Co-Sleeping with a Baby

I coslept with mine from 4 mo to 18 mo. Make sure to follow the safe sleep 7 (no alcohol/drugs, no  soft bedding and pillows around baby, hard enough mattress, breastfeeding instead of bottle feeding, no smoking, cuddle curl). La Leche league has more information on this.

Cosleeping is controversial because of the suffocating risk but as long as you take the above precautions, you minimize this risk. And cosleeping was the only way I could function during the day since my baby woke up so often. Sleep training was never an option for me.

Oh and to add: at 18 months we moved my child to his own room on a floor bed and he started sleeping through without any wakes at 2.5 years. It happens on its own without sleep training eventually.

Hi there! I’ve bedshared with my LO for at least part of the night for his whole life. My spouse and I were never interested in sleep training. He’s now a little over 2.5 and it’s still working for both of us! If I felt like I needed to make a change to get him in his own bed, I’d probably read books to him about it and prep him for it before he made the move. We anticipate this might be on the horizon soon as I’m pregnant and while it’s still comfortable to have him in bed at this point, I could see that changing as I get bigger. Overall, it has been one of the best things I’ve done as a parent. It makes it so easy to respond to him at night when needed without losing much sleep. I also work full time outside the house so it really feels like such good bonding time after I’m away all day. There’s lots of info available on Instagram if you’re interested in resources on how to make it safe as possible and how to make changes to your arrangement if you’re interested! I like @heysleepybaby. So glad it’s working for your family 🩵

One thing to consider is all of the 4 month old milestones- sleep maturity, seeing further, becoming more social. It's not uncommon for babies to start to have a harder time sleeping with their parents or in their parents' room around this age. I never coslept, but I would say if it works for your family, go for it! If it ever isn't working- then you can adjust. 

I've published a few blog posts on my bed-sharing/co-sleeping experience:

https://blog.pamelafox.org/2020/12/how-and-why-i-co-sleep-with-my-baby…

https://blog.pamelafox.org/2022/08/my-bed-sharing-setup.html

I'm now still bed-sharing with our second daughter who's 22-months old. I am still okay with it since I have ways to occupy myself while in bed (when she wants to be on me in the wee hours of the morning), specifically programming on my laptop or reading a kindle. I imagine I would go crazy if not.

I sometimes wonder if I made a big mistake and we should have tried sleep training more aggressively, so that I'd have the freedom to take an overnight trip. But I don't know if it'd work out for me, due to my own difficulties with sleep (see blog posts).

I can't recommend it one way or the other. You will likely get bored/antsy at some point of the arrangement, so hopefully you can find ways to occupy yourself during the contact naps and sleeping.

I’m far away from these early years so I’m not so emotional/anxious about the issues you bring up - any longer.  I definitely was at the time worried I wasn’t making the right calls on sleep. My 2 cents are that your baby is an individual with their own predispositions and traits.  Sleep training as an idea/ practice buys into the idea that all babies need to learn to sleep alone and self soothe in the future.  It assumes that every baby can do that despite the neurological differences between individuals. It also assumes that the best time is really early- like under a year. My child was a good sleeper when she was ready to sleep- but didn’t require as much sleep as the “average” baby. She could self soothe for awhile to get to sleep, but needed reassurance and comfort in the middle of the night to get back to sleep.  I was also exhausted, so the fact she was already next to me co-sleeping was fantastic. I didn’t have to stumble around.  Some other mothers did make me feel like I was some sort of failure because my child didn’t nap for 2.5 hours everyday and because we co-slept.  Co-sleeping helped our whole family to rest and to feel secure and safe.  My child did not grow up maladjusted, dependent or unable to be self sufficient.  I say trust your gut.  The mom- hive, especially, can be very judgmental and thrives on fear.  When my child was too big and active at night we transitioned to half nights in her bed. She was happy to have her own special place.  Start in own bed- then moving over to the “big bed” at 2/3 am.  This was around the toddler years- so she came over on her own.  Slowly over time it was more and more on her own…. But even in later years every now and then she wanted back in for a half night for a week or so because she was going through some difficult development phase or school issue…. And that was ok. We let her- but by that time weren’t getting kicked in the ribs anymore!!  I’m happy with how it all worked out.  In our really busy and programmed lives, quality time to show love and patience is in short supply.  For us- and for awhile, sleep time was a dedicated time and place to be together in comfort and love.  As they get older it’s harder to do- so maybe rethink this as something to appreciate!  

Hi, we have a 4.5 yo and almost 4 month old and would be happy to share our cosleeping experience in more detail if you’d like to reach out to me directly, but briefly, I was in a similar boat regarding the concept and looking back now wouldn’t want it any other way. Our oldest slept in a bassinet by the bed until he started rolling when we transitioned him to our bed. We took precautions outlined in the book, the No Cry Sleep Solution by Elizabeth Pantley to make our bed safe, e.g., mattress on the floor, I kept my hair tied back, light blankets, etc. I had a hard time breaking the nightly feedings as he approached one year old, but that was situational to us and COVID. We still all sleep in the same bed and when our second came along we weren’t sure how things would change. For the most part, they haven’t; he still sleeps between us and our daughter is in the bassinet by the bed. He isn’t woken by her during the night and most of the time he doesn’t wake her. We plan to continue this arrangement until he’s ready for his own bed. It’s wonderful to be all snuggled and am grateful it has worked for us. 

When I read your post, my first thought was: how can you NOT keep co-sleeping?

We are a family by adoption, and co-sleeping is often recommended to help with attachment issues. Our daughter (now 18) had a hard time with the grief and fear that many babies experience upon adoption. The net result is that we co-slept for many months, nights and naptime, initially with a co-sleeping crib, then with a toddler bed right next to our bed, then with the two beds apart but in the same room. We moved back to our bedroom when she was maybe five. Thereafter, she often climbed in bed with us, and likely would have done so straight through high school if we had let her.

And now? We have a very affectionate relationship with our kid. She wanted to go to college near home, so she's at SF State, she talks with us daily, comes home for the weekends, hugs us a lot. We experienced minimal adolescent rebellion or strife. I wouldn't claim that all this amity and love comes from co-sleeping, but it sure must help that she had access to love and comfort during sleeping hours, particularly if she had a nightmare.

There's little question that sleep-training kids helps with parents' sleep, and most people sleep better alone. Through most of human history, however, people slept together as families, sometimes even in larger groups. In many countries this is still the practice, and to folks in those cultures, the separated arrangements we favor seem strange and cold. In the USA, most of us married and partnered folks choose to share beds with our S.O.s despite snoring and other sleep disruptions, because we want that time together.

So if you and your partner are comfortable with this arrangement, why change it?

I grew up in a culture where cosleeping was normal. When I moved to the US as an elementary school kid, we all got our own beds and there wasn't really any issues. And my husband and I always say... back in the caveman days, they didn't have their babies in separate caves. 

The reality of having a baby and breastfeeding meant that the baby would end up in our king bed with us, often. We didn't mind. Once I stopped nursing, our child more or less slept in the crib that was pushed up against our bed, but sometimes in the middle of night when they wake up crying, I would put them in the middle of the bed to snuggle and sleep. When covid happened, we moved temporarily, and the new place only had king beds down far hallways from each other. Our toddler was hesitant to be so far away from us, in a new place, so we reverted back to co-sleeping all in the same bed. We all slept well, it was very cozy. When we moved again, this time to bedrooms with adjoining walls, our child was able to move to their own bed without really any transition. Some nights either my husband or I will offer to sleep on their bed and they get really happy to have company. And if we say let's all sleep in the big bed (parents' bed), they get really excited too. I don't know what we would have done differently. We never formally pushed them to sleep solely in their own bed, we basically rolled with it and looked to see how our child was feeling and what they can handle. There were times when something scared them (barking dogs outside, monsters, whatever) and they wouldn't want to sleep alone, but we would just offer to leave the bedroom door open and the nightlight on, and that was acceptable. We also offer that if they wake up in the middle of the night scared, they can come to our room. Our kid now 95% of the time sleeps alone in their own room. My husband and I have no regrets on cosleeping. They're only a baby/toddler/child once, we're never going to have these experiences again, and in a few more years when they are teenagers they might not even want to be in the same room with us! We're glad we got all those years of nighttime snuggles with our little one. 

Please continue to do what is working for you and your family and don't worry about what other families are doing! You're doing it so so so right. I didn't co-sleep, neither of my kids had any interest in it, but I do know that when something stops working, you will be able to find a solution that helps you and your family. I love following https://heysleepybaby.com/ for normalizing all things baby sleep. You don't have to sleep train to have a good sleeper. (We did with my first and we didn't with my second and I can tell you that other than the stress sleep training caused ME, there has been virtually no difference.) 

Keep doing what you're doing until it doesn't feel right for you. No need to change something that is working for everyone involved. And has been done for generations, by the way. As maybe you can tell, I'm a fan of cosleeping. After a while you'll come to a need for change, either because a new baby is on the way, or someone in the arrangement isn't sleeping well anymore. Then you can change it. It may be painful for a few days or weeks but everyone will settle on a new routine. This is how most things go in parenting. Good luck and enjoy the sleep you're getting, and the snuggles. 

We are occasional cosleepers.  I'm glad to hear that it has been working for you!  My only word of caution is that we have friends who have first or second graders who still cosleep and it's past the point the parents want to do it.  I do believe that there's a point when every kid will outgrow this, but it might be later than you think.

Both my babies coslept with us. The older one was quite the active sleeper, had difficulty falling asleep, and woke up often. We weren’t into using the cry-it-out method and he didn’t easily take to other methods which we didn’t wholeheartedly try. As difficult as it was having him in the bed with us parents, we tolerated it. When baby 2 came along a little over 2 years later, things got rough. Baby 2 was easier when it came to sleep issues but it was not good having a toddler and baby in bed with us. We eventually got the toddler to sleep in his crib about half the night for quite some time. Finally when the kids were a little older (maybe 8 months and nearly 4), we moved them to their own shared bedroom and told them they could come to our room when the first number on the digital clock was a 7. With some struggles and lots of nighttime wakings, this finally worked. In hindsight, I wish we had done something more proactively, especially for my benefit as I was nursing them and took responsibility for (too many) wakings.  My advice is, while it’s very sweet to carry around a sleeping baby at 3 months, it’s not as great when they’re bigger, heavier, and you need time (and your body) to yourself. As to nighttime, babies generally start life by sleeping well and this can change as they get older. I recommend trying to put the baby down to sleep so they get used to it early. My “babies” are now 20 and 22 and gentle sleep training is definitely something I wish we had been more persistent about.

Every child is different so you’ll have to feel this out as your baby gets older. I have 2 kids who innately had very different sleeping demands. I did not plan on co-sleeping with my older child and we tried sleep training. The harder we tried, the more anxious she was at night. She ended up kicking my husband out of the master bedroom and he slept in her room. When she was about 7, she began to sleep on her own. When she hit her teenage years, she found the idea of sharing a bed repulsive and only allows it when we are traveling. 
  My son, who is 4 years younger than my daughter, did not want any contact when sleeping. He slept on his own before his older sister, in his own bed, in his room, with the door shut. He hates to travel and not being able to sleep in his own bed in his room is one of the main reasons why he doesn’t like to travel. 
  In order to figure what works best for your baby so that everyone gets proper sleep at night, try experimenting with different situations: co-sleeping same bed, same room different beds, separate rooms, hybrid. Whatever situation that maximizes the sleep quality for everyone in your household is the best solution. 

I co-slept for years. I am a tad bit envious of you for having a child who sleeps well. We were desperate for sleep, and the only way we could manage any sleep was to have the baby next to me so I could feed the baby while half asleep. We tried sleep training -- didn't work and I couldn't stomach the crying. I longed for a solid 6 hours of uninterrupted sleep for so many years. Co-sleeping resulted in more sleep than sleep training / sleeping in separate rooms. Most importantly, co-sleeping felt right for me. It felt like the natural thing to do.

In lower elementary school years, the child was ok for me to leave the room after they fell asleep but wanted me in bed to help them fall asleep.

When the child turned 3rd grade, they decided they wanted to try sleeping alone but often wanted me to stay in bed until they got sleepy or were asleep. At age 10, the child started showing signs of puberty and started not wanting me around as much. The child did not need me anymore. Hormones kicked in, clearly signaling that it was time to start preparing for the next phase in life. 

I spent hours upon hours bouncing the baby, crying and desperate for sleep, falling asleep next to my kid before the kid got sleepy and being rudely awaken by the kid. Now, the child gives me a quick hug and says "good night", closes the door, and turns off the light. 

I let the child lead with many things, allowing the child to take the next step when the child was ready. We didn't potty train really. One day, the child refused to wear diapers and that was that. I breastfed until the child was almost 4 years old when the child decided they didn't want mommy milk anymore. I don't regret it. I feel that we have a very strong bond. When the child wanted to try sleeping alone, we supported. When the child indicated that they weren't ready yet, I was there. The child doesn't want me in bed anymore and I'm glad there was never a feeling that the child was forced to sleep alone when they didn't feel ready. My spouse was worried that we were not encouraging them to be independent. On the contrary, I feel that the child has healthy attachment with us which allows them to go out into the world with confidence. 

The earlier years were difficult and I do not wish to go back to the days when I was severely sleep deprived. However, I am also thankful for the time I had with my baby. 

This is a long way to say that if you like the arrangement you have now, don't worry and enjoy. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. Every child is different. Every family is different. Do what feels good for you. There's no "you're supposed to do x/ y/ z by this time." Kids develop in different ways and they all have their unique gifts and challenges. 

Co-sleeping is more than ok. People from my country have co-slept for thousands of years. My kid co-slept with me regularly for almost 10 years, and I'm very proud of the kid that I have -- brilliant, kind, self-assured, and confident.

Cherish every moment with your beautiful baby. 

We co-slept with my son (now 3) until he was about 5 months old, and honestly, we'd have continued longer if it hadn't stopped working for all of us. Up until about 4 months, he slept best that way (which meant we did, too) and my partner and I both really loved being so close. And then... honestly, it's hard to remember with any precision now how it devolved but his sleep got worse, the stretches of continuous sleep started to shorten where they'd been lengthening and we decided it was time to get some support around sleep training. My partner especially really missed having him in our bed/room but we quickly saw that we all slept much better post-sleep training. Post-sleep training, he mostly sleeps on his own but comes to our bed when he's sick, when we travel or if he wakes in the middle of the night (which is uncommon for him). It's sweet to get a night of snuggling and also always a much worse night of sleep for the adults.

I'm sure we would have eventually reached a point where co-sleeping felt more burdensome, even if he'd continued to sleep well that way-- wanting to have our bed to ourselves, to be able to go bed on our own schedule rather than his, etc. It definitely got trickier as he became more mobile-- it stopped feeling safe to leave him in our bed solo and we started to feel trapped with one of us stuck in bed with him at all times. I will say once he started sleeping 12 hours a night independently, the freedom of having that time to ourselves was pretty amazing. So I guess my advice is, enjoy it while it works for you! You'll know clearly enough if it stops working you and/or your kid, and you can always pivot then. Sleep training is a slog any time you do it (in my case, we've done it a few times, when life took us too far off our routines and we needed a reset) but there's no need to "fix" something before there's an issue!

i never thought i’d be cosleeping but my son literally couldn’t sleep without me. after ten weeks of fighting it (the first ten weeks of his life, wherein i thought i would die from sleep deprivation) i brought him in bed and he’s slept great ever since— generally 8-9 hours every night. we never did sleep training as i saw it cruel and unnecessary. as a result, our son is a great sleeper and can sleep anywhere (in any country or city or bed or couch or train or plane or time zone etc etc)— so long as i’m there. HOWEVER. he just turned three and we are still cosleeping. the other day i asked him when he’d be ready for his own bed and he replied ‘when i’m one thousand.’ so on one hand, it’s really sweet and we get the best snuggles and are SUPER close, but on the other hand, he really needs me (sometimes my husband will suffice) if he wants to fall and stay asleep. i don’t regret having him in bed with us, but it’s a sacrifice; other parents put their kids in bed and walk away (i can’t imagine this!). we invest a lot more time getting him to sleep— laying with him, coaxing him back into bed if he gets up, resting with him until he’s asleep. he’s our only kid right now, so i can’t speak to more than one. but i know he’ll soon be 15 and will want nothing to do with me, so i’m making the most of the snuggles while i can. 💕

Our daughter was exactly the same as your baby, and since we were all sleeping well we just kept at it - despite my friends at the time who were all sleep training their babies. Along came kid number 2 (when she was about 2 years old) and he wanted NOTHING to do with co-sleeping and was fine in his crib. We transitioned our daughter to a big girl bed around that time (she was happy to keep her baby brother company in their room) and the rest is history. 

It's not for everyone, but it worked great for us (in fact, she's 18 now and when she comes to visit us in our room at night sometimes and plops down between us we joke about how she's always staking out her spot - don't worry tho, she never stays LOL). I wouldn't have changed a thing - it was great.

My attitude was always - do what works for the health of your family - if you are all sleeping well that way then GREAT! The next kid might be different. One day at a time.

Postscript  - that same muffin graduated high school, got into Cal, and is happily adjusting to college life - turned out just fine!

Congrats on having a sleep situation that feels like it‘s working already! And also that you have a supportive pediatrician. I‘m surprised to hear that you haven’t found resources about co-sleeping, I don’t recall specifics but there were definitely some books and bloggers who offered tips and support.

We also co-slept with our first kid (who is now in middle school and sleeps in own bed) and it took a long time before she would nap anywhere other than the ergo. We night weaned at about 17 months (so I could go away for a weekend) and then moved her out of our room at 2.5 years, just before baby #2 arrived. (Baby #2 never co-slept, she needed her own space - each kid is different.)

Logistics: We (as a couple) are comfortable in a full size bed, so once baby was bigger, we got a twin mattress and put both mattresses together on the floor. Then to transition, we started putting her on the twin and calling it “her bed.”  When it was time to move out, “her bed” went to the other room with her. 

We didn’t sleep train either kid and they are both healthy sleepers now. Your arrangement sounds perfectly fine to me, and especially if the nights are working, no reason to change. Just don’t rub it in to your parent friends who are having a different experience! And be willing to try new things if the current set-up stops working. Hope you have many enjoyable nights with baby ahead!

You absolutely do not need to change what's working!  Sleep training is not some sort of necessary developmental step, only a possible method of solving a serious sleep problem if you have one (and it's more often a parent's problem, not the child's).  I never tried to train my kids to sleep alone or not to come to my bed at night; they each gradually did that on their own, when they were ready and completely without stress for anyone.  They are now healthy young adults and have no trouble sleeping alone.  (They also dress and feed themselves and manage their own hygiene, which are all things you will struggle with in various ways over the coming years, but yeah...you get through it, I promise!)

The only thing I would have done differently, in hindsight, is that I would not have bothered using a crib at all, or would have gotten rid of it earlier.  An unfenced mattress that is big enough for a parent to cuddle the baby to sleep on, and low enough for the baby to climb in and out of independently, makes life so much easier! Once our firstborn had that arrangement, he no longer had to cry and wake me when he needed me at night; instead, he'd just come snuggle up to me in the wee hours and I usually only half-woke, if that.  The second kid never went in a crib at all and was able to do the same by around 9 months.  I did worry a little bit when I was pregnant with #2 about how we would manage 3 year old coming into the same bed as a newborn but it turned out fine.  The older one always noticed if the baby was next to me rather than in the bassinet, and would climb in at dad's feet instead of next to baby!  With both kids, the middle-of-the night relocation just naturally got later and rarer as they got older, and was almost entirely over by the time each started kindergarten.

Oh, and as for napping in a carrier, let me tell you how horribly inconvenient it is to have a toddler who *doesn't* nap very well in a carrier, so you're trapped in the house letting her sleep in a dark and quiet room for a couple hours in the middle of every day, hahaha.  At that stage I really, really missed the days when I could be working, shopping, socializing, whatever, and the baby would just sleep on me while I went about my business!

Anyway.  You may at some point find that your child's sleep habits are creating a problem for someone or something in your family's life, and you'll need to figure out how to solve that problem.  But right now there's no problem, so enjoy the many advantages of "contact" sleeping and don't worry about it.  No need to cross any bridges before you come to them, especially given that your child may very well lead you to swim or take a ferry instead, and you'll get to the other side all the same.  ;) 

Hi there,

Passionately responding to your post! We've co-slept with both of our kids and wouldn't do it any other way, despite the enormous pressure of the western world to train totally dependent children to be independent. Our kids are 8 and 4 and we savor all that non verbal, bodily connection we have shared over the years. It feels so good to know we've established that trust and security with them.  I work in early childhood education and see nothing about cry it our that is for the child's benefit. The skills to self soothe comes from being around others who co-regulate with you. A kid crying alone in a room who eventually stops and falls asleep hasn't learned to self soothe; they've learned that they can't rely on their caregiver and go to sleep (with elevated cortisol levels, mind you) to conserve energy. 

Our choice to co-sleep was not hard, but it still was hard to feel like we were in some freak minority of parents who couldn't just put their kid in a crib and walk away and not think about them for 12 hours. I definitely had bouts of jealousy towards friends who seemed to win back so much time by sleep training. It has helped immensely to find other like minded parents who are also putting their kids' needs at the forefront to normalize that it actually isn't normal for a baby to just go to bed on their own. It just feels that way in our culture. 

I recommend looking into the work of Dr James McKenna who runs the Mother Baby Sleep Lab at the University of Notre Dame. Here is short interview he did with Ariana Huffington for Huff Post that I've sent to so many friends over the years. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/james-mckenna-co-sleeping-expert_b_71197…

Hope this soothes any doubts you are feeling and hope you can savor that baby so much! 

HI, we too didn't think we'd cosleep past the baby stage but here we are ha. I find different kids have different needs, and when we put my two kiddos in a room together the older was happy to have their sibling in the room with them and was motivated to being more calm/quiet at bedtime. 

For those who co sleep with toddlers/ older children- do you go to sleep the same time as your child? Our almost 3 year old always slept well in his crib...until we transitioned him to a toddler bed and he refused to sleep in his own room. We now co-sleep in our bed which is going fine, but the biggest struggle is he needs one of us to be there to go to sleep. We are taking turns, but it's tough to go to bed so early half the week. Any tips to transition out of this would be helpful. 

Responding to the post requesting tips for staying in bed. I actually do like going to bed early, so I did often go to bed with the kid. If I am not sleepy, I would meditate. My spouse doesn’t like going to bed so early. So, my spouse often listened to pod cast or audio books while laying in bed to pass the time.