Étiquettes
cot death, Daily Mail 29th Jan. 2018, Grandchildren, home life, Life, sleeping in parents bed, sleeping with baby, under twos
Baby Lucy, seven months, sleeps with both her ever attentive parents, as does our Toddler 2.6 years old. They are both Breast fed, fed on demand, at night, round the clock and neither has been left alone to sleep since Birth.
I was shocked to read the front page of the Daily Mail yesterday, with its’ admission that 133 babies a year die in their parents’ beds. Presumably like ALL Health Care workers most people believe children fare better in a cot suitable for the age of the baby. This is NOT actually true. We were always told that babies likely to suffer Cot Death were those born early and too small, or simply because no one was listening carefully enough to their breathing.
In our family we have always preferred to watch our children sleeping and when the Toddler was born she was Ten pounds in weight ! So although a small baby she was barely small enough to fit her carrycot pram – but that is where we put her down to sleep in the day time, downstairs with us. AT night she had a sleep alongside Mama crib which zipped down for easy access, but soon she was spending all her night time snuggled in with mummy. With each of my children we slept next to them till they were Two. Only the one that’s soon to enter her fourth decade had a separate cot in her own room… Four hourly they said, scolding me for picking her up for a cuddle beforehand, I soon lapsed, but was unusual for my generation, and only when the third child kept us awake all night did she sleep alone in her own bed, she never had a cot of her own as the second one had learnt how to climb out before she was sixteen months old !
So, whatever these medics have decided lately, in their infinite wisdom, if you are sensible and don’t Drink and don’t smoke in bed, and you are Breastfeeding your baby in the wee small hours, she or he is likely to be safer in bed with you than anywhere else.