bed sharing

2moms2twins

Meegs10.13.06:

2moms2twins:

10 ) a friend of ours has  sister who has a baby that is 10 mo and weights 20+ lbs and said her Pediatrician said a front facing car seat was ok .. THIS IS NOT OK ... WTF .. I am so annoyed and well - I was a intern at a CORONERS BUREAU and I am PISSED that a DR would even suggest it and on what ground and HOW can I get my friend s sister to listen to me ... WTF WTF... and then a another friend ask about co-sleeping - so i did my spiel and sent them this link  :  https://thestir.cafemom.com/baby/135775/mom_convicted_for_not_heeding

I agree with you on the carseat, that is way way way way too early to front face! 

However, I'm curious about your co-sleeping "spiel." I have to say that the co-sleeping (actually bedsharing is what is mentioned in the article) article you posted is just a blog post, on cafe mom, not an informed article. It talks about one tragic situation, and doesn't even go into details about what other factors might have been at play. Bedsharing, where the baby is in the bed with the parents, when done correctly (and there are very simple rules to follow), can be perfectly safe. No one can predict SIDs, but bedsharing/co-sleeping actually lowers the risk of it. Baby will align its breathing with the mother, cutting the risk of apnea. (And co-sleeping refers to the baby being in the room, but not in the bed.)

oh damn .. I thought it was the article ... its about a woman who had 2 children and lost them both  while bed sharing .. Her first son she lost bed sharing and then had another child and also lot him at 2 month old  while bed sharing...

Its not for me in general ... we dont even let our small dog sleep with us in our bed for fear that he will be suffocated. I am by no means saying my way is right

 ...but while I worked at the Coroners Burea  there were many cases... I think is is possible to have a child survive bed sharing i am not saying it will result in death or imminent danger but ... based on the cases I saw - its just not wise... no matter how smart you are about - and the people involved in the cases were all so different - by that i mean ... They were from all socio- economic backgrounds and some were super educated and some were not  some had used the special in bed sleepers - uber conservative uber hippies... so to me personally "WHY RISK IT " and for me professionally  "HELL NO "

again its just my take ..I have several friends who have and do bed share with their child and or children .. and it works wonderfully for them- i just worry ... because no matter how prepared how perfect or how set up you think you are  u just never know ...   my  bottom line is    " your the MOM and you make the right decisions for your family"

 

Kershnic

SIDS deaths happen in cribs too.  And there are also a lot of sleeping hazards that parents unwittingly put in cribs.  It's tragic either way.  As for that particular woman in the cafe mom piece, I will admit that my alarm bells go off for two such similar tragedies in one family, but of course coincidences do happen.

ctbride08

We all are educated and capable of making the right choices for our own families regarding bedsharing. Frankly quoting that article to make an argument against it is just rediculous and not in the spirit of this board.

JoySeattle

It's very tragic that the family mentioned in that post lost two children to SIDS. I did read somewhere that the mom in that case had both hydrocodone and xanax in her system. When I teach about safe sleep practices, I define bed-sharing, co-sleeping and separate sleep and discuss the benefits and risks of each, and how to do each safely. For example, more infant deaths occur in unsafe cribs than in parental beds, so parents need to know not just "crib" vs "bed-sharing" but what is safe for each location. Also, many families do a combination of separate sleep, co-sleeping and bed-sharing, over the course of infancy, or even the course of a night.

The biggest factors with bed-sharing risk include parents under the influence of drugs and alcohol, second-hand smoke, and unsafe bed conditions (such as . There is a research-based link between socioeconomic status and SIDS incidence. Also it's much safer to co-sleep with a breastfeeding infant next to that parent, than an infant who is not breastfed or is next to another adult or child. World-wide research shows that SIDS is actually lower in many countries/cultures that practice exclusive bed-sharing. There is more and more research that SIDS is has both genetic/biological/physiological components and environmental factors.

More children die of SIDS from sleep deprived parents who accidentally fall asleep holding baby on a couch than from informed and intentional bed-sharing families. There are risks to everything, and each family needs to weigh those for themselves.Unfortunately, the media, anecdotal or second-hand personal experiences are not the research-based and should not be considered the definitive source on this topic. It believe it's better to teach families how to make safe sleep environments, wherever they choose, than to offer scapegoats and scare tactics which could actually create even more unsafe scenarios.

2moms2twins

ctbride08:

We all are educated and capable of making the right choices for our own families regarding bedsharing. Frankly quoting that article to make an argument against it is just rediculous and not in the spirit of this board.

 I was not making an argument against on the board I was sharing what i shared with a friend.. and i apologize for sending the wrong link  I actually had the link for the real article from the news but i am not sure what happ to it

   Anyhow-  I apologize if i offended anyone that was not my intention.  As I said before its not for me and I also said that  each person is educated and capable of making the right choices for OUR OWN families just not as eloquently as you 

 

ctbride08

2moms2twins:

ctbride08:

We all are educated and capable of making the right choices for our own families regarding bedsharing. Frankly quoting that article to make an argument against it is just rediculous and not in the spirit of this board.

 I was not making an argument against on the board I was sharing what i shared with a friend.. and i apologize for sending the wrong link  I actually had the link for the real article from the news but i am not sure what happ to it

   Anyhow-  I apologize if i offended anyone that was not my intention.  As I said before its not for me and I also said that  each person is educated and capable of making the right choices for OUR OWN families just not as eloquently as you 

listen, I hear you and this certainly doesnt have to turn into any big thing.  I understand that you arent trying to pass judgement on any of our parenting choices.  I just want to offer that maybe your respect for us and our ability to choose for our own families could extend to your friends off the board as well. 

And if she did ask for your opinion and you offered it, which of course is fine, maybe do it without the use of that article which is more situational than having any relavance on the safety of bedsharing (and clearly written as a scare tactic).

Kershnic

JoySeattle:

There is a research-based link between socioeconomic status and SIDS incidence.

Joy, do you have any references or anything on this?  I'm really curious to read more about it (and obviously it relates to what I stated about how my job encourages me to view this).  Of course I can look for it myself, but if you know an author or have a link or anything I'd love to know!

JoySeattle

Sure!

Here's a systematic review in the The Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1732769/

Full pdf available from a link.

There are other sources, but that's the best I have at hand.

Kershnic

Awesome, thanks!

2brides

I have a lot of thoughts on this topic and have tried 5x to write a thoughtful response to no avail. Perhaps I am tired from the 6y old who crawled into my bed at 2am this morning. :P

Pre-kids I was staunchly in the "everyone sleeps in their own bed" line of thinking. But once I found out that 1) the kids would sleep better/more soundly in our bed 2) I could nurse/doze while lying down and 3) I had a kid who refused to sleep alone for a single night until 3.5y old I had to reevaluate my thinking.

I have worked in a pediatric trauma ER for nearly 9y and have seen dozens of kids coming in found "down" in the morning. Some were in unsafe co-bedding situations, some were in safe co-bedding situations, some were co-sleeping, and some were in their own room in their own crib. Heck, 2 were in a baby Bjorn strapped to the mother's chest and the mothers thought that the child was sleeping. I also work with one of the nations leading SIDS researchers - the author of a few of the articles in Joy's lit review. So, I knew the risks - and I also knew how to alleviate some of the risks. But to me it is about weighing the risks based on our family. Each day we take calculated risks by taking our children in the car, by deciding which car seat to purchase, which childcare setting to place them in...If we didn't take some of these risks, we'd all live in a bubble.

I agree that this article wasn't the most helpful in providing thoughtful/informative/balanced approach to the topic (it was the TMZ of co-bedding.) But I am all for making sure parents know the risks, how to alleviate them, and are able to make informed decisions. I have these types of discussions with families I work with all of the time - often the only place they have for the baby to sleep is with the mother - and we have respectful conversations about safe practices.

In the end we all want what is best for our families and those "bests" can come in all shapes and sizes.