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Should kids sleep in parents' bed?
Filed under: Babies, Toddlers Preschoolers, Big Kids, Feeding & Sleeping
I receive many emails and letters every week asking for my advice on parenting issues. Well, this week, I'm asking readers to give me advice on my current parenting dilemma -- kids sleeping in our bed!
Here's the lowdown: as many of you know, I have five kids. The youngest, Paloma, is five months old and sleeps in a co-sleeper next to my side of the bed. She still gets up five times a night to nurse and/or use my breast as a pacifier. Upon hearing this, a good friend recommended I buy a pacifier. Though I never used one with my other kids, I bought one and Paloma likes it and uses it. Unfortunately, she often loses it during the night which results in her waking up and my having to wake up to find it or nurse her back to sleep. My two year-old, John-Paul, sleeps most of the night in a crib in his room. However, he wakes up every morning at 4:30 am screaming at the top of his lungs to be taken out of his crib. He's stubborn and loud so we end up getting up and bringing him to our bed because we don't want his screams to wake up the baby. Our four year-old, Lucia, and six year-old, Jack, will also come into our bed, though the days and times vary. There are mornings when we wake up to all three kids in the bed. Recently, we purchased bunk beds and instead of storing the old toddler bed in the basement, we put it in our room in hopes that at least one of them would sleep in it. Occasionally, Lucia will, but inevitably, she ends up in our bed before the night is over.
Having kids in the bed disrupts our sleep and God knows that parents with five kids need their sleep. On the other hand, we know that this stage is limited (our nine year-old no longer comes to our bed at night ) and that we will one day pine for the days when our kids loved to crawl in our bed and cuddle. What should we do?
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ReaderComments (Page 2 of 2)
10-13-2008 @ 9:32PM
kc6815 said...I am a mother of two girls ages 6 1/2 and 15 months. Both of my girls are "bad sleepers". Our first daughter came into our bed at around 6 mths after my husband found me slumped over the crib standing and sleeping. Our almost 7 yr old is healthy and well adjusted. Our 15 mth old came in around the same time. I am going to be 40 in 2 days and physically it is very very hard for me to keep up with the two girls with out at least some sleep. For centuries familys have been co-sleeping, for a variety of reasons. My opinion is families 40, 50 or 60 years ago were much closer and family oriented. I think maybe we should learn many lesson from our past !
I tell people when you start paying our mortgage you can have a comment on our sleeping arrangements !
Good night to all Sleep Well !
Reply
10-14-2008 @ 3:57PM
Diane said...i agree with what you are doing totally. If my 4 year old or 1 year old wants to cuddle with me and my husband, i love it. Its not every night, but i totally agree, the will only want to cuddle for so long. And then we will wish for it again!!
Reply
10-27-2008 @ 4:19PM
LVIGILRO said...I believe there is nothing wrong with the children coming in and cuddling with mom and dad. I will go a step further and tell you that both my children slept with me and my husband until my son was about 11 and well my daughter sometimes still sleeps with me...she's 21. You have to understand my husband worked and still works graveyard and we had an incident with a severe earthquake and I was unable to get to them. After that I vowed I would never want to be in that situation especially being alone at night.
To date I have the most confident children both in college my eldest graduating and going straight to grad school and I have my other who just graduated in June and is already a sophomore in college (3 months) later. Why because we have always made our children feel they came first. ALWAYS! I am proud of our family bed and add to this we had two golden retrievers on the bed too even when my husband had the night off. I have been with my husband since we were 16 years old and now I am 44....Now we just go away for the weekend when we want our alone time. Because our children still come first.
BTW, if it was so damaging I don't think my daughter would be graduating so quickly and my son be so advanced. He also was the Senior Class President!!!!!!!!!! Maybe our way is the right way....
Neither do drugs or drink too!
Reply
12-02-2008 @ 2:01AM
peggy said...thank you for your comments!!
my 10 yr old daughter is having major sleep anxiety right now,....and has off and on i guess since our "divorce" 3 yrs ago.
i love having her sleep with me,...........
she is always welcome to.
i don't like to sleep alone,...i prefer my partner/spouse to be in the same bed with me,....someone i love and care about,........my dog is ususally right next to me too,........
life is too short, to deprive a child from co-sleeping,..i say, enjoy it while we can!!
12-20-2008 @ 1:04AM
happymom said...Rachel,
I don't know if you are still reading the comments about this topic but I am going to write on this bc my husband and I have received a ton of comments (not positive) from family members about this topic.
We have a happy, healthy, well adjusted, well traveled, 6 year old girl. My husband is military and we move around a lot. Our daughter was a real light sleeper when she was first born so in order to get sleep we started her out sleeping with us (yes, in between us at about 1 month). It was very convenient for nursing or daddy helping out with bottle feedings. She really was used of it so most nights she from about 2-4 she ended up with us at some point. We spoke to our Pediatrician about it (since both sets of Grandparents made us feel weird about it). He said it was called co-sleeping or a family bed and many cultures around the world do it. He was completely supportive about it. He said, 'It's not like they are going to be 15 and still do it.' I thought wouldn't that be the perfect time, then we wouldn't have to worry about her ever sneaking out:)
Anyways, on weekends she jumps in or sometimes just goes in our room and falls asleep. If she falls asleep on the couch my husband throws her in our bed and then we go to sleep when we are ready. It is very rare that she sleeps with us during the week and she doesn't usually come find us either. Although any time we offer her to sleep with us she will beat us to our room.
I think we both treasure our little snuggle moments with her. We laugh when she talks in her sleep and we try to make her talk when we go to bed just bc it is so cute.
I think there is not a thing wrong with the little ones sleeping with you. If it is too hard to get good sleep after a while go grab a couch or jump in one of their beds. If letting them in lets you sleep in any or makes you or them feel more secure then it is completely worth it.
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1-06-2009 @ 8:59PM
janice said...Well I love cuddling,but I dont know if it is healthy for my daughter to sleep with me, I'm trying to get some answers so someone please reply!!!!
JAn
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