Sleeping Vs Cosleeping

Some parents of infants think co-sleeping is beneficial, however; experts do believe that this practice is very dangerous. Every parent has the decision to co-sleep (sharing a bed with your baby), its weather they do or not that counts. There are reasons parents decide for or against, for example; if you’re a heavy sleeper, you might accidently roll over and suffocate your child. You might not realize that something like could happen, but it can. “Most parents just figure it will be easier for them, it’s not like every parent of a newborn is going to spend hours re-searching reasons not to co-sleep” (lifescience)

In 1997, anthropologist James Mckenna and his colleagues conducted a study in a sleep laboratory at the University of California's Irvine School of Medicine. The study was to observed thirty-five nursing mother- infant pair sleeping together as well as apart for three consecutive nights. The infants were between eleven to fifteen weeks old. Twenty of the infants had been co sleeping since birth and the other fifteen had been independent sleepers. To observe they used many tools such as polygraph to record mother and infants heart rate, breathing rhythms, body temperature, the nursing cycles and even monitored their brain waves all of this along with watching their test subjects simultaneously on an infrared video monitor. What they found was quite unique, the infant and mother were highly responsive to each other and their movements. The infant and mother changed position of sleeping to face each other. They wake more frequently to nurse, and about twice as much as an independent sleeper and nurse three times longer but still get more sleep co sleeping than independent sleepers,

Infant co-sleeping is a highly controversial topic of debate in our society. There are many valid reasons as to why infant co-sleeping is an appropriate practice based upon many different things, some to include research, culture and personal opinion. And there are just as many reasons to recede that claim and support that co-sleeping is detrimental to the health and well-being of an infant. Before the following research, as outlined in this paper, my personal opinion was based on the fact that I practiced co-sleeping with my son many years ago, back when co-sleeping was not such an issue. I felt comfortable with co-sleeping and supported co-sleeping. The reasoning behind this could have been the age factor as a teen mother, my cultural beliefs and also the comfort of knowing my child was close and I could access him easily if needed. As I learned more about co-sleeping and began my work in the field of ECE, I was encouraged to support the “Back to Sleep” movement and to share the cons of co-sleeping with the families I worked with based upon the beliefs of my employer. The following articles will highlight the many pros and cons of infant co-sleeping

Dr. James McKenna of Notre Dame University’s Mother Baby Sleep Laboratory said “the bodies of women and their babies are more in sync when they sleep together, which helps the baby sleep better. Babies are designed to feel the presence of their parents. It is only a very recent and very strange cultural innovation that babies would be sleeping apart from their mothers. It is very much a departure from the normal human pattern.” (McKenna, et al., 1994)

Many of the benefits of co-sleeping stem from the interactions that can readily happen within the open, close proximity environment co-sleeping enables. One of these benefits is breast feeding, which can influence many other aspects of infant health and behavior. Breast feeding is much easier to perform when co-sleeping, as the infant is nearer to the parent and the position already accommodates for mother and baby’s comfort. Breast feeding and co-sleeping a cyclical relationship, as each promotes the other. A mother that co-sleeps will find herself breast sleeping more throughout the night and this nightly breast feeding will facilitate more co-sleeping

Explain why it is important that babies and infants sleep as they need, rather than setting a specific ‘sleep time’.

One of the major points discussed is in sleeping in Houston is the deaths during bed sharing, the police say this is caused by suffocation during bed sharing and parents rolling onto their baby due to fatigue. This is countered in “Co-Sleeping research” By listing points that benefits, the argument for “Co-Sleeping” Such as babies are able to breastfeed during Co-sleeping another point is that the parent and the baby are highly responsive to each other movements also that babies rarely cry during the Co-Sleeping. During the time that I allowed my kids to sleep with, me the cried a lot, Furthermore, my children also breastfeed a lot. They would also wake me up so that they can play around. The children would wake me up to play with them, they

Everyone, at some point in life, has experienced the terror of waking up from a disconcerting dream and longing for the comfort that only a mother can provide. Imagine there is an infant, new to the world and confused about everything around him, and how this child must feel when awakening with this uneasy feeling. Who knows how long it could take for the child’s mother to wake and come to his aid and how long that will feel to the newborn. Now imagine that the baby is right next to his mother, and just as he begins to stir, this warm familiar hand brings solace and familiarity with just a slight touch, quieting the child before there is any disturbance. This situation is one of the many positive ways that co-sleeping can affect a family. Co-sleeping is a hypernym of sleeping arrangements defined by Wendy Goldberg as “the presence of a caregiver who sleeps within close enough proximity of the infant to permit the exchange of at least two sensory stimuli” (par. 8). Goldberg is a psychology professor at the University of California, with specializations in infant sleep and transition into parenthood, among other things. While the medical community is at odds on the topic of co-sleeping, both sides acknowledge the risks and benefits of the other; however, the belief that co-sleeping is the superior arrangement for both baby and parent definitely has more corroborative evidence than the inadequate data used in advocating for solitary sleeping.

Hello, Abigail! I found your post very interesting, as it brought up some examples that I hadn't thought about. My mother breastfed all of her children, so I didn't really consider the increasing amount of women using milk-formula for their children. Whereas, in many other places breastfeeding is the norm. It is definitely an interesting thing, as breastfeeding is considered healthier and better for the child, yet it seems more and more people are choosing to use formula. I wonder if breastfeeding will make a come-back like co-sleeping currently is doing? Many doctors are worried about the comeback of co-sleeping, as it can be dangerous and they warn against it. By co-sleeping, they are specifically talking about same-bed sleeping, as many

The title of this study “Sleep Quality in Nurses: A Randomized Clinical Trial of Day and Night Shift Workers” appropriately portrays the information of the article. It describes the design of the study, a randomized trial, as well as the topic, sleep quality of nurses. Overall it gives a good picture of what the article includes.

It was published in February 2013. It discusses the “Back to Sleep” campaign with the expanded guidelines that the AAP recommends for parents to follow to reduce the chances of SIDS. The article is clearly articulated. It discusses each guideline in detail, citing research studies to back up the recommendation. This is one of the strengths of the article. Another strength of the article is that the research the authors cite is within five years old. The authors also provide the results and statistics of research studies that they use to cite within the article. One example is the authors says “Since the Back to Sleep campaign, the number of infants being placed in a supine position to sleep has risen to 75.7% as of 2006, and overall SIDS rates have decreased over 50% since 1988.” (CITE) The sources that are cited are credible and are not magazine articles or

The online article poses an inquisition on whether babies should be left to “cry it out” at bedtime. Using data provided by a study conducted in Australia, this American news/talk show tells the viewers that the infant is better off if the parent ignores the crying to the point of exhaustion, something the article called "graduated extinction". The different techniques proposed in the article show all the different methods that a parent can use to get their child asleep and stay to stay that way longer. Many new parents would deem this information invaluable, considering that most newborns are up crying every couple of hours during the night. New parents and infants need sleep to function, and for the infants, major developments occur during the sleep cycles. Any parental training interventions are encouraged, as long as the adjustments have a proven basis for the change.

When addressing sleep positioning, one also needs to consider the factors that influence parental decisions and preferences regarding sleep positioning for their infant. In 2017, the Pediatric Nursing Journal included an article titled ‘Factors Associated with Parental Compliance with Supine Infant Sleep’ (Zundo, Richards, Ahmed, & Codington, 2017).  The article includes a compilation of studies that address the research on different factors and

     Finally, sleep is lost and never will be regained. During the first year of a baby’s life, parents, especially mothers, lose 700 or more hours of sleep. That is a lot. No wonder parents look like a walking zombie. When babies do sleep through the night, parents still wake up to check on them to make sure that they are comfortable and everything is all right. Unfortunately, babies aren’t the only cause for loss of sleep. Teenagers are to. They go out and stay

In the independent model of parenting lots of praise is given. When I become a parent I plan to praise my child when they do tasks on their own. Praise will give the child confidence and perseverance to continue to do well. Children who never get praised may end up feeling like a disappointment or failure to their parents. It’s important for children to find their voice and not always have a parent speak up for them like in the interdependence model. I also believe it’s extremely important for a child to sleep in their own room. “The Academy of Pediatrics does not recommend co-sleeping because Western beds are not designed for that'd infant deaths are attributed to parents’ rolling over on the child.” (Brooks, 2013) Co-sleeping is not only