New Parents’ Views About Sharing a Bed with their Baby

How would you answer the following question?

Stand to the right if you plan to bed share with your new baby OR

Stand to the left if you defiantly won’t bed share with your new baby

new parents don’t want to bed share but they do – why? One mother told me when she had her first child that the constant feeding in the night meant it was the only option that allowed her to get some sleep. Did you see the recent article that went viral about the dad who took a picture of his wife snuggling their children in their parents bed click here to see it, it went crazy with comments about SIDS and how dangerous this was. It had Susan Castellano, maternal and child health director at the Minnesota Department of Health suggesting you’d suffocate your baby if you bed shared! And there was a tonne of comments about the A>B>C’s of safe sleep - eek. This would have been enough to scare me to death, and judge parents who planned to bed share as irresponsible, but thankfully I know better!

Have you ever shared a bed with your baby? I have, I even planned it with my Son (it never worked out – oh well, open mind and all that) the thing is that it’s totally normal and natural to share a bed with your baby, it makes breastfeeding easier too, in fact mothers who breastfeed and bed share get the most sleep overall YES THAT IS TRUE. 

But what about SIDS, will your baby suffocate? well with SIDS there is always a risk - if they are in a cot or bed sharing, but if you plan to bed share there are 7 areas to consider to reduce the risk.  La Leche League’s book Sweet Sleep outlines these in great detail and it’s well worth a read if you plan to bed share.

Extract from Sweet Sleep:
Night-time and Naptime Strategies for the Breastfeeding Family.

http://www.llli.org/sweetsleepbook
The Safe Sleep Seven:
If you are:
1 A Non-smoker
2 Sober and Unimpaired
3 A Breastfeeding Mother
And your baby is:
4 Healthy and Full-Term
5 On His Back
6 Lightly Dressed
And you both are:
7 On a Safe Surface

Additionally the lullaby trust https://www.lullabytrust.org.uk/ has some great resources for parents on safe sleeping.

Both my children sleep in their own rooms, aged 3 and 6 and have done since they were aged 7 and 5 months respectfully, this is what worked for our family, what worked/is working for yours?

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