Sleeping with the baby

Ball, H.L.

Abstract

Who sleeps with their baby, and why? More babies bed-share in the first few weeks of life than at any other age. On any given night between 20 and 25% of babies under 3 months of age spend some time sharing a bed with a parent and during their first 3 months up to 70% of babies in Euro-American households will have bed-shared once or more.2,3,4 When parents are interviewed about sleeping with their baby they give various reasons for doing so.5,6,7 Their answers express deeply rooted cultural or religious beliefs and parenting philosophies, invoke the physiological links between lactation and night-time breastfeeding, and reflect the biological compulsion that drives bonding and the urge for close contact. On a practical level they also explain that sleeping with the baby makes night-time care easier, helps them to monitor the baby, provide comfort, and yet obtain sleep. Other parents report having nowhere else to put their baby at night, or that they have fallen asleep with their baby unintentionally. For breastfeeding mothers all of these reasons may apply, and so it is unsurprising that the largest group of bed-sharers around the globe are breastfeeding mothers.

Citation

Ball, H. (2012). Sleeping with the baby

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Publication Date: 2012
• Deposit Date: Mar 13, 2013
• Publicly Available Date: Jan 15, 2014
• Journal: Breastfeeding briefs
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 53
• Article Number: 1-12
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1465239
• Publisher URL: http://ibfan.org/breastfeeding-briefs