thin pillow recommendations?

[Lilli]

My DD loves sleeping on her side but without a pillow her head looks wonky (akward angle). I have been using a small pillow which has helped but I feel it is a little too high and ****y. I usually allow her to fall asleep on her side with the pillow and when she's asleep I remove it (coz I'm scared of SIDS) and roll her onto her back. Do you have any recommendations for a thin pillow I can use - where to purchase etc?
PS - when is the recommended age for using a pillow (ie when is the threat of SIDS "neutralised"?)

[CrystalBoo]

Hi, I'm not much help as I was looking for the same thing and couldn't find it. In the end, my mum made one for DD. A place like Clark Rubber would have some foam you could probably cut to size and then just stitch a basic cover for. I'm not sure of the SIDS recommendation for pillows - 12 or 18m maybe? But DD has had pillows since 9m as she sleeps so much better with them Think it's up to you in the end. Good luck!

[Curly]

I initially bought a thin latex pillow from Baby Bunting for DS when he was 18 months old. He still wasn't sleeping through the night and I wondered if a pillow would make him more comfortable. It was expensive but I have a latex pillow myself and it was in the back of my mind that this pillow would do 3 kids (we are planning 3). I also felt a firmer pillow would be "safer" in terms of SIDS. Generally I have read that a pillow is not recommended for under 12 months but anyone I know seems to not have given a pillow till 2 years old. I also have a bad neck so I'm quite fussy about having a "good" pillow.

He was sleeping a bit better with the pillow but still waking up for a breastfeed.

But then we went through a period of co-sleeping while I was weaning DS - instead of getting up in the night to BF we would bring him into bed with us and he kept creeping onto my pillow even though we had his pillow there in bed with us. I spoke to DS' osteopath about it because I had read in Choice magazine that a thin soft pillow is best for tummy sleepers. DS never sleeps on his tummy but I still had SIDS in the back of my mind - what if he flips over?

She actually pointed out that little kids tend to have their head and shoulders on the pillow rather than just the head like adults do so it is fine to go with a thicker pillow. That is certainly what DS does - almost the whole top half of his body is on the pillow.

Given that he really seemed to prefer my big thick pillow to his thin one I went out and just bought a plain Tontine "Junior" pillow from Target (had teddy bears on it). It's quite a floppy pillow actually. He took to it straight away and finally began to sleep through the night and we have transitioned to his big boy's bed with no problem whatsoever. I wish I'd introduced the pillow earlier!