S.I.D.S Prevention and Bedsharing

  (sudden infant death syndrome)

Since mankind's beginning and to this day, co-sleeping is the manner by which most of the world's parents choose to care for their children at night. Though forms of co-sleeping vary from culture to culture, most societies outside our own co-sleep with their infants and small children. In cultures where co-sleeping and bedsharing are the normal practice, S.I.D.S rates are not only lower than in parts of the world where co-sleeping is not practiced, but in some places, S.I.D.S is not even heard of . Though people recognize the importance of the mother's body for her infant during pregnancy, people often fail to notice the biological importance after birth. Human infants are born the least neurologically mature of all mammals. They develop at the slowest rate, and are the most dependant for the longest amount of time upon their parents for nutritional and emotional support . From a physiological standpoint, the relationship that mother/infant contact has is astonishing. Babies, from moments after birth have been shown to recognize their own mother's voice, and even recognize the odor of their mother's breastmilk. When babies are held by their mothers, they have increased body temperature, they cry less, have greater heart variability, and even gain weight faster than babies separated from their mothers. When taking these factors into consideration, we need to recognize that sleep time makes up a considerable amount of time in an infants life. By separating mother and infant, often for hours at a time, we are not taking into consideration the child's needs. Those needs do not stop just because baby is sleeping. Never is a baby found to have died of S.I.D.S while being nursed by mother, never does a child die of S.I.D.S when being rocked to sleep by father. S.I.D.S (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome), would perhaps be more appropriately called Solitary Infant Death Syndrome .Research suggests, that it is actually more than twice as safe for infants to sleep in bed with their parents when compared with solitary crib sleeping. It is our hope that parents will not blindly assume that because the normal practice in our society suggests solitary infant sleeping as the appropriate choice, that it is the only choice. Making your bed a family bed can protect your baby from S.I.D.S. Please go to our informational links and read more about the suspected causes of S.I.D.S as well as S.I.D.S prevention and make an informed decision to co-sleep.

                                 James McKenna Library                               Mothering.com