Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community - View Single Post - Co-sleeping with your baby: do you? did you? would you?

levite · 11-01-2010, 09:36 PM

Yeah, I've been hearing about this (Mrs. Levite and I are thinking about starting to try to get her pregnant, so we've been doing research). Seems like it's the flavor of the month in alternative baby-care circles these days.

I have to say, this just doesn't sound like a good idea. Putting the baby's bassinet in your room for the first few months is one thing-- that does sound like a good idea. But actually having the baby sleep in the bed with you? No. And especially not after the first few months. That just seems like a great way to make sure the baby thinks you will always be there to entertain/feed/whatever, 24/7, and that you will never have good boundaries. I think it's perfectly healthy to be very close, loving, affectionate, demonstrative, and still sleep in different places.

Turns out one of my best friends and his wife did this with their son-- I never knew until just recently. He said that for the first two years almost, their son slept with them. He constantly worried about rolling over, about waking the baby with snoring, about accidentally farting on the baby in his sleep, and so forth, and he and his wife barely had any sex the entire two years.

So, no thank you.

11-01-2010, 09:36 PM	#20 (permalink)
levite Minion of Joss Location: The Windy City	Yeah, I've been hearing about this (Mrs. Levite and I are thinking about starting to try to get her pregnant, so we've been doing research). Seems like it's the flavor of the month in alternative baby-care circles these days. I have to say, this just doesn't sound like a good idea. Putting the baby's bassinet in your room for the first few months is one thing-- that does sound like a good idea. But actually having the baby sleep in the bed with you? No. And especially not after the first few months. That just seems like a great way to make sure the baby thinks you will always be there to entertain/feed/whatever, 24/7, and that you will never have good boundaries. I think it's perfectly healthy to be very close, loving, affectionate, demonstrative, and still sleep in different places. Turns out one of my best friends and his wife did this with their son-- I never knew until just recently. He said that for the first two years almost, their son slept with them. He constantly worried about rolling over, about waking the baby with snoring, about accidentally farting on the baby in his sleep, and so forth, and he and his wife barely had any sex the entire two years. So, no thank you. __________________ Dull sublunary lovers love, Whose soul is sense, cannot admit Absence, because it doth remove That thing which elemented it. (From "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" by John Donne)