Roll Over, I’m Crowded
To sleep with your children or not to sleep with your children-that’s the question for parents. Well, some parents anyway; some have very definite opinions. Most parenting experts also have an opinion, but there doesn’t seem to be a consensus. I, for one, am a big believer in the family bed, which, for those of you who don’t know the term (or who know it by its alternative name, "oh, all right"), simply means that children share a bed with their parents.
Providing a family bed doesn’t mean children are there constantly, although some parents encourage the arrangement on a nightly basis. Now that my son is nine years old, I’ve limited planned family bed nights to once a week. Not because I’m worried about damaging his psyche or anything, but simply because he’s taking up more space now. I usually wake up clutching the very edge of the bed, while the kid and the cat are happily stretched out over the whole thing.
And I say "planned" because at least once a week, I’ll be startled from a deep sleep to find my son nose to nose with me, patiently waiting for me to awaken with a scream so he can relate the following information: he’s had a nightmare, he heard a faint rumbling of thunder two states away, or he has growing pains in his legs (the price everyone in my family pays for long legs). And the cure for it all is, of course, to climb in with me for the remainder of the night. Enter the alternative name to the family bed, uttered by exhausted parents everywhere: "Oh, all right."
My mother was also a big fan of the family bed concept, and her views prevailed in our household for a while. My father wasn’t as big a fan-apparently I was a kicker when I was younger-and he put his bruised foot down after a while.
So after that, when I wanted to sleep in their room, I crept in with a blanket and pillow in the middle of the night and slept on the floor at the end of their bed. My father was always the first one up, and, not knowing I was there, tripped over me every morning. So averse was he to the family bed idea that he would rather take a header onto the carpet on a regular basis than split the queen-size three ways. To each his own.
When I had my own child, I found out that many other people feel the way my father does. I believe I heard "lazy parenting" on more than one occasion. That was hard to disagree with because it was true. My son initially slept with me out of sheer laziness. For the first few weeks of his life, my husband brought him to me in bed just about every hour so I could feed him, and then he would take the baby back to his crib when I was done. Eventually, we decided that was one step too many, and he just ended up sleeping with us.
As any new mother can attest, when you’re exhausted and subsisting on Pop-Tarts and whatever the baby happens to spit up while you’re yawning, you’re looking for any shortcuts you can find.
A good friend of mine recently had her first child, and when she told me she had decided to breast-feed, I told her to prepare a spot in her bed for her new daughter. My friend asserted that she wouldn’t be sleeping with the baby, thank you very much. She bought a rocker-glider for the nursery, and that’s where she planned to nurse at night.
Her daughter is now a week old and sleeping-guess where?-in my friend’s bed. Like epidurals, it just makes sense.
My child eventually moved into his under-used nursery, but when I became a single mother, back into my bed he went. My friend, also a single mother, swears this sleeping arrangement is only temporary. That’s what I thought nearly a decade ago, I told her.
Of course, shared sleeping is easy for me because I only have one child. And it was easy for my mother because I was an only child. Come to think of it, the shared sleeping arrangement may have something to do with each of us only having one child. Perhaps the family bed theory does have one or two holes… TPW
Providing a family bed doesn’t mean children are there constantly, although some parents encourage the arrangement on a nightly basis. Now that my son is nine years old, I’ve limited planned family bed nights to once a week. Not because I’m worried about damaging his psyche or anything, but simply because he’s taking up more space now. I usually wake up clutching the very edge of the bed, while the kid and the cat are happily stretched out over the whole thing.
And I say "planned" because at least once a week, I’ll be startled from a deep sleep to find my son nose to nose with me, patiently waiting for me to awaken with a scream so he can relate the following information: he’s had a nightmare, he heard a faint rumbling of thunder two states away, or he has growing pains in his legs (the price everyone in my family pays for long legs). And the cure for it all is, of course, to climb in with me for the remainder of the night. Enter the alternative name to the family bed, uttered by exhausted parents everywhere: "Oh, all right."
My mother was also a big fan of the family bed concept, and her views prevailed in our household for a while. My father wasn’t as big a fan-apparently I was a kicker when I was younger-and he put his bruised foot down after a while.
So after that, when I wanted to sleep in their room, I crept in with a blanket and pillow in the middle of the night and slept on the floor at the end of their bed. My father was always the first one up, and, not knowing I was there, tripped over me every morning. So averse was he to the family bed idea that he would rather take a header onto the carpet on a regular basis than split the queen-size three ways. To each his own.
When I had my own child, I found out that many other people feel the way my father does. I believe I heard "lazy parenting" on more than one occasion. That was hard to disagree with because it was true. My son initially slept with me out of sheer laziness. For the first few weeks of his life, my husband brought him to me in bed just about every hour so I could feed him, and then he would take the baby back to his crib when I was done. Eventually, we decided that was one step too many, and he just ended up sleeping with us.
As any new mother can attest, when you’re exhausted and subsisting on Pop-Tarts and whatever the baby happens to spit up while you’re yawning, you’re looking for any shortcuts you can find.
A good friend of mine recently had her first child, and when she told me she had decided to breast-feed, I told her to prepare a spot in her bed for her new daughter. My friend asserted that she wouldn’t be sleeping with the baby, thank you very much. She bought a rocker-glider for the nursery, and that’s where she planned to nurse at night.
Her daughter is now a week old and sleeping-guess where?-in my friend’s bed. Like epidurals, it just makes sense.
My child eventually moved into his under-used nursery, but when I became a single mother, back into my bed he went. My friend, also a single mother, swears this sleeping arrangement is only temporary. That’s what I thought nearly a decade ago, I told her.
Of course, shared sleeping is easy for me because I only have one child. And it was easy for my mother because I was an only child. Come to think of it, the shared sleeping arrangement may have something to do with each of us only having one child. Perhaps the family bed theory does have one or two holes… TPW