[Jaimep]

Would you still co sleep if you KNEW your baby would sleep longer and not nurse at much at night if he/she was in a crib/other bed?

I am really conflicted about this, because I love co-sleeping, but I think it is the reason my DD doesn't sleep through. I know some people have co-sleepers that sleep through the night, but they seem to be the minority.
I guess I just feel like the night waking, constant nursing is my fault because she sleeps with us. I don't think it would change now if she were in a seperate bed. However, I feel like we made her this way from having boob 2 inches away and always giving in to her at first peep.

 

[JanetF]

I would and I do

Sleeping through the night isn't something babies are designed to do. And the constant bfing only adds to the overall health of the baby, your bf relationship, your supply and reduces your chances of developing breast cancer. You haven't "made" her any way, she is just doing what babies naturally do and would do if more parents followed the research and their urges and coslept. Giving it to her at the first peep is also really good for her emotoinal development. If you would like to lengthen her periods of sleep between feeds, you can try other ways of settling her in the bed with you. You can pat, cuddle, rock, sing, talk or soothe her any other way and maybe she'll be happy enough to go back to sleep with that reassurance that you're there. Sometimes it might work and sometimes it won't. I've tried using other techniques with my son (just over 12 months old) but the quickest and least disruptive to my sleep is to just whack him on the boob in the dark and go back to sleep. Sometimes I slide his dummy in when he's finished and he snuggles up to me very happily.

Having coslept with your baby it's unlikely that she will suddenly sleep longer and nurse less if you move her into a cot now. It could well make many sleepless nights for you both. Cosleeping isn't always easy but the health benefits, both physical and emotional have always made up for this with us. My son has woken every 2 hours (or more often in growth spurts) his whole life. It's only been about a month now when his sleep periods have lengthened to around the 4 hour mark. But generally I haven't felt sleep deprived because cosleeping has made feeding him back to sleep so easy. Yes sometimes it has snuck up on me and I feel like crap but I think I would feel a lot worse if he was in another bed and I had to get out of bed to feed him. Ugh!

Maybe Elizabeth Pantley's No Cry Sleep Solution would be comforting and interesting to you.

J

 

[~Megan~]

It depends. I might try putting the baby in a seperate bed close to me. I think its safer and more convenient to have baby in the room with me.

 

[Night Owl]

My son co-slept with us until he was more than three years old. At first, he woke during the night, but as he got older, he awoke fewer and fewer times. He is four now and sleeps through the night just fine. My dd sleeps with us still, and will get in quite a few hours of sleep before she wakes up to nurse. She is almost 20 months.

Waking during the night is something your baby will outgrow when she is ready.

 

[Meli65]

We're still sleeping with ds, who turned three last month. He didn't sleep through the night 'til he was fifteen months old, when we used The No-Cry Sleep Solution, which worked wonders for us.

We didn't start out co-sleeping, but turned to it after a month because he woke so frequently, nursed for so long, and really didn't care to sleep alone at all -- after four weeks of this I was a wreck! Co-sleeping allowed me to get a lot more rest.

And now I love it -- he is getting to be a very big boy and it is awfully precious to have him in bed with us. I know it won't be for much longer, and I'm so glad we've had this time together.

 

[dharmama]

Ya know I think our sleeping arrangements will always be changing to adapt to our dd's needs.

I

the idea of co-sleeping but I'm not sure that it is what's best for us all the time. It seems that my DH and I wake our dd up more often then the other way around. I also end up contorting my body into all kinds of crazy positions to ensure dd's comfort and find myself waking up in the morning with a stiff neck and sore back.

SOOOO.....for us the compromise has been that dd starts the night in her own space (co-sleeper was next to our bed...now it's a few feet away) and then comes into our bed after her first waking....which can be anywhere from 2-6 hours.

Right now she has a cold so she is sleeping best if she can be upright so that's in the swing in her room (which ajoins ours) with the vaporizer going (DH couldn't sleep with the vaporizer going in our room).

A few weeks ago she went through a phase where she was sleeping REALLY well in our bed so we went with that while it was working.

Not exactly sure what the point of all my

is. I guess basically that we all need to be flexible and do what works best for our families (as long as it doesn't involve CIO...that makes me so sad

) so we can all get a good night's sleep!