interesting article on co-sleeping

Officials highlight dangers of co-sleeping with babies - Newsday.com



Hours after childbirth, Erin Maher lay in bed at Nassau University Medical Center holding her newborn daughter Samantha close when a nurse asked to take the child to the hospital nursery.

"I just kept her on my chest," Maher said. "They kept trying to take her away but I wasn't being separated."

Since then, Maher, 33, of Farmingdale, has rarely spent a night in a different bed than her now 4-year-old daughter, joining other mothers on Long Island and nationwide who sleep with their infant children -- a practice Maher and others say makes breast-feeding easier, helps them sleep and strengthens the child-mother bond.

But a coalition of government agencies and pediatricians has stepped up recently to warn of bedsharing's risks. Today, Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi will join state and Suffolk County social services leaders at a Mineola news conference highlighting dangers they say include accidental suffocation and head injuries from falling.


"Parents are working longer and longer hours, and is a way to spend time with their children, but they should be aware of the safety risks," said Suozzi, a father whose three children slept in cribs.

At least 89 infants statewide have died in co-sleeping incidents since 2006, when the state began tracking such deaths, including two in Nassau and at least one in Suffolk, said the state Office of Children and Family Services. Most of them involved young mothers rolling over in bed and unintentionally smothering babies less than a year old.

New York began a $500,000 public awareness campaign in 50 counties this month.

"Children are dying every day needlessly," said Gladys Carrion, New York's commissioner of the Office of Children and Family Services. "There is an easy way to prevent that, quite frankly, and that is -- don't co-sleep with your baby."

There are no nationwide statistics on co-sleeping injuries and deaths because not every state tracks the numbers, and the numbers that do exist are likely underreported, officials said.

Nearly 13 percent of infants regularly sleep in the same bed as their parents, and about 50 percent do so occasionally, according to the most recent study, a 2003 paper by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Although the number of affluent women who co-sleep appears to be rising, most who share beds are poor, officials said.

States began warning about bedsharing after a 2005 report from the American Academy of Pediatricians recommended, for the first time, that parents never co-sleep with infants.

"There are just a lot of risks that you can't control as easily as you do in a crib," said Dr. Rachel Moon, a Sudden Infant Death Syndrome researcher at Children's National Medical Center, in Washington, D.C.

Co-sleeping advocates say the concerns are overblown. Mothers who breast feed and co-sleep say they are attuned to their children's every move, waking when they notice changed breathing patterns or unusual movements.

And there are many precautions parents can and do take. Carrion said co-sleeping cribs, which have three walls, the open side directly adjacent to the mother's bed, are a safe alternative, though Moon said there was little research on the devices.

La Leche League, a breast-feeding education group that does not endorse or reject co-sleeping, advises using a firm mattress placed in the center of the bedroom, avoiding heavy bedding that can suffocate a baby, and never co-sleeping after drinking, smoking or when exhausted.

"You have to find something that works for you, even if it means dad on the couch and mom in bed with the baby," said Angela Salas, 25, of Hicksville, a La Leche League teacher.

Bedsharing death statistics often include cases where caretakers and infants slept together on sofas -- universally acknowledged as unsafe -- or cases with mothers under the influence of drugs or alcohol, said University of Notre Dame's James McKenna, director of the Mother-Baby Behavioral Sleep Laboratory in South Bend, Ind.

"Unless practiced dangerously, sleeping next to mother is good for infants," McKenna said.

Maher, who teaches childbirth classes and also has a son, Brandon, 2, said she knew of co-sleeping's risks and never planned on doing it. "I tried to do the 'normal thing,'" she said. "It just didn't feel right."

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Mom used co-sleeping. I understand the concerns and am not really sure how I feel about it. In many cultures co-sleeping is the norm. I plan on using the arms reach co-sleeper when the baby is born.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

I read this earlier, and heard it on the radio. I personally wouldn't do it, just because to me there are too many 'what if's'. It is just easier for me not worrying I am going to roll or suffocate my child. I don't even want to have the option for that to happen.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Scary stuff but it doesn't shock me. I was never interested in co-sleeping, but that was not my reasoning. I do plan on giving BFing the best chance I can and if I have to get out of bed or have DH get up to give her a pumped bottle, I will.

We are both very much against sharing a bed with a child. I wasn't raised that way and neither was DH. He was breast fed in his own room.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

I was co slept child, and then since we lived in an apt when I was a baby kept the crib in there room. I ended up sleeping in my parents bed till I was 9....I had major separation issues, not sure if that was from the cosleeping, but my mom seems to think so....so bc of this I am not comfortable sharing a bed with the baby...

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Dh and I are strongly against co-sleeping with a child. I don't think its safe for the baby. Plus, I think it can put a rift between husband & wife (JMO)

Plus, I've seen enough Supernanny to know this is a hard habit to break

Message edited 5/29/2008 4:25:36 PM.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

we won't do it... initially becuase of suffocation issues, later on becuase... well, honestly, a kid doesn't belong in his parent's bed, and once they're accustomed to it, it is very difficult to make them change!

the crib will be in our bedroom away from our bed...

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Sorry to crash - just wanted to put my 2 cents in.

I am not an advocate of co-sleeping. I am also not an advocate of crib sleeping. I am strongly for parents finding what works best for their family.

I co-slept with both of my sons and it was a wonderful experience. It worked for our family.

There are rules to co-sleeping just like their are rules to pretty much everything. If I were a heavy sleeper or if I had been the weight I am NOW when I had my children or if I had been on medications that could alter my sleep patterns - I would not have co-slept.

As for it being a hard habit to break - it wasn't the easiest thing in the world to transition them to their own beds when the time came - but neither was potty training!

Message edited 5/29/2008 5:37:18 PM.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

I would LOVE to cosleep and snuggle w/ my baby, but I will not . I"m afraid of the baby being injured or worse, I know it would be a hard habit to break, and I don't think it would be healthy for DH and I to have a child in our bed.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

My mom has drilled this into my head. I am def not going to co sleep

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Regardless of intentions parents often find themselves co-sleeping because that's what works. That's why I think it is so important that people understand what safe co-sleeping is -- I think it's a mistake to just put out a blanket statement that co-sleeping is "dangerous." First of all, that's not true, second that doesn't help the exhausted mother who is trying to get some sleep.

Co-sleeping accidents happen when mothers are over-tired or under the influence of drugs or alcohol. I used a co-sleeper withe DS for the first year of his life and highly recommend it. I knew I was too tired to have him in my bed, but it kept him close.

Also, many people don't know that a firm bed is a safe place to sleep with an infant, but a sofa is not. Over and over again I see people who do not want "the baby in the bed" (they're afraid of creating a habit), but are napping with them on the couch, which is much more dangerous.

Co-sleeping can be a wonderful way to bond with your baby as long as you understand how to do it safely.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

I know Erin- we went to HS and College together- so funny.

Honestly- I agree w/ Erin... what did people do for ages and ages when familys of 10 were stuffed into 2 bedroom apartments? Or what do they do in most of the rest of the world?

I think there is a right and wrong way to do it- and I think they're overblowing it.

edited to say: you can't say I won't do this or that b/c you just don't know until the baby comes. You can be 100% against something & cave b/c it's the only thing that works. If you have a child w/ collic who is sleep depriving you, unless you co-sleep, I bet after a week of not sleeping, even the person most against co-sleeping will try it!

Message edited 5/30/2008 10:22:31 AM.

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

Re: interesting article on co-sleeping

We fully intend to co-sleep. We registered for a little crib type thing that is elevated and goes to bed with you. It has sides so you can’t just roll over it. But it’s large enough for the baby’s own personal space. I’ll post a pic

I think sometimes we go too far with warnings. Be careful, be smart, don’t take really big risk but otherwise you have to do what works for you.

Having my child close is what works for me. I have a form of sleep apnea and sometimes I just stop breathing at night. It’s not a good feeling to wake up coughing so suddenly and hard because my body just realized I hadn’t taken in air for awhile. I am afraid my child may get that and I want her close.

I can’t imagine how I’d feel if she were in the other room and quietly dying and I was so far. I have intentions of putting her in a crib and even registered for the arm’s reach crib for beside the bed, but I worry she’ roll off that.

Still with the in-bed crib and side-crib I hope to have best of both worlds but my daughter will always be in arms reach of me for those first few months.