Could co sleeping be behind is bad sleep habits of a night?

We co sleep with our 6wk old and he is lucky to go 2hrs at a time before he wakes up and grizzles. He'll often feed but sometimes he just comfort sucks and is asleep again within minutes. When I move in bed he usually startles and I have to start evasive manouver's to avoid him waking up and wanting to suck on something (usually my poor boobs). He sleeps in his swing during the day and will go 3-4hrs without a peep.

Could co sleeping with me be disturbing his sleep? Has anyone had this happen?

I always said Id never co sleep and we didnt with our first baby but atm its convenient for me as he is breastfed and I kind of like the cuddles but if its affecting his sleep then we'll put him in his cot.

I don' co sleep as such.. usually only after the morning feed from 3am onwards. But it is possible it is unsettling him.. Could you try a week or so with him in his own bed? Some of the co sleepers on here would know more though

I prefer not to co-sleep but I do if need be. Like you our first bub did not need it and she always slept better on her own. This bub is different and needs a bit more comforting at times.

My only suggestion would be to try some thing else, such as putting him in a cot and see what happens. He will probable protest for a bit (like a few days) but perserve and see what happens.

I know some people put the cot beside the bed so that you can have your hand on bub and bub has his own space.

Also my SIL co sleeps and has her bub in a snuggle bed. Unfortunately these take up heaps of space especially if you have double or queen bed.

Not sure Anna but the 3-4 hour sleeps during the day sound a little long so perhaps that's why he's not going so long overnight. Also, if he's in his swing during the day, perhaps he needs to get used to self-settling without motion (during the day) or a nice warm mummy (at night-time)?

I would try getting him used to a bit of self-settling during the day and then perhaps see if that improves the night sleeps.

Anna, it's a bit hard to know whether or not he would be the same in his cot. The advantage of having him in your bed is that you can feed and sleep at the same time so your sleep is less disturbed in that sense. But I do believe that some babies don't co-sleep well. Neither of mine would have a bar of it - I am not sure why, I think Jack gets to hot when someone else is in bed with him, and Tom is a light sleeper. But whatever it is, neither would even fall asleep in bed with us. But I know of many others who have co-slept with success.

None of this really helps you though. I think you need to follow your heart - if you are enjoying co-sleeping and don't want to stop, try doing it for a bit longer. If you really need more sleep, try the cot and see what happens. You can always go back to co-sleeping if he's less settled in his cot. GL, I hope you find something that works. I do think he will sleep longer as he gets older, it's just a matter of how long that will take and how much of a wreck you'll be by then!

Oh gosh he's only 6 weeks - sounds normal to me be in in a cot or your bed. In fact babies have less SIDS risk co-sleeping as they have more/better arousals and get into their mothers breathing rhythm. If it gets too much, by all means try something else besides co-sleeping, but he's only little still and getting into his rhythm!

Something I have learnt watching two co-sleepers grow up is alot if it is due to personality. Marisa has just gone to school and all the other kids get home from school and sleep for hours. Marisa gets home, has bounds of energy and no point putting her to bed before 9.30 anyway as she will chatter for ages and we end up falling asleep with her (in her bed). Whereas Elijah who is now 3, passes out after about 10 minutes in his bed, sooner if it's later. He asks to go to bed at 8-8.30. So I think its personality, and I also wish I would have ignored everyone and relaxed about being a co-sleeper. They all turn out in their own ways and I think I am going to have more trouble worrying about WHOSE bed they are sleeping in when they are teenagers, let alone mine!

Just like carrying/wearing your baby, studies all prove that it creates secure attachments. Marisa is miss independence. So I would not worry, do what YOU want to do and remember that he is only little, and he is only little once. He will not sleep for 2 hours at a time forever! :)

ETA: Don't forget that babies only need so much sleep so if he's doing lots of sleeps during the day then he will do less at night. When he's asleep during the day, make sure it's not dark, so he can work out day and night and things like that.

perhaps bubs would sleep better if he was swaddled? I agree with Fiona, he's probably getting used to the rocking motion too much.

Just a gentle reminder that this is the gentle parenting section of the forums, so it's designed for those who want to choose or already choose gentle parenting options. This means following baby's lead/responding to baby's needs with comfort and things like that. You are more than welcome to discuss alternate sleep measures in the baby and toddler sections. Thank-you.

Here are some articles on co-sleeping/gentle parenting:

Co-Sleeping - Is It Part of Bonding
Cuddle Me Mum
Velcro Baby

Look my first daughter stopped co-sleeping after 10 weeks and it really disrupted my sleeping habits. It was awful. After then until she was 4 months I was up every 2 hours & trying to settle her in the cot.... then after 4 months she wouldn't come back into bed with us :(

Jovie, on the other hand, has been an amazing co-sleeper/settler. She starts in her cot now (she is 15 months) and if she wakes up she comes into our bed & goes straight to sleep with us. If she wakes up generally its around 5am and she sleeps another few hours with us. If we stay somewhere else, she will sleep with us & is perfectly content rather than having to worry about getting her to sleep somewhere new.

Hi Anna,
I agree with Kelly! Also who is to say one habit is bad and one is good! All babies are very different!

Ds at that age was waking every 2-3 hrs for a feed or just a soothe! He would fall asleep at the breast and I would too, but I didnt move cause I was already asleep!
I dont belive co sleeping causes bad habits as its very natural for your baby to want to be close to you. They have just spent the last 9 months being part of you so to put them in another room will make them a little unsettled!
Ds has now gone to his cot cause he just wasnt sleeping at all in our bed and is sleeping great! He does come in at about 3 though for a feed and we fall asleep together! I know that as he gets bigger he will come back to our bed, hopefully!
Dont know if this actually helps I think I may have just rambled a little sorry!
good luck x

ps. I just wanted to add that my daughter Marisa, who is not a sleeping baby has an anxiety / social phobia called Selective Mutism. It is a common trait for them to be restless, clingy and not sleep well from a very young age. Sleep school made her vomit, miserable and yell at the top of her lungs for two weeks. I am so glad I made the decision to surrender to her needs at that point because it wasn't her, it wasn't healthy and was probably all from her medical condition which I never knew she had until she was older. I would be feeling terribly guilty right now if I would have pushed her even more than her little body was telling me she was capable of.

Hi Anna, a lot of people seem to have done the same as we have. We've never co-slept as such, well not in the beginning. With our two kids, (and I'm guessing with this one too) they've slept on their own until the early hours of the morning feeds (3am about....) then come into bed and co-slept until a more reasonable hour! I mention this because you said that you enjoyed the cuddles and it made BF easier so maybe it would be a nice compromise? If you think co-sleeping all night is disturbing him (I have no idea if it is! :)) then maybe try him out in his cot for hlaf the night and getting your cuddles in early in the morning. If that's what you feel comfortable with. No doubt he'll let you know if he's happy/unhappy in his cot soon enough!

Good luck :D

Sorry Anna, quick hijack....

For those whose bubs come into your bed at 3amish, how old were they when they stopped this, or are they still doing it sometimes/all the time? Just wondering!

For you Anna, I think that Ripley sounds very normal for a 6 week old bub! You could try him in his cot, but you might find that he's exactly the same, and that you're getting less sleep. Do what you feel comfortable with hun :)

Anna,

Charlie and I did not co-sleep and he still woke every few hours when he was young. He only stopped when he was 11 months old. I do believe it very much depends on their personality, and trust me with a baby that wakes often, I think I would definitely have been better off co-sleeping just so I could have a bit of sleep too. And who knows, he may have slept better than in his cot.

I have since seen the cot that allows you to co-sleep with baby in their own cot space and would have given my right arm for something like that back when Charlie was a tiny bub. I do believe from personal experience sometimes putting their tiny little bodies in a massive cot at that young age probably feels more insecure than being next to mummy, too, so try it by all means, but you may end up with no more sleep in the end.

Hey Anna,

It's really hard not to compare your second bub to your first - DS was much more unsettled during his first few weeks than our DD was and so often co slept in those early weeks. We then found though that he started waking more and more frequently. We thought we'd see how he went in his room in his cot and found that he slept much more soundly and woke a lot less frequently. I'm definitely not against co sleeping, DD always slept with us when she woke at night and wouldn't settle back to sleep or was unwell etc, and often she would have her early morning feed in bed with me and then sleep with me after DH went to work (he is a smoker :angry: so co sleeping isn't really a great option for us anyway). I'm not sure why, but I guess some babies like to co sleep and others like their own space? I was pretty devastated about moving him out of our room, so we came to a compromise - DH and I are sleeping in the spare room next to his with both doors open, that way I still feel really close to him, it's easy to feed him at night and I can still hear him when he stirs etc. It's working well and he is sleeping a lot better.

Janie, both my kids stopped coming in regularly when they stopped having feeds during the night. That's not to say that if they woke they wouldn't come in anymore because they did. Depending on the situation they have both gone through periods where they have come in every night for a couple of weeks, and then not for ages but this hasn't been until they were around the 12 month mark. Both my kids went into big beds by the time they were 1 for different reasons so again this gave us another option where I could always lay with them to settle them back to sleep or just get into bed with them too. There have been times where I have worried it's happening too much (them coming into bed) but it never lasts long. To this day it's still our family meeting place of a morning, as the kids wake in the morning they come into our bed for a snuggle until we all get up. HTH

Thanks Bec :)

I agree with Kelly. For 6 weeks that sounds pretty normal... although maybe the day sleeps are a tad too long?

I tend to agree that co-sleeping is nature's way of gently disturbing your baby and thus preventing SIDS. What size is your bed? When we had a double bed i found it a bit squishy but our Queen seems to give us enough room although a King would be better!

I co-slept with my 2nd child the most and now he is the best sleeper of all my kids...eventually he preferred his own space. With my current 20 month old he starts in his bed and comes in at 5/6am. He hasn't decided that he actually has a preference for his own cot yet but I don't refuse him if he cries.

I figure that ultimately you do what is the best fit for both of you. Maybe try the cot/crib beside the bed like others have suggested too.

Hi Anna,

I just wanted to jump in and say that I have co-slept with Savannah from day 1 and she is a beautiful sleeper now. We're just coming out of a phase of her waking every 3 hours for a feed and the night before last I got a whopping 5 and a half hours straight!! :dance: For the past couple of weeks though she was feeding at midnight, 3am, 6am etc. Just a phase.

For 6 weeks it sounds pretty normal. Although I would also suggest the "making sure it's light during the day and dark at night" advice.

I can't really comment if the co-sleeping is the cause, I'm still on my first and have no other comparisons. But Savannah sleeps beautifully with me, cuddled up against my chest. And breastfeeding over night is a breeze as she finds her way there. Most times I'm awake long enough to notice the time and that's it.

Our bed is a queen size and currently only occupied by bub and I - DH has taken himself into the spare room lol

Well night before last I tried sleeping him in the bassinette. He went down fine and stayed there through 2 feeds with minimal fussing/effort but I caved and brought him back into bed with me after the 5am feed. Last night he started out in the bassinette but ended up with me for most of the night.

I think I'll keep going with the co sleeping but atleast I know he will sleep elsewhere.

thanks for the advice guys!

Anna, I am glad to hear that you are going to keep co-sleeping. I think it is great for mum and bub and in the long run you'll get more sleep that way. I am sure it won't take too long for him to start sleeping for longer stretches.

I think sometimes we get spoilt by our first bubs - Jack was sleeping through from 6 weeks, but Tom was a terrible sleeper for 12 weeks and didn't sleep through regularly until 12 months. I's funny though, Tom has gone on to become a better sleeper than Jack so you never can tell!

Anna that's great news! At Ripley's age, things change so much and so often, and it's likely that it's nothing to do with the co-sleeping that he's waking often right now, so I'm really glad you're going to persist. As I said, Charlie and I didn't co-sleep and he was still just one of those babies that woke a lot. He's an excellent sleeper right now, so things do change, get better, get worse, then even out eventually.

Sounds like a good idea (starting off in bassinette beside the bed then bringing him in with you when he cries). I have found that if you can get your newborn sleeping in a variety of locations it's really good down the track. When my sons were newborns I had them regularly sleeping in: the big cot in the nursery, a smaller crib beside my bed, the bassinette style pram, our bed, and in the port-a-cot that was permanently set up in the lounge (that way when we have trips it's not a new thing)... they would also sleep in the sling when i was out. This variety from a young age is really useful because as they grow older they can become more particular. So I think getting him used to sleeping in the bassinette as well as your own bed is a great solution. :)

hiya anna, those night time snuggles are beautiful aren't they. you sound like you are really enjoying them. i co-slept with all 3 of mine and they all slept differently. 1 thrashed around the bed getting comfortable, one would crawl upsidedown and sleep between us that way and one went in the middle and didn't move except for breastfeeds. i guess at 6 weeks you are all getting to know each other and learning to sleep together, i certainly don't think you are disturbing his sleep he would probably wake as frequently if not more frequently if he were no sleeping with you. i would give it time, you will all get in sync eventually and have a more peaceful night knowing your bubba is within easy reach to respond to when needed. good luck
beckles

How are you going now, Anna?
FWIW, we have co-slept since day one and DS still stirs in his sleep for feeding once or twice a night (maybe more, depending on how he feels in himself) and we get a great night's sleep. We're used to each other and it took a bit of stubbornness on my part because DP wanted to kick DS out at about 3 or 4 weeks of age...it felt all wrong by my gut instinct to have him sleeping elsewhere, even if it was next to our bed, and now we all thank me! It took some adjusting and working each other out and we definitely reap the rewards now. It wasn't easy, and neither is a lot of stuff that's worth persevering with :)

Forgot about this thread :)

He's been in his cot in the room across from ours since 9wks because he got too big for the bassinette and started sleeping through. Dh and I decided it was time to have our bed back seeing as he wasnt being breastfed or waking during the night. He's a champ at sleeping now and he much prefers the cot as he can scoot around in his sleep without bumping into one of us.

Thanks for all the advice though, I appreciate it!