Co-Sleeping

In our yoga class a while back we had a substitute teacher (I wrote about her here.) Although she made some giggle-worthy lines she did say something that made a lot of sense to me,

"Breathing is contagious."

I think she said something like, "Breath loudly so that your neighbor can hear, it will help them to remember and breath deeply, breathing is contagious." It made a connection to what I had been reading at the time in regards to co-sleeping.  I picked up a used copy of Mothering magazine at the local thriftshop for a mere quarter. It was a special issue focusing on co-sleeping with your baby. Having the baby sleep near you in the beginning of it's life is great for many different reasons and one of them is that you are helping the baby transition from womb to room. The baby has been hanging out with (in) it's mama for 40 weeks or so, listening to her breathing, heartbeat and feeling her movements. Co-sleeping is aiding in that transition by being near for a little while longer; I imagine that being near enough to mom to hear her breathe (or snore) would help in that transition by being semi-familiar to what he heard in the womb. Plus I would feel more at ease in being able to be near him and hearing him breath. Breathing is contagious, after all. Plus I think all I'll do for a few months is just stare in awe at his little face and zombie hands and monkey feet. Those are my non-scientific thoughts on the subject. In this issue of Mothering they had several different research institutions look into co-sleeping after the Consumer Product Safety Commission deemed it unsafe and discouraged parents from doing it. Mothering had researchers in the U.K., New Zealand, Australia, at UC Berkeley, the University of Notre Dame and other US universities contribute one and only research papers on this subject. First of all, like anything, there are pros and cons to it. The cons are hazards. The hazards are preventable. It's good to know about these hazards. Here are some of the hazards and what I learned to prevent them:

1. Gaps between beds and wall - push the bed snugly against the wall.
2. Soft beds, pillows and blankets leading to suffocation - get a firm mattress and remove any pillows and blankets from baby's sleeping area
3. Falling off the bed - put the baby between you and the wall or use a co-sleeper that attaches securely to the bed.
4. Overlaying (Parent rolling onto wee babe) - don't go to bed drunk! I read that most mom's won't do this but more father's are prone to do it because they aren't as in tune with the presence of the newborn.
5. Smoking in bed, going to bed drunk - the baby's exposure to tobacco is associated with a higher risk of SIDS. Being drunk causes you to be less aware of your surroundings

The pros make complete sense to me. Here are some of the pluses to co-sleeping:

1. More sleep for mom and baby
2. Increased breastfeeding for baby
3. Increased sensitization to infants physiological social status
4. Less crying time (for baby)
5. Increased sensitivity to mother's communication
6. Increased prolactin levels 
7. Increased ability to monitor and physically manage and respond to infant needs.

There is so much more and the research articles were super detailed with graphs and charts and lots of information. You can read a mini synopsis of it at Mothering dot com. Another good (and more recent) article I found is at Babble dot com.

We have an Arm's Reach co-sleeper from my friend Kristen and it snugs up close to one side of the bed - so he'll be just an "arm's reach" away from me. Who knows, maybe we won't use it much and we'll just hang out in bed together. When we (me and baby) are both ready we will put him in a crib that Garbage Man Harold found for us. This crib is one of the projects I would like to tackle while I'm off from work (if I have the time and energy). It's an old timey crib that I want to make look more modern by painting it. It will be vintage chic.  We still need to get a mattress for it. Oh my, am I tired.