SOMETIMES THEY DO LISTEN

As has been the case for as long as I can remember, I do not run my life by popular consensus, according to the status quo or based upon what I think my neighbors are doing. In this regard, parenting is no different.

When our daughter came home with us, we really didn’t have any carved in stone Parenting Plan. Frankly, with her early arrival, we didn’t really have time to consider it a whole lot before we found ourselves doing it. Which might be for the best – preconceptions lead to expectations and expectations almost always lead to disappointment.

So, we went with what came naturally.

Right away, we realized that our daughter was A LOT happier sleeping snuggled right up next to us. We had planned to keep her in a co-sleeper next to the bed, but alas… that just wasn’t close enough to make her happy. It felt ridiculous to spend all night holding her hand while she wriggled closer and closer, so after a day or two, she just slept right next to us.

Her instincts made sense to us right away. Of course she was happier sleeping while touching one of us – a human baby in the wild who was left alone EVER probably only had a few minutes to live until the tiger ate him. If he cried loud enough then maybe someone else from his tribe would find him before he died.

The more I thought about it, the more I didn’t feel comfortable putting my child in a cage, no matter how cutely decorated that cage might be. Hell – I didn’t feel right about keeping a parakeet in a cage (he always flew free around the house), so how could I do that to my own child? The short answer was, I couldn’t.

At first, I found this a little alarming. Unfortunately, I had made the mistake of reading “What To Expect When You’re Expecting Disaster,” so I was a little edgy about everything. (I could tell you how an infant can be injured by looking at a diaper pail or thinking too hard about the color blue.) So, I did what all overly concerned literate mammals do when they need justification for their instincts – I researched it.

Several books, articles and hours on-line later, I felt very secure in the decision I had already reached. Co-sleeping was what the human baby was wired to expect and what had been practiced for millions of years… up until the time when somebody realized that they could make money selling cribs, that is. Only in the last couple of hundred years has forcing a baby to sleep alone been in vogue, and only in parts of the world where nature is seen as the antithesis of civilization.

One anthropologist doing a cross-cultural study of infant / parent sleep habits was approached by two African women who asked, rather shocked, if it was true that Americans kept their babies in cages. So I guess I’m not the only one who made that analogy…

In many cultures, babies are kept in arms or slung on the body during waking hours and of course sleep with their mothers at night. If thee didn’t, how would they eat? I also try to imagine chimps forcing their offspring to sleep in another tree, or Neanderthal Man having a separate cave for his little ones. None of it really seems to make sense.

I also found, to my great delight, that co-sleeping meant LOTS of sleep. So much for all of the doom-sayers predicting that I would never sleep again once I was a parent. In fact, I sleep more and better than I ever have in my life.

Many moms are awakened by screaming from down the hall out of a deep sleep, have to get out of bed, calm a baby, feed them, then get them to stay asleep when they put them back down just to get up and do the whole thing over again in two hours. Does it seem like Nature’s Infallible Plan to have mothers be exhausted for six months or babies screaming through the night?

Conversely, I hear a little grunt or feel a wriggle, wake up half way, position myself correctly and go back to sleep. Voila. This, to me, makes a whole lot more sense.

So there I was, happy as a lark with the wonderful restive state that is motherhood, assured of the safety and sanity of our decision.

Then, one day, a home-care nurse came to the house to give our daughter a routine vaccination. She asked, as was customary, how long the baby slept, was I getting enough sleep, etc.. I answered her questions and assured her that I was getting plenty of rest, that everything was going great and that we really enjoyed co-sleeping.

She gave me The Disapproving Look and explained that I should never, ever under any circumstances EVER sleep with my baby. She implied that it was common – nay, inevitable – that I would roll over on her and kill her.

Had she asked for a fuller explanation of our arrangement, she would have realized that I would have had to roll uphill, dislocating my arm, to physically accomplish this. Not to mention that I would have to be in a coma not to notice – I am and always have been a very light sleeper. But, I didn’t want to argue with her since 1) it was very early in the morning and 2) she was about to do something painful to my daughter – she didn’t need to be annoyed with me.

However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I would have to do something about it. Her information was simply incorrect, and who knew to how many highly impressionable parents she would disseminate her erroneous assumptions? Of course I believed that her motives were good – she was truly advising what she thought was best – but her information was based upon assumption, not fact. As for accuracy, she may as well have told me that my cats were going to steal my baby's breath.

So, I did the responsible truly trying to get something changed thing – I sent the following letter to her boss…

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Attn: Home Care Administrator

Dear Sir or Madam:

I am writing this letter as a concerned parent who has had contact with your service. In particular, I am writing in regard to what appears to be an erroneous attitude assumed by your service toward co-sleeping and the advice given as a result of this attitude. Because of the otherwise high quality of care which your organization seems to display, I felt that this matter should be brought to your attention.

I was recently told by a member of your staff that parents should not sleep with their infants, that to do so was quite dangerous, inferring that there was a high probability of danger or death to the baby. This information is quite incorrect; certainly as a medical establishment your employees are aware of scientific information regarding a topic before they give out advice regarding it.

The topic of co-sleeping is quite controversial in this culture, and I fear that the above mentioned advice is more the result of cultural bias than medical fact. Much research has been conducted in this area in recent times, and it has been found that most of the widely held assumptions regarding the dangers of co-sleeping have been unfounded.

Among the facts currently supported by medical science and growing numbers of pediatricians:

1) Co-sleeping is the cultural norm throughout most of the world and seems to be the safest sleeping alternative for infants.

* There is a direct correlation between cultures who co-sleep and low incidences of SIDS.
* As people from those cultures move into Western countries and / or assimilate Western ideas regarding sleep patterns, i.e. as they begin to use separate sleeping quarters and cribs, the rate of SIDS increases among those populations.
* The 2500 – 3000 SIDS deaths reported annually in America almost always occur in cribs.
* Co-sleeping babies have a very low incidence of SIDS.
* According to the Chicago Infant Mortality Study, breastfed babies are 1/5 as likely to die from SIDS; approximately 80% of breastfed babies in America sleep with their mothers.

2) The widely cited 1999 Consumer Products Safety Commission study claimed that approximately 50 – 60 accidental deaths occur annually among infants sleeping in adult beds.

* Of the deaths sited, only 15 - 20 occurred from the adult rolling over onto the infant.
* Of these 15 –20 deaths, information regarding parent intoxication or obesity was not reported.
* Conversely, nearly 1000 deaths resulted from suffocation in cribs or playpens during the same time frame studied in the above mentioned report.
* Approximately 10,000 children per year are injured in cribs severely enough to require hospital treatment.
* 230 babies die each year from house fires where parents survive. When infants sleep with their parents this tragedy is preventable.
* It should be noted that the CPSC study was co-sponsored by The Juvenile Products Manufacturers Association (JPMA), the national organization of crib manufacturers.

3) The greatest risk factors for adult bed deaths:

* Smoking parent.
* Sleeping without parent in the room.
* Unsafe space between mattress and headboard or wall.
* Waterbeds.
* Prone sleeping.
* Parent compromised by drugs or alcohol.
* Extreme parental obesity.

Note: These factors are preventable and co-sleeping adults should be educated about such safety issues and concerns.

4) There are many benefits of co-sleeping for both parents and babies.

* Babies cry less, conserving energy needed to grow and thrive.
* Studies have indicated that babies prone to apnea regulate their breathing when co-sleeping, drastically reducing the incidences of pauses in breathing.
* Many cases have been reported of parents who immediately awaken when their baby has had distress or stopped breathing; in these cases, co-sleeping has been attributed to saving the life of the infant.
* Infants who are sick recover more quickly when co-sleeping.
* Premature infants gain weight more rapidly than their crib sleeping counterparts.
* Babies who co-sleep cry less and are more independent as toddlers.
* Co-sleeping babies have fewer sleep disorders later in life. They are also much less likely to require transitional objects (teddy bear, blankie, thumb sucking) in order to feel secure or fall asleep.
* Baby and mother synchronize sleep states causing them to often awaken simultaneously. Mothers who co-sleep report feeling significantly better rested than mothers whose babies sleep in cribs.
* Co-sleeping is the norm in most areas of the world and is the natural sleep arrangement for human beings. Humans have evolved and are designed for parent / infant closeness during sleep. Prior to modern culture, a baby left to sleep alone would have been in imminent danger; the infant brain and neurology supports this preference to be close to adults while sleeping.
* All other primates keep their young close to them while sleeping; humans in Western culture are the only exception to this rule.


I have included a selection of information from various sources documenting current findings regarding co-sleeping. If your service is to make recommendations about this topic, it is only responsible that they be informed. I am also including a bibliography of related articles and books for further documentation and research.

Certainly I believe that all of your staff strives to do the best job possible and has only the best interest of their clients in mind when they make recommendations. However, to disseminate cultural bias and unfounded assumption under the guise of medical advice is misguided and unprofessional at best. To unequivocally dismiss the practice of co-sleeping could have many far reaching consequences for the community, especially considering that current studies imply that co-sleeping may save lives rather than endanger them.

With proper information, your staff can truly make beneficial recommendations regarding the sleeping arrangements of their clients, thus insuring their safety and health to the utmost degree. Co-sleeping, if undertaken with the correct precautionary measures, can be safe, healthy and beneficial to both babies and their parents.

Please review the enclosed information and consider informing your staff about this topic. Co-sleeping is becoming more and more popular in this culture, largely due to the support of the medical community and current scientific research. This being the case, your service might consider reviewing and / or revising its current stance.

Thank you very much for your time and consideration.

Sincerely,
Etc.

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Included with the letter I sent seventy pages of current documentation on co-sleeping along with a five page bibliography for further research and education. The envelope looked like it contained a phone book. I didn’t really expect anything to come of this and was quite surprised when I received a call from one of the vice presidents of the hospital under which this home-care service is affiliated.

Apparently, she really did look over the seventy pages of research that I sent, copied some of it and sent it to all of the home care coordinators along with a memo containing instructions to educate the nursing staff about co-sleeping. In light of recent research, it is the VP's view that the old attitudes and advice given about co-sleeping needs to be updated and that the entire staff needs to be aware of this. She apologized for the attitude that I encountered and asked if I felt that the issue was being dealt with in an
adequate manner.

Of course, this was more than adequate. I didn’t really expect that one person – and a whole lot of research – could actually change the policy of a large medical establishment that quickly. So much for my cynicism and my assumption that such endeavors must always fall upon deaf ears…

This has taught me something valuable, I think. When I sent my packet, I had no expectation that anything would or could change – I sent it because I felt that I was doing the “right” thing, not because I expected any particular result. However, because of this, many parents in the future will not have to be confronted with negative and misinformed attitudes about this issue, or have to go through the emotional trauma of being told that they are a threat to their child’s well-being when they are clearly not.

Studies show that while a huge number of parents co-sleep with their children, only about 15% of them admit that to their health care providers, usually because they don’t want to deal with the negative attitudes they feel sure to encounter. Because of this, many people are not educated on how to do it safely, which of course only leads to problems.

Perhaps in some small way this will help to close that gap and make this natural practice seem less “radical” in the future. At the very least, it is good to know that sometimes they do listen.