The Evolution of Our Family Bed


Co-sleeping is one of those things that people tend to feel very strongly about. Whether they think it is great or they think it is terrible people have strong opinions. Dr. Sears includes doing it as one of the basics of attachment parenting (AP). On the other side of things the National SIDS Institute runs campaigns to tell everyone how terrible it is. When a co-sleeping and a nonco-sleeping mom get together they will often both feel the other is completely and totally wrong.

When Big Brother was a baby I was of the "it causes SIDS: camp. I was adamant that he sleep in a completely empty crib with no blankets, no stuffed animals or pillows or anything. I was convinced a friend of mine with a son about two weeks younger than Big Brother was going to kill her baby because she put a tiny little stuffed animal in his crib with him. I was petrified of SIDS and so I was going to do anything and everything anyone said I should to avoid it. I remember talking to the nurse at his doctor's office and asking if it was really safe to give him a pillow and blanket at a year. I mean what magical thing happened on his birthday to make it safe. And she told me that she did not think I should give them to him until he was three or older. That it was better safe than sorry. Ironically, it was this advice that actually made me give him the pillow and blanket. I felt that she was too over the top and I did not want to be crazy like her. :)

When Big Sister was born I pretty much had the same attitude about co-sleeping as I did with Big Brother. Her crib was empty and from day one I tried to put her in it. I worked pretty hard at it for awhile. She needed to sleep in her crib, I mean I could not possibly bring her to my bed could I? That might kill her. And even a sleep deprived mom does not want to kill her baby. Eventually I started to read a little more and think a little more about it and started this middle of the road thing. I would sit in the chair in her room and feed her. She would fall asleep in my arms and I would put her in the crib. She would sleep for anywhere from six to eight hours at this point. Whenever she did wake up she would be brought to our bed with us. She would eat and she would sleep with us for the rest of the night. To save her from SIDS I would hold her all night. Cradling her in my arms or putting her on top of my chest. To this day she wakes up a few times a week and will join us in bed.

Now, Little Sister on the other hand I was all set. I thought I knew so much better than I had with the first two. WIth this one I was totally going to get it right and let her sleep with us. But she had ideas of her own. She was happy to be put down and allowed to go to sleep. We were a distraction to her. We would keep her awake. So, we put her in her crib with a small blanket that she likes to hold and have watched her sleep 12 - 13 hours most nights. There are some nights, like last night, that she does wake up and we bring her to our bed and snuggle her. She takes quite awhile to fall back to skeep but at least she has us holding her. And since my options when she wakes up in the middle of the night are to hold her and let her take longer to fall asleep or leave her in her crib crying for a few minutes I choose to let it take a little longer.

Co-sleeping (or really what some refer to as an open bed policy) has been an evolution for us. I wonder, if we were to have another child, what the next step on the evolution would be. Hubby and I tend to hang out in our room after the kids are all asleep. It seems that would make co-sleeping all night impossible for us. We could not have our children in our room with us while we were talking or watching tv. But then I do not see us fighting to keep the baby in their crib like we did to Big Sister. I do not think I will ever find out what the next step on this evolutionary chart is for us. And in reality I am very happy with where we are now. I like this "open bed policy" or family bed thing that we have going. I love waking up with the baby snuggled next to me all sweet and cozy. But I also enjoy the quiet time with Hubby before bed. This way I get both.

One last thought - in the pictures above both of my girls have things in their beds. Big Sister sleeps with a load of dolls and two blankets. However, Big Sister is 17 months old and therefor out of the risk area for SIDS. Little Sister sleeps with a small blanket that she holds but is much too small for her to lose control of. When she does sleep with us we clear the area that she is sleeping in, as you can see in the first picture. Even if you are co-sleeping you do need to be mindful of SIDS recommendations and be careful to create a safe sleeping environment. Sorry folks, even though I am more lax I am still a little bit of a SIDS nut. :)
Posted on 1/27/2010 Labels:

12 Comments:

  1. I was totally scared of the SIDS too with the kids but more afraid that I would roll over suffocate them. I let all of them sleep with me when needed but when they were little it was cradled in my arms precariously. I don't sleep very well with them in my bed because even though its a King size bed, get all three in there and then there isn't any room for me!
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  2. Hmmmmm, SIDS and suffocation are not the same issue, it sounds like you are a "suffocation nut" which we all should be :)

    I am a 9+ years co-sleeper, but- I'm not all judgemental about it, it just works for me/mine. Trust me, if mine would have slept at all in a co-sleeper next to the bed (I had one who eventually did sleep in a side car), I would have been all over that! I don't judge people whose babies sleep HAPPILY in cribs (I judge the cry-it-out folks ;)).
    ~Patty
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  3. I read once that 80% of families co-sleep in some way or another, they just never admit to it because they are afraid of backlash.

    I think co-sleeping is wonderful and safe (when done correctly), and it also takes many forms. Some nights my oldest is in her own bed and my youngest in our bed, sometimes my husband is with my oldest, and many times we play musical bed and never know where we may end up by morning!

    Great post.
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  4. We co-slept with our son for the first 3 months of his life because it was the only way we could get him to sleep more than an hour at a time at night. After that we put him in his crib because we only have a full-size bed so him getting larger it was harder to have all three of us. He did fine in his own crib at this point though he still doesn't sleep all the way through the night occasionally. I miss it, but I know now that my son rolls and crawls and talks and twists in his sleep and I couldn't sleep with him in there if he did!
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  5. I wanted to have my daughter co-sleep with me...but she likes to sleep alone. There have been many time that she woke in the middle of the night and I was so tired that I thought it would be easiest to bring her to bed with us but she would get so upset. She really just wanted to be rocked and then put in her own bed. Now at bed time after the story time she hardly lets me rock her anymore. She just asks to go in her bed. The rare occasions I was able to get her to sleep in our bed were wonderful occasions. I love how she would roll over and throw her arms around my neck and I would breath her sweet aroma in and quickly fall back to sleep. But, I had to laugh at how such a tiny little person knows how to hog a bed! That girl always finds a way to get me to keep moving over until I nearly fall of the edge. LOL.
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  6. We co-sleep and love it! I did a lot of research on the correct way to co-sleep after I had my first daughter. She was a horrible sleeper and the only way she'd sleep for more than an hour at a time was in our bed. She's almost 3 and still regularly climbs into bed with us in the middle of the night. My youngest daughter has been showing signs of being ready for her own space. She is starting to sleep better on her own than in my bed. Even though her crib is right next to my bed, I still get paranoid that she's going to stop breathing in the middle of the night. I honestly sleep better with my kids in my bed or in my room. I know that they're safe and sound that way. My kids have both always had lovey blankets in bed with them too. My mom crochets them out of very light weight baby yarn and they're very lacey. I think we gave my oldest a pillow in her crib when she was 1 and that's when she got heavier blankets too. Now she's a blanket nut! LOL!

    They've always napped in their own beds though, unless I'm able to sneak a nap in with them ;)
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  7. I think it's so interesting how we feel the need to be so "pro" as moms about whatever we do. I have it about me, too. I want to share my love of cloth diapering. I am passionately for vaccinating my children. And I don't want kids in my beds (I do like napping with a baby). But I'm starting to learn that I don't need someone else to do it my way to feel good about it and they are not doing something "wrong" just because they do it differently. This is easier said than done, but even though co-sleeping doesn't appeal to me, I am not "against" it, it's just not for me.
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  8. I am the same as the comment from "Kristen". Pixie wouldn't sleep unless she was held for the first two weeks, so I was just happy to be able to lie down! I am a super light sleeper and she had to be smashed next to me (usually feeding) the entire night. I started to get her used to her crib with The Baby Whisperer method at two months. It wasn't until she was 6 months old that I had 4 hours of straight sleep. Then at 10 months she started to sleep through the night in her crib most of the time.
    My parent's co-slept with all of us, but it's not for me. I don't sleep well at all with a child in my bed...let alone a husband!
    I was just so shocked at the hospital when they said to me "and NEVER sleep in the same bed with her, ok?"
    Ugh. I do know of some people that are such sound sleepers it could be a bad idea, but sheesh!
    About the crib thing. Pixie wouldn't sleep on her back. The only way I got her to sleep in her crib for any length of time was to roll up a towel and prop her up on her side with it (next to her tummy so her head wasn't next to it). It wasn't until she was about a year that I used a pillow on her. I only use a pillow when she has a cold and needs to be elevated to breathe. You can get the little square pillow forms at craft stores that are very firm. I used a wearable blanket on her until she was older too.
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  9. I'm right there with you too! With my 1st, she had awful colic/reflux, so if I wanted sleep, I had to hold her and after waking up after 2 nights in the rocking chair w/a sore neck, she joined us part-time in bed. Depending on how I felt, I'd let her stay in bed all night w/us, or move her to the bassinet once she was asleep. Now at 3, she joins us most nights at some point & we love snuggling her. Hubby did not like co-sleeping with her the first year of her life, but now is fully on board. With dd #2, I needed to snuggle her all night on my chest (she was a preemie) because I just could not sleep if she was trapped in that bassinet. She will be 1 tomorrow & prefers her crib most nights. She sleeps with us usually if she wakes up in the middle of the night or we just want to snuggle in the morning (and we usually get an extra bonus hour of sleep then too!). I hope newbie on the way will be a snuggle bug too and we get to co-sleep some of the time at least! But in our tiny bed, we'll have to soon kick kids out (haha, or hubby. but I doubt he'd like that!), but I plan on letting them sleep on the floor on mats if they like. I always feel SO much better when my kids are in the same room as me at night. The ironic thing is when I was pregnant I did not want to be one of those parents to co-slept, and now I just wish we had a HUGE bed so we could all sleep in the same bed. hehe.
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  10. Kimberly, Yes it is a little crowded in our bed and we generally only have one in the bed at a time. Big Sister is especially squirmy and takes up so much of the bed. :)

    Patty, :) I should say that I did go all the way with the SIDS thing. I keep the heat between 64 and 68 overnight just like the recommendation. I do not let anyone near my baby if they are smoking and make them wash their hands before they come anywhere near the baby. I really was a nut - I had to go check on Big Brother CONSTANTLY to be sure he was still breathing. It was a HUGE fear for me.

    Shelly, Yes, yes, yes! I think that co-sleeping (sharing a bed with your children in some form or another - whether it is all night or a portion, everynight or only some nights) is just incredibly sweet.

    Kristen, As they turn into toddlers they start to take over the bed. :)

    Amanda, My son really likes his bed and his room. But every once in awhile he really likes to sleep with us too.

    Shaun, That's great!! I wish there was more out there about how to do it safely as opposed to just "do not ever let your baby sleep with you."

    Mindy, That is so true. We all have this urge in us to make everyone think like we do. I do not let my kids watch much tv, I do not allow video games, etc and I have to stop myself from being all gung ho about it when I talk to other moms. I have to remind myself that just because we make different decisions doesn't mean that one is right and one is wrong.

    Karen, While I am glad that you found a way to get your baby to sleep I do feel the need to say that the SIDS people do not recommend putting a towel or blanket like that because it can move and suffocate the baby. Sorry!! Like I said I am a SIDS nut and I just want anyone considering doing that to know that they need to be careful. Of course, the same is true for actually co-sleeping so who am I to talk. :)

    Mama Campbell, I wish I had been smarter with Big Sister I wish I had been smart enough to realize that she just needed to be with me and I needed to sleep. I cannot even count all the hours I spent sleeping in the chair in her room. UGH!
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  11. With my oldest we co-slept pretty much from the get go. It was the only way we all could sleep. He would nurse so often at night that it was just easier. Even now, at 3.5 he still comes in our bed a few times a week. My little guy has maybe slept in our bed 3 or 4 times when he was a itty bitty. He much prefers his own space and goes down in his crib without complaint. With our next baby we will do what is best for that child...although I love snuggling with a baby in my bed!
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  12. I can't wait to co-sleep with Alex!!!
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Thanks for your kind words! I love hearing from you.

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