How to Decide on Sleeping with a Newborn

Newborn sleep patterns are for the most part very predictable and regular. Newborns spend most of their first few weeks either sleeping or eating. As they grow and spend more time awake, regular patterns of naptime and bedtime become easier to establish. Sleeping with a newborn presents some real safety issues for baby, so it's important to think carefully before making this choice.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

1. Determine whether your desire to have the baby in bed with you is based on the baby's needs or your own wants. Some new mothers go through separation anxiety and are afraid to let a new baby sleep without constant supervision. Babies sleep better in their own basinet or crib, and you'll sleep better as well.
2. Discuss baby's sleeping options with your pediatrician. Your pediatrician can go over all the dangers of keeping a newborn in bed with you, and the advantages to having them in their own crib or basinet.
3. Keep the baby in the bedroom with you for a while after they are born, as long as they sleep in their own basinet or crib.
4. Place babies on their back to sleep. Since pediatricians began making this recommendation to parents in 1992, the incidence of SIDS, Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, has decreased by more than 50%.
5. Breastfeed in bed during the nighttime hours only until the baby is satisfied and ready to go back to sleep. Remove the baby from your bed and return her to her basinet or crib. Nursing a newborn in bed is difficult, as they may not have gotten good at latching on right away. Use this method only when your baby is much older and has taken to breastfeeding well.

Tips & Warnings

• It is never a good idea to allow a newborn to sleep in the bed with you. The dangers of suffocation and accidentally rolling over on a baby are very real and dangerous. As your baby gets bigger, there may be times when you will let the baby sleep in bed with you. When they are sick, fussy or just need a little bit of extra comfort. Do this only for a short time and always put the baby back in his own bed as soon as he is asleep again.