Looking forward to bedtime?

Co-sleeping

Crib sleeping

Kelly's story


Sleeping babies we all love them. They are so cute and precoius looking while the snooze happily. But if you have fussy babies you just like the quite time you get lol. I don't have a sleep schedual or schedual at all really for my kids lol. I probally should but it works for us.
Kairi starts getting sleepy aroung 8-9 pm so she eats a bottle or bottle (5-6 ounces) and cereal depending on how hungary she is.Takes her about 20 minutes or so to eat. THen she lays in her swing for about 30 minutes to get asleep. Ever other day or so she get a bath and a massage to help her sleep better.

She just started sleeping in her crib at night she sleep till about 4-7 am depending on how loud daddy is when he wakes up and get ready for work.

She takes 2-4 naps a day about 30 mins to 2 hours all really depends on how tired she is.



BABY UPDATE!!!Kairi is 15 weeks now. She weighs around 15 pounds. And around 26 inches long I think. Haven't had a doctors appointment since 2 months except for her emergancy doctors appointment. Shes growing like a weed. I wish she would stay samll but I know that thats not going to happen lol.




Sarah's story

We've all heard it before: "Get your rest while you can because once that baby is born your sleeping is over!"  It was one of the things I just wasn't looking forward to with regards of becoming a new parent.  I love my sleep, love love love it!   During my pregnancy I could sleep up to 14 hours a day, and then still find time to squeeze in an afternoon nap.  So the idea of having to wake up every couple of hours to a crying baby just did not look like future fun to me.  I thought for sure that once the baby came I would constantly be tired, moody, and quite unpleasant to be around come morning.  And since I would be breastfeeding, I just knew that I would be very bitter towards my husband because I would be the one waking all hours of the night while he just slept the night away and woke up well rested.  I didn't want it to be like that, but everyone was telling me that this is how it would be and it's "normal".

But where would the baby actually be sleeping?  My husband and I were just not ok with putting him in a cage (a crib), something about it just didn't sit right with us. With how many recalls there are annually with cribs, and all the infants that die because of defects, we just didn't think that it was worth it. And we didn't want to buy a bassinet when he would just grow out of it within a few months time either.  So in the end, we just decided to get a baby mattress and place it on the floor next to our mattress (which is also on the floor).  

The first night in the hospital after Alexander arrived was really easy.  He didn't cry at all and  basically slept all night only waking to squirm and grunt, letting me know it was time to try and breastfeed him again.  I could hear all the other newborn babies in the hospital wing crying their tiny little heads off, but Alexander was just snoozing away.  I spent the majority of the time holding him and was very reluctant to put him down so I could sleep, but they were always reminding us that the baby is not to sleep with us, and to place him in the plastic container that would be his "bed" for the duration of the hospital stay.  I could not wait to get home so I could just be with my baby and my husband and not be under the ever watchful eye of the nurses.  After two long days, finally we were on our way home.

  When he was about three or four days old I woke up to him on his stomach after I had sputum down on his back.), so we decided to get a crib and try it out.  It went against everything we had agreed on in the beginning, but we thought we would just give it a shot, thinking that if we got a pretty decent crib then the risk of an injury would be slimmer than normal.  But man, what a change that made in my sleeping habits.  The first night in the crib was easy, but that didn't last long.  Now I had to wait for the baby to fall asleep (there's no way I could just let him lay there upset to "put himself to sleep"), put him in his crib, and then stay there with my hand over his chest until he fell into a deep enough sleep that I could go lay down.  When it was time to feed him, like usual he would wiggle and grunt to wake me up and let me know, but now I had to get out of bed, get him out of his crib (that was still in our room) and take him to my nursing chair and position him on the boppy.  Then I would be there for about 15 to 20 minutes holding the baby, trying not to fall asleep so he wouldn't roll off my lap, and then repeat the getting him to sleep routine.  I was very doubtful that this was going to work.  Then my husband left for deployment about a week after we got the crib, and after he left I just kept bringing the Alexander to bed with me.  It was just easier that way.  Not to mention that I have a huge fear of the night and needed someone in the bed to help me sleep.  I was getting more sleep then I ever had with him, and his sleeping patterns were the same as mine.  If I slept in until 2 pm, so did he.  And it just felt right to have him next to me.  So I decided to do some research on bed sharing to see if this was okay and to check to see if there was a safe or unsafe way to do it, and it turns out that not only is it ok, but it's potentially beneficial as well.  After sharing these things that I found with my husband, we both just decided that it was the best thing for our little family.  

The term co-sleeping refers to any situation in which a committed adult (usually the mother) sleeps within close proximity of an infant so that they can respond to each other’s sensory signals and cues.  You can either room-share, where the baby is in the same room as you, or bed-share (which is what I do), where the baby is in the same bed as you.  Room sharing is the least controversial kind and is always considered safe and is recommended by all.  Whereas bed-sharing can either be safe, or unsafe depending upon how it is practiced (will discuss later).  However, sleeping on the couch with your baby is considerably more dangerous because the infant can be smashed against the back of the couch by the adult, or even flipped face down into the pillows where the child will suffocate.

"Unfortunately, the terms co-sleeping, bed-sharing and a well-known dangerous form of co-sleeping, couch or sofa co-sleeping, are mostly used interchangeably by medical authorities, even though these terms need to be kept separate. It is absolutely wrong to say, for example, that “co-sleeping is dangerous” when room sharing is a form of co-sleeping and this form of co-sleeping (as at least three epidemiological studies show) reduce an infant’s chances of dying by one half."

( http://neuroanthropology.net/2008/12/21/cosleeping-and-biological-imperatives-why-human-babies-do-not-and-should-not-sleep-alone/   An excellent article, by the way)

  Here is a list of reasons why I let my son sleep in the bed with us, along with reasons why it can be beneficial;

1.)  It's how it is done in nature.  With my little family trying to be as close to how things are supposed to be in nature as much as possible, this just seems like the logical thing to do.  Our ancestors all slept with their young and breastfed them through the night, and we are still here.  And something about letting my baby sleep with me just feels right.

2.)  We all get more sleep.  As I mentioned before, with breastfeeding my son, all I have to do is offer him my breast and then we can both go back to sleep.  His needs are met before he feels stressed, so he never really wakes up.  Although my son feeds frequently during the nighttime, I will still tell anyone he sleeps through the night because in all reality, he never wakes up.  He grunts and wiggles a little, but as soon as that happens, I wake up, give him my breast, and fall back asleep.  Not once does he open his eyes.  I no longer wake up feeling as though I haven't been to sleep yet, and I find my day to be a lot more pleasant.  It also makes breastfeeding much easier, and promotes a mother to breastfeed longer.

3.)  Far less nighttime stress, making for a more peaceful, loving parent.  When I was using the crib, I just remember feeling so frustrated trying to get him to sleep on his own.  I would take it out on my husband and it would just cause silly, unnecessary fighting.  Once I started to share my bed with the baby I got more rest and was just a happier person in general.  I no longer feel any kind of aggravation towards the baby if he isn't falling asleep in his crib.  I hated when I had to put him to sleep after he ate and I would be so tired, but every time I would put him down he would wake right back up, and I would find myself feeling angry, wondering "why can't you just go to sleep so I can sleep?".  I feel bad looking back at it, it's not his fault.  He just wanted me to hold him.

4.)  I feel more bonded with my baby.  With less stress on me, I look forward to going to bed rather than dreading trying to get him to sleep.  Every night around 8:00 pm I get the baby ready for bed, we lay down, I nurse him until he is asleep, and that's that.  No trying to get him to fall asleep, he just does.  And you should see how happy he is when it comes to bed time.  I tell him it's time to change his diaper and get ready for bed and once we lay down he is kicking like crazy, giving me a huge smile cause he knows what is about to happen. He is going to be fed and held close to me while he drifts off to sleep. I value this time with him, and I love knowing that instead of having a fear of the night, he feels safe close to me.  In the morning when I wake up I will sit in bed next to him on the computer or eating breakfast or something until he wakes up (usually about an hour or two after me) and you should see his face light up when he sees me awake, ready to tell him good morning.  Nothing is better than that gummy grin.

5.)  It may help prevent sleep problems.  Most people think that letting a baby sleep in the bed with them will cause many sleep problems, but some would also say that is the opposite from the truth.  Many sleep issues come from trying to force children to sleep on their own.  Instead of dreading bedtime because of isolation and/or fear, the baby actually begins to look forward to it, thus avoiding bedtime battles.  Being cared for during the night as well as during the day gives the child a constant flow of love and support, instead of having to cope with feelings of fear, abandonment, and anger every night. 

6.)  Just like any other aspect of life, it is perfectly safe when practiced safely.  It also has some safety advantages over a crib.  Anytime you leave your child unattended there is a risk.  There is about 40-50 crib related deaths a year, with thousands of other serious injuries.  When you sleep with your child you become very attuned to them, and are able to respond very quickly if something is going wrong.  And nighttime danger is greatly reduced if the child is close by.  Every year children die from fires, are kidnapped, sexually abused, attacked by pets, suffocate after vomiting or choking, or die or are injured in other ways that could have been prevented if the parent had been nearby to help.   The only time suffocation is a real danger is if the infant is on a water bed or sleeping with a parent that is too intoxicated by drugs and/or alcohol to attend to a child's needs.  If a child is suffocating for any reason they are more likely to rouse a parent who is sleeping nearby than one who is sleeping in another room.  Just make sure that there aren't any blankets or pillows that can suffocate the baby.  Also, it isn't advisable to let the baby sleep in the same bed with a parent who smokes.  The Academy of Breast Feeding Medicine, the USA Breast Feeding Committee, the Breast Feeding section of the American Academy of Pediatrics, La Leche League International, UNICEF and WHO are all prestigious organizations who support bed sharing when practiced safely.  Of course you will hear of infant deaths that occur while co-sleeping, but they never really tell you how the baby died, and where.  Were they practicing it safely?  Were they on a couch?  On average, about 60 infants deaths occur in adult beds, but what they fail to tell parents is that many of these deaths occurred while the baby was sleeping alone in the bed, without any supervision.  So it is very biased (and not scientifically backed) to tell mothers that they should not sleep in the same bed as their babies, that would be like telling a mother that she should never drive with her child in the car because some mothers don't install the car seat correctly, don't buckle their child in, or (God forbid) drink and drive. That's not even mentioning how many automobile accidents occur annually because of another driver, regardless of how safe you are.  You get the point.

7.)  The highest rates of bed sharing worldwide occur alongside the lowest rates of infant mortality, including SIDS.  This shocked me because everyone always told me that letting the baby sleep with me could cause SIDS.  But once I dug a little deeper it occurred to me that maybe they were confusing SIDS with suffocation?  I can see where the parent could potentially roll over on the infant, or cover it with a blanket or pillow, but cause it to die for no reason? Take Japan for instance.  It is a cultural norm to breast feed and co-sleep, and they have the lowest rates of SIDS in the entire world (not to mention that they delay all routine vaccines until the age of 2 and they banned the MMR vaccine in 1993 after 1.8 million children had been given two types of MMR and a record number developed non-viral meningitis and other adverse reactions.)  How can co-sleeping reduce the risk of SIDS?  When a mother and infant sleep together, their sleep cycles, breathing patterns and heart rates move in sync with each other.  Many people will argue that an infant is meant to sleep with its mother because it's neurological system is still immature and gaps in breathing are normal during the early months of a child's life, and the mothers breathing provides important cues to the infant, reminding it to take a breath.  For all my breastfeeding mothers out there, we've already discussed how breastfeeding reduces the risk of SIDS in my previous blog, but when you sleep close to your baby, s/he will wake more frequently to feed, thus reducing the risk of SIDS even further.  (So it's a given that co-sleeping also promotes breastfeeding)  Here is a fact sheet on Co-sleeping and SIDS;

 http://thebabybond.com/Cosleeping&SIDSFactSheet.html

8.) It's great for helping the working parent to find more time to bond with their baby.

9.)  Some studies have shown that routinely sharing a bed in infancy has been associated with higher self esteem among children, greater self reliance, fewer temper tantrums, and greater independence.  Whereas children who didn't co-sleep tended to be harder to control, were less happy, and were more fearful.  Here is a site with some studies on people who had co-slept compared to those who had not;

http://www.nd.edu/~jmckenn1/lab/longterm.html

So this is how it is with my family.  We all sleep together and we love it.  And when we have more kids, they will also sleep with us until they decide other wise.  The only time he doesn't sleep with us is during his naps, and then he is usually in his swing or in my lap (or in the Moby wrap, depending on if I was carrying him when he went down)  He still takes a nap every two or so hours and they usually last about and hour and a half.

  I know that co-sleeping, however practiced, may not be for everyone.  A lot of parents are turned off by the idea of sharing the bed with their kids because they think that it will inhibit their sex life and cause intimacy problems.  Rest assured that me and my husband still have sex, and we are very intimate.  The bed is not the only place to have sex people.  My love life is still the same as it was before Alexander was born.  And I find myself happier than I ever have been.  We may have wasted over $300 on a crib, but it makes a great place to store laundry I have yet to fold, and it is awesome for holding all the cloth diapers ;-)  But I encourage everyone to research co-sleeping and possibly try it out.  I have presented plenty of links throughout this blog and there are more at the end, but feel free to do your own independent research.  As with every aspect of parenting, I find it very hard to just "take the doctors word" on anything. 

http://www.wearsthebaby.com/articles/tenreasonssleep.html

http://www.naturalchild.org/jan_hunt/familybed.html

http://arubanbreastfeedingmamas.blogspot.com/2009/12/complexity-of-parent-child-cosleeping.html

http://www.phdinparenting.com/2009/01/09/cosleeping-benefits/

http://www.askdrsears.com/html/10/handout1.asp

http://www.naturalchild.org/guest/tami_breazeale.html

http://www.breastfeeding.com/reading_room/co_slepping.html