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We tried this (our daughter is almost 6 months old) but every bloody doctor, nurse, family member etc. that we discussed this with put the every living terror i

We tried this (our daughter is almost 6 months old) but every bloody doctor, nurse, family member etc. that we discussed this with put the every living terror in us about accidentally killing her. The baby slept well, we did not.

DanBC 14y ago
There are cots which attach to the side of the bed which give the benefits of co-sleeping without the risk.
- Tichy 14y ago
  Yay, we had that and it was great, highly recommended.
antirez 14y ago
This is normal, family, doctors, and friends are dangerous: * Hey, you no longer have enough milk! Try giving some more integration with artificial milk. * You'll end killing her because of co-sleeping! * Co-sleeping will increase chances of SIDS! * Let her cry, otherwise you'll always carry her in your arms! * <Other bad advices here> And so forth. My advice is: don't listen to them, they tell you this with good intentions, but the reality is, for a shitload of years since we exist small babyes co-sleeped with their mothers. This is how it's supposed to work.
- jamesaguilar 14y ago
  For "a shitload" of years infant mortality rate was >15% too. How things used to be is not a good indicator of optimal approaches. A scientifically-minded person should not prefer random internet commentators to doctors' when the sole argument proferred by the former is that things used to be a certain way, therefore it's ok.
  - Domenic_S 14y ago
    A scientifically-minded person realizes that doctors people too, with their own biases, agendas, and misinformation. A scientifically-minded person would seek out research to determine the best course of action.
    - jamesaguilar 14y ago
      Of course, I would never deny that people should do their own research. Based on my googling, they would probably find that there's a lot of research to back up the doctors' advice, and plenty of anecdotes to back up co-sleeping advocates. Certainly the default position should be that medical professionals know what they are talking about for folks who are not inclined to do the actual research.
      - DanBC 14y ago
        > Certainly the default position should be that medical professionals know what they are talking about In general I agree with you. When you're faced with a large amount of literature from many doctors and specialists in the field you should be able to assume that someone has done the research, and that most of the medical profession agree. It'd be great if more people could read and understand research. But we're stuck with sub-optimal reporting, and people struggling to understand what is really meant by "50% reduction in risk" or "20 times less likely to die". Having said all that: Here's an off topic rant. There are very many examples of doctors not using scientific method but relying on their "expertise".[1] This has caused significant harm to many people. Doctors tend not to talk about stuff that is obvious nonsense, and a lot of their interventions sound plausible. But that's the sneaky danger! We know woo is woo, and if people want to fund research into it good luck to them. But for things that sound plausible? That's exactly when we need good research, because common sense and expertise is fallible. This isn't from doctors trying to deceive people. It's from good clinicians who are not aware of their limits. [1] A great example is "Arthroscopic Knee Surgery No Better Than Placebo Surgery", from about 2000.
    - readme 14y ago
      A person with common sense would look at the mass of a baby, and the mass of an adult human. They'd consider their tendencies to sleep heavily, and perhaps conclude that the adult could easily roll over on the baby, and kill it. Or knock it off the edge of the bed, and kill it. Hell, if you do the research there are plenty instances of people punching their sleeping partner in the face during sleep, because they were having a dream (I almost did it once, with my fist landing right next to my girlfriend's head in her pillow. I thought I was having a fist fight, but I was dreaming) So, could a human kill a baby by sleeping with it? I don't know. Could a swallow carry a coconut?
- Tichy 14y ago
  Some of those are so infuriating. Luckily by now there are also some experts who speak out against the "let her cry" theory. Turns out that feeling safe and cared for actually gives kids more confidence and in the long run than being left alone for long stretches of time. We also had a close shave with the milk thing, but there are also now experts who help with and promote breast feeding. But the "standard docs" are rather quick with "just add artificial food". Even though they should now that it's better for the immune system to be breast fed (there actually is research on that).
  - purephase 14y ago
    The "cry it out" method (or CIO as it's annoying referred to on the baby forums -- acronyms central) does not actually advocate leaving the child for long stretches of time. It is a common misconception based on people not actually reading about the method, or the person who originally advocated it (Ferber). For us, we had to do it at around 4 months or we would have been in serious trouble. 4 months of averaging 2-3 hours of uninterrupted sleep per week was wreaking havoc on our lives, and no one (including baby) was happy. The only way she would ever sleep is in our bed next to mum, and this was not sustainable, and terrified us every single night. We read all of the no-cry sleep methods, and ferber. We realized that we were essentially doing all of the no-cry methods already (swaddle, side sleep, white noise, pick-up and soothe immediately, co-sleep, cradle at the side of the bed) and we tried each one for weeks. None of it worked. At all. For the Ferber method, you only leave the child for a few minutes at a time and gradually increase it. In our case, she was never left alone for longer than 10 minutes (we couldn't do any longer) and we did it over weeks and as gradually as we could. Now she sleeps in 4+ hours segments regularly which, to us, has been a god send. To each their own. No one method is foolproof as all babies are different and I've learned through this that I no longer trust "experts" or anecdotal evidence. I will use it as a guideline, but adjust based on my own observations. I don't think any other approach works.
Evgeny 14y ago
every bloody doctor, nurse, family member etc. that we discussed this with put the every living terror in us about accidentally killing her The reason is probably http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_infant_death_syndrome http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_infant_death_syndrome - no one is exactly sure why some babies dies without a visible reason, but there are some correlations. Sharing a bed with parents or other siblings may increase risk for SIDS, but the mechanism remains unclear http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20148046 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20148046 The risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) has fallen dramatically in the "Back to Sleep" era; however, half the cases now occur when the infant has been sleeping in bed with another person.
- tsewlliw 14y ago
  "Safe Sleep". Hopefully that campaign of education will eliminate the idea that these infants are just randomly dying and promote -- the mechanism is not unclear, just nobody wants to tell a grieving parent that they are responsible for death of their child.
  - antirez 14y ago
    Are you sure? We are talking about children that after autopsy are not found with a clear cause of death. See the wikipedia page about that.
- purephase 14y ago
  We know all this, which is why I didn't sleep while Mum and baby were in bed. It was the only way that we could get my daughter to sleep for a few hours at a time. All other methods (co-sleeping devices, cradle at the side of the bed, crib at the bottom) were not successful (or marginally better). The simple fact was that she needed to be close to Mum. Things are better now, but it honesty felt like we were all going to drop dead at around the 2 month mark. I've never been so exhausted in my life.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
sergiotapia 14y ago
Ditto. When I had my first son my wife and all nearly killed each other due to lack of sleep, we would take shifts so there were a pair of eyes on him always. At least until he was around 7 months old. SIDS is real, and is not worth it. The same thing happened when my daughter was born. Heh, well, with my baby girl I never slept. I kept an eye on her like a HAWK.
- tadfisher 14y ago
  I feel like there should be an easy and failsafe technical solution to this.
  - kevinskii 14y ago
    Companies like Angelcare sell a "baby movement monitor" sleep pad that sounds an alarm if the infant stops moving for 30 seconds. It's sensitive enough to detect movement from breathing alone.
  - purephase 14y ago
    There are a lot of them, but nothing replaces skin-on-skin touch. In our case, it was the only way we could get my daughter to sleep.
  - conroe64 14y ago
    Negative reinforcement through shock therapy is both easy and failsafe (it will not physically harm the child).
    - marekmroz 14y ago
      I don't know much about babies, but the way you phrased it made sound like "Beatings will continue until morale improves" approach.
logn 14y ago
I know a pediatrician who advises patients' parents the same thing: co-sleeping is dangerous. This doctor admitted to me that they co-sleep sometimes though.
Gustomaximus 14y ago
We were worried about this with our first. So we placed her in a low/soft walled inner cot box between us in bed. It gave a boundary you could easily feel when sleeping and seemed to give the best of both worlds. The other strict rule we had was if someone had a few drinks, the baby slept in the cot or you slept on the couch. A nurse told us that largely these smothering baby tragedies occur when someone has had a few drinks.
- r00fus 14y ago
  ...Or sleep pills (ie, ambien,etc). When we coslept with our first kid, I almost rolled over onto my daughter once - she squaked in a way that I would never be able to ignore - unless I had been medicated.
  - buddyp450 14y ago
    I lol'd, sorry, it was the imagery. Glad everything worked out for the best.
Tichy 14y ago
Our doctors told us that mothers don't kill their babies while they sleep, due to some instinct. Fathers might, but apparently mostly if they are drunk (so we've been told). What we had and loved is a "baby bay" - basically a half open crib that docks onto the bed (on mommy's side obviously). That way the child has instant access to mommy, but you can't accidentally roll into the crib and smother her because the crib is too small for mommy.

DanBC 14y ago

There are cots which attach to the side of the bed which give the benefits of co-sleeping without the risk.

Tichy 14y ago
Yay, we had that and it was great, highly recommended.

antirez 14y ago

This is normal, family, doctors, and friends are dangerous: * Hey, you no longer have enough milk! Try giving some more integration with artificial milk. * You'll end killing her because of co-sleeping! * Co-sleeping will increase chances of SIDS! * Let her cry, otherwise you'll always carry her in your arms! * <Other bad advices here> And so forth. My advice is: don't listen to them, they tell you this with good intentions, but the reality is, for a shitload of years since we exist small babyes co-sleeped with their mothers. This is how it's supposed to work.

jamesaguilar 14y ago
For "a shitload" of years infant mortality rate was >15% too. How things used to be is not a good indicator of optimal approaches. A scientifically-minded person should not prefer random internet commentators to doctors' when the sole argument proferred by the former is that things used to be a certain way, therefore it's ok.
- Domenic_S 14y ago
  A scientifically-minded person realizes that doctors people too, with their own biases, agendas, and misinformation. A scientifically-minded person would seek out research to determine the best course of action.
  - jamesaguilar 14y ago
    Of course, I would never deny that people should do their own research. Based on my googling, they would probably find that there's a lot of research to back up the doctors' advice, and plenty of anecdotes to back up co-sleeping advocates. Certainly the default position should be that medical professionals know what they are talking about for folks who are not inclined to do the actual research.
    - DanBC 14y ago
      > Certainly the default position should be that medical professionals know what they are talking about In general I agree with you. When you're faced with a large amount of literature from many doctors and specialists in the field you should be able to assume that someone has done the research, and that most of the medical profession agree. It'd be great if more people could read and understand research. But we're stuck with sub-optimal reporting, and people struggling to understand what is really meant by "50% reduction in risk" or "20 times less likely to die". Having said all that: Here's an off topic rant. There are very many examples of doctors not using scientific method but relying on their "expertise".[1] This has caused significant harm to many people. Doctors tend not to talk about stuff that is obvious nonsense, and a lot of their interventions sound plausible. But that's the sneaky danger! We know woo is woo, and if people want to fund research into it good luck to them. But for things that sound plausible? That's exactly when we need good research, because common sense and expertise is fallible. This isn't from doctors trying to deceive people. It's from good clinicians who are not aware of their limits. [1] A great example is "Arthroscopic Knee Surgery No Better Than Placebo Surgery", from about 2000.
  - readme 14y ago
    A person with common sense would look at the mass of a baby, and the mass of an adult human. They'd consider their tendencies to sleep heavily, and perhaps conclude that the adult could easily roll over on the baby, and kill it. Or knock it off the edge of the bed, and kill it. Hell, if you do the research there are plenty instances of people punching their sleeping partner in the face during sleep, because they were having a dream (I almost did it once, with my fist landing right next to my girlfriend's head in her pillow. I thought I was having a fist fight, but I was dreaming) So, could a human kill a baby by sleeping with it? I don't know. Could a swallow carry a coconut?
Tichy 14y ago
Some of those are so infuriating. Luckily by now there are also some experts who speak out against the "let her cry" theory. Turns out that feeling safe and cared for actually gives kids more confidence and in the long run than being left alone for long stretches of time. We also had a close shave with the milk thing, but there are also now experts who help with and promote breast feeding. But the "standard docs" are rather quick with "just add artificial food". Even though they should now that it's better for the immune system to be breast fed (there actually is research on that).
- purephase 14y ago
  The "cry it out" method (or CIO as it's annoying referred to on the baby forums -- acronyms central) does not actually advocate leaving the child for long stretches of time. It is a common misconception based on people not actually reading about the method, or the person who originally advocated it (Ferber). For us, we had to do it at around 4 months or we would have been in serious trouble. 4 months of averaging 2-3 hours of uninterrupted sleep per week was wreaking havoc on our lives, and no one (including baby) was happy. The only way she would ever sleep is in our bed next to mum, and this was not sustainable, and terrified us every single night. We read all of the no-cry sleep methods, and ferber. We realized that we were essentially doing all of the no-cry methods already (swaddle, side sleep, white noise, pick-up and soothe immediately, co-sleep, cradle at the side of the bed) and we tried each one for weeks. None of it worked. At all. For the Ferber method, you only leave the child for a few minutes at a time and gradually increase it. In our case, she was never left alone for longer than 10 minutes (we couldn't do any longer) and we did it over weeks and as gradually as we could. Now she sleeps in 4+ hours segments regularly which, to us, has been a god send. To each their own. No one method is foolproof as all babies are different and I've learned through this that I no longer trust "experts" or anecdotal evidence. I will use it as a guideline, but adjust based on my own observations. I don't think any other approach works.

Evgeny 14y ago

every bloody doctor, nurse, family member etc. that we discussed this with put the every living terror in us about accidentally killing her The reason is probably http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_infant_death_syndrome http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_infant_death_syndrome - no one is exactly sure why some babies dies without a visible reason, but there are some correlations. Sharing a bed with parents or other siblings may increase risk for SIDS, but the mechanism remains unclear http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20148046 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20148046 The risk of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) has fallen dramatically in the "Back to Sleep" era; however, half the cases now occur when the infant has been sleeping in bed with another person.

tsewlliw 14y ago
"Safe Sleep". Hopefully that campaign of education will eliminate the idea that these infants are just randomly dying and promote -- the mechanism is not unclear, just nobody wants to tell a grieving parent that they are responsible for death of their child.
- antirez 14y ago
  Are you sure? We are talking about children that after autopsy are not found with a clear cause of death. See the wikipedia page about that.
purephase 14y ago
We know all this, which is why I didn't sleep while Mum and baby were in bed. It was the only way that we could get my daughter to sleep for a few hours at a time. All other methods (co-sleeping devices, cradle at the side of the bed, crib at the bottom) were not successful (or marginally better). The simple fact was that she needed to be close to Mum. Things are better now, but it honesty felt like we were all going to drop dead at around the 2 month mark. I've never been so exhausted in my life.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]

sergiotapia 14y ago

Ditto. When I had my first son my wife and all nearly killed each other due to lack of sleep, we would take shifts so there were a pair of eyes on him always. At least until he was around 7 months old. SIDS is real, and is not worth it. The same thing happened when my daughter was born. Heh, well, with my baby girl I never slept. I kept an eye on her like a HAWK.

tadfisher 14y ago
I feel like there should be an easy and failsafe technical solution to this.
- kevinskii 14y ago
  Companies like Angelcare sell a "baby movement monitor" sleep pad that sounds an alarm if the infant stops moving for 30 seconds. It's sensitive enough to detect movement from breathing alone.
- purephase 14y ago
  There are a lot of them, but nothing replaces skin-on-skin touch. In our case, it was the only way we could get my daughter to sleep.
- conroe64 14y ago
  Negative reinforcement through shock therapy is both easy and failsafe (it will not physically harm the child).
  - marekmroz 14y ago
    I don't know much about babies, but the way you phrased it made sound like "Beatings will continue until morale improves" approach.

logn 14y ago

I know a pediatrician who advises patients' parents the same thing: co-sleeping is dangerous. This doctor admitted to me that they co-sleep sometimes though.

Gustomaximus 14y ago

We were worried about this with our first. So we placed her in a low/soft walled inner cot box between us in bed. It gave a boundary you could easily feel when sleeping and seemed to give the best of both worlds. The other strict rule we had was if someone had a few drinks, the baby slept in the cot or you slept on the couch. A nurse told us that largely these smothering baby tragedies occur when someone has had a few drinks.

r00fus 14y ago
...Or sleep pills (ie, ambien,etc). When we coslept with our first kid, I almost rolled over onto my daughter once - she squaked in a way that I would never be able to ignore - unless I had been medicated.
- buddyp450 14y ago
  I lol'd, sorry, it was the imagery. Glad everything worked out for the best.

Tichy 14y ago

Our doctors told us that mothers don't kill their babies while they sleep, due to some instinct. Fathers might, but apparently mostly if they are drunk (so we've been told). What we had and loved is a "baby bay" - basically a half open crib that docks onto the bed (on mommy's side obviously). That way the child has instant access to mommy, but you can't accidentally roll into the crib and smother her because the crib is too small for mommy.