are greatly exaggerated. I also think you need to look at your nine month old's development rather than go arbitary on age.

My son at 9 months would not have been capable of crawling over me and more at risk. He would be at far more danger from using a pillow. The published guidelines are very conservative.

Yet, health professionals do not chastise those who leave a newborn to cry it out in a dark room on their own.

"Yet, health professionals do not chastise those who leave a newborn to cry it out in a dark room on their own." Yes, I have met a couple of HV who believe this to be true.

My 9 month old, pulls himself to standing, cruises around the room. Drops himself feet first off sofa etc. He can pick a pillow up off the bed and he climbs up me pinching my skin as handholds (gently discouraging this activity) !!! So I think my toddler is properly in more danger from him LOL

They sleep together in our bed alone in the evening and we can hear they on the baby alarm downstairs. Him giggling and her singing to him...so precious

Hi babieseverwhere

we have exactly the same arrangement with the cot and bed attached and DS, DH and myself all sleeping together. We tried for 14 months to keep our bed space to ourselves until we realised that it was easier and more comfortable for everyone to share. I am 33 weeks pregnant now and have been worrying somewhat about a fourth person in our bed re space and he waking schedules of new babe. How did you get on with this? Re Pillow I wouldn't worry...baby is close to you and you will undoubtedly feel any disturbances long before a crisis occurs. I understand the worried reactions of those who have no CoSleeping experience, but feel it's just one of those areas of parenting which is down to instinctive parenting rather than out of a book parenting. Intrigued to know how having a newborn and a toddler in bed together has worked for you. Thanks!

I have found that by putting our baby and toddler in a bed in the evening they laugh and play, however once they are asleep one waking and crying does not seem to wake the other one up. (I wonder if this happens with twins ?)

Hence the newborn sleeping between mum and the edge of the bed, should not affect the toddler sleep patterns.

The toddler should be next to mum or dad not the baby. So we are not doing things correctly.

We find it works well, but we could do with a bit more space and are debating about moving to 2 double mattressers on the floor, so there is more space than our king size bed and no falling out of bed risk either.

We are co-sleepers too....Before DS came along, DD used to sleep in the middle. When DS arrived, we put him at the end of the bed in an arms reach co-sleeper. But our experience was a bit different from yours babieseverywhere, in that we found that DS did wake up DD - especially if he woke up for a feed at, say, 5.30ish - she would then wake up for the day. But then he is a very noisy baby (lots of grunting and burping!) and DD is a really dreadful sleeper. We are now using two rooms and two double beds- one of us sleeps with DD and the other with DS and we swap round in the night. When DS settles down a bit we'll all move back together again.

So I think you will need to try it out once your baby is born and see what works best for the 4 of you.

I LOVE the sound of your bedtimes babieseverywhere!! That's what I'm going to aspire to when DS gets a bit bigger.

For what it's worth, I would be ok with both kids in the middle in your situation - but when the weather gets colder and you want a duvet on the bed I would guess that things might get a bit tricky!!