Co-Sleeping Advice?

Have you tried placing a small playpen at the foot of the bed? Then he'd be near you, but he couldn't roll out.
M.

both of mine slept with us from infantcy. if he decides he would rather play than sleep move him to his crib and say if he cant lay down and go to sleep he has to go to his room so mommy can sleep. if he cries go get him and put him back in your bed to try again. it doesnt seem like they understand but they will catch on. before moving him to the crib though pick him up and lay him back down saying its time to sleep. after about 3 times doing that put him in crib. if anything the crying from you leavinghim and making him stop crawling will tire him out to eventually give up. after a few times of this or nights of it he will get the idea. i never neded rails for my bd as baby slept between me and hubby. if you dont like it like that you may have to throw fung shei out the door and put your bed against the wall for awhile. they do have bed rails though at the store. most stores have them heres walmarts site with their array of bed rails.

http://www.walmart.com/search/search-ng.do?search_constra...

Hey A. - its Danielle from Nova Moms with 2008 babies. : ) I co-sleep with my son William still (he is 18 months), sometimes he sleeps on a toddler mattress on the floor and I(ironically,) have decided last night that tonight, we will start trying the mattress every night. You see, we are also moving this month (any day actually) and I am pregnant - so for me I think a transition would be good now, if alittle stressful. I have moved the family bed to the wall and keep my son always between myself and the wall - just because it is always possible he may fall, even though I think its very unlikely. I am lucky to have a relatively low bed and carpeted floors - if we had hardwood floors I would get some rails. I have been wanting to get William to sleep more on his own because I am concerned about having a kicking toddler in bed with me (after my c-section in November) and the new baby. I will be having the new baby co-sleep with me for sure. I will still let William sleep with me once in a while - but I have been hoping he is not too attached already and doesn't get overly jealous - I am nervous and unsure about the whole thing. My husband does not like to sleep with an infant because he is alittle afraid of rolling on him - although I always keep the baby on my side for sleep, I had to move him to breastfeed. My husband does appreciate the lack of crying in the night that comes from the baby being in bed and he knows the benefits - still, he asked if the new baby could not co-sleep - I said "sure, if you will help with feedings and diaperings while I recover from my c-section" well, that changed his mind on the subject very quickly! LOL he is a super wonderful father - just not the diapering kind : ) For me co-sleeping has been the best thing for bonding, breastfeeding and my parenting style - but man oh man do I get ZERO support in it! My entire family hates that I do it and I hardly ever talk about it to avoid their critisism. I say, do what works for you and Miles and don't worry too much - it will all pan out! : ) E-mail me anytime! : )

Hi A. -

My son is 3 years old and has slept with us from the day he came home from the hospital. If you are fine with your little guy in your bed there is no reason at all to move him. The first thing safety wise to do is to put your mattress on the floor. We have our mattress and boxspring on the floor and it works great. This way even if your little guy falls off the bed he will be fine. Also www.onestepahead.com has bedrails that will fit your adult bed. You have gotten a lot of good responses here, but you may also want to check out the boards on www.mothering.com almost all of the mommy's there co-sleep of co-slept. Also there was a great blog post today about co-sleeping at http://attachmentparenting.org/blog/ we moved when my son was about 18 months old and I just thought that a move and a new sleep situtaion was just too much for him. But I also never planned on getting him out of our bed. Who knows he could be with us until he is 5, I really have not put a number on it. Good luck with everything.

Cheers,
M.

We co-slept for about two years with our son. If your child is the monkey ours is, getting all the way to 2 might be hard.

We also moved right when he was about 1.5 years old so I am familiar with your situation.

We set up his room like a big boy room - bed, sheets he helped pick, etc. - and had it all ready for him when we moved in. We showed him the room, let him play in there, and so on, but when it came to choosing where to sleep he chose to sleep with us until he was just about 2.

Two seemed to be the magic number. He still wants someone to snuggle with most nights before falling asleep, but he does it in his room most of the time.

So - here are my suggestions. First - don't buy anything if you really don't need it. If he is starting to crawl off the bed, pile pillows around. My little monkey always slept between me and my husband so he had a few things to crawl over first, but there were pillows on the floor and sometimes he fell out - he was fine when he did. Other nights we were the ones falling out of bed when he would sleep perpendicularly to us and push out his legs. (At 3 he is 41" tall so kind of big.)

On transitioning - you can try what we did and see if you have more success. Start talking about how the new house has a big boy room and how it will be his special place to sleep. However - new house, new room, no more mommy & daddy security blanket may be too much. Be ready for that! Transitioning out of the bed before 2 may work, or may not.

And believe it or not, sometimes they just tell you if you listen to their whole body.

Good luck!

We had my son in our bed for the first 4 months, and it was a nightmare. I kept waking up at almost every sound he made and found my husband's arm draped across his face one time. With the next one we definitely plan to use a cosleeper! Getting him to sleep in his crib was not too hard, he transitioned really well and not only did we seem to sleep better but he did as well. We just used the monitor. We did have to use the "cry it out" method, but keep in mind we didn't resort to this until he was a year old. I think we would have not had to ever resort to this or he would never have even got very upset if we had allowed him to self soothe early on, like put him to bed when he was tired but not fully asleep. We tried everything else we could but finally the doctor said by picking him up and rocking him and such when he would wake up at night was only rewarding and reenforcing the crying. So we were told to check on him and just tell him to go to sleep or pat him down and say goodnight and tell him it would be ok. It seemed like torture at the time but after a few nights he was sleeping like a champ, though I think we lucked out because I've been told for some people this can take longer. I do think moving and changing sleeping arrangements at the same time could be h*** o* him. I only say this because we tried to break my son of the paci right after coming back from a trip where my son was sleeping in the same room as us. When we got back and tried to not give him his paci, he screamed for hours and finally climbed out of his crib. I think it was too much for him to go back to sleeping by himself and losing his paci. Whatever you choose to do, I'm sure it will all work out.

Hi A.! When we were co-sleeping, I found a great bolster-pillow-bed-rail called the Snug Tuck Pillow (snugtuckpillow.com) that helped us once our baby was more mobile (at around 7 months, I think), and I was afraid of her rolling or squirming out of the bed. Once she got even MORE squirmy (at about 10 months), I decided we'd all sleep better if she had her own space, and we moved her into a Pack and Play in our bedroom. My hunch was right, and she started sleeping much more soundly at night (we did, too!). Once she had her first birthday, we wanted to move her out of our room and into her crib, sharing a room with our 3-year-old, and we did time that with another change--we were going to be away from home for a week, so while we were away, we had the kids share a room (with the baby in the pack and play), so when we returned home, they were already used to room sharing, and it was easy to then put her in the crib in their shared room. That was 2 months ago, and it's worked great! We still use the pack and play in our room for afternoon naps so the kids can have separate places to nap (because our 3-year-old won't always sleep). I also remember that we used a move from one house to another to transition our son from crib to toddler bed when he was 2 years old, and again that seemed to work great--everything was new and different anyway, and he just took it in stride. I hope this helps!

My advice would be to transition him now in his current environment to his own bed. Hold him till sleepy or asleep and then put him down in the new bed. If we wakes up upset, pick him up, soothe him and put him back sleepy or asleep again. This may take a few nights but if you consistently put him back in the new bed, he will get the picture. Always start putting him in there for naps too. If you nurse, nurse sitting up so as to transition him easily to the new bed when he is asleep. I am not a 'cry it out' person either... so cuddle him and love him but gradually lessen how much you do it for. You will see that in a few days to a week he will be adjusting well to his new bed. It is much safer and in the end will give you freedom. He will sleep better on his own (contrary to co-sleeping where they tussle about with every move you make) and you will sleep better too. Hope this helps.

A., My husband and I practice MANY aspects of attachement parenting however, not co-sleeping. I nursed my daughter for a long time 13 months but just got up and went into her room at night. I read an article about a parent who woke up to their child gasping for air and one of the parents had rolled onto the child and collapsed his lung. SO I commend you for practicing co-sleeping safely. However, I believe our daughter has done excellent sleeping in her own crib. You are so limited when you have to go to bed with your child ever night. Parents need down time and alone time to get things done or to relax. Plus I think many parents who co-sleep let their children stay up too late and the child is exhausted.
Whatever choice you make will be right for your family but think about what is right for you and do the co-sleeping safely. Best of luck.

Hi there,

As far as the bed rails go, go to amazon.com and search bed rails, alot pop up! You can find something there!

Our daughter and son for that matter have co-slept with us and then in their bed in our room for the first 2 years. Our daughter is almost 2 and sleeps naps in our bed, we have a king size, so she never rolls off...at night after she is asleep, I put her in her own bed b4 we go to bed. She wakes up in the morning and finished sleeping in our bed. I started her in her own bed at 5 months, otherwise I would have never gotten her to sleep in her own bed. She is very insistant on things she really wants. :-)

Eventually we will put her in her own room, and make her crin into the toddler bed. I pray that she accepts this fairly quickly! haha we will see! Alot of ppl would suggest that I do this already. Since she is our last child, and our baby, we are spoiling her and ourselves for now. Ppl will critisize, but do what you want, you are the one that is living with the child and have to deal with the circumstances as well...so keep this in mind! :) Not only will your child have sleepless nights upon an unexpected transition, you will too.

Good luck to you and God bless!

If you're dedicated to co-sleeping (personally, I am at least in some form until age two at least) then put your mattress directly on the floor. This way, even if your little crawler manages to get to the edge and fall off, the fall is very minor and likely to scare him more than anything else. We had our mattress on the floor for both of my sons and they both fell out a few times, but never got hurt. It's such a short drop, all it did was teach them about physical boundaries and that they should be more careful when they're rolling around.

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss?url=search-alias%3Daps&...

:)

If co-sleeping is working for everyone, why change it? We shoved our bed up against the wall (it was a little harder for me to get into, but it worked) when my daughter was mobile but not too smart about it. Of course, both of my kids fell out of the bed at some point, so maybe I'm not the one to listen to! I agree that changing sleeping arrangements and moving might be a bit much.

If you get a bed rail, be extra sure that he can't slip down in between the rail and the side of the bed! Stuff it with pillows or an old quilt all folded up or something.

Or, you could put him in the middle between you and your husband. That's where my kids always slept, and one of us woke up when the started moving.

Best,
A. @ http://prettybabies.blogspot.com

I would recommend reading The No-Cry Sleep Solution by Elizabeth Pantley. She is not in favor of the cry-it-out method and all her approaches to sleep are very gentle. If you're moving though, I think I would wait to transition him. I'm getting to move as well in addition to transitioning my son into his crib, but I'm waiting until after we've moved and settled into our new house. As for the crawling, my son does that too. We bought a bed rail at target and that seems to have helped. Good luck!

My son slept with me for the first couple of months, but once he started rolling over it became a safety issue. I would put him on one side of the bed, and I would wake up and he would be up against my back! It scared me that I might roll on him or that he might accidentally end up face down on my pillow. So, we transitioned to the crib and it wasn't easy!
I did not do the cry it out method, I really don't believe in it. What I did was start a very simple bed time routine that I followed every night (bottle in the rocking chair, then some cuddle time and once he was drifting off I would transfer him to the crib.) When he would fuss, I would pick him up, rock him back to almost sleep, and put him back down. It took a couple of nights of not getting much sleep, but eventually he just got used to it and slept. Sometimes he wakes up too early in the morning so I bring him in to bed with me for an extra hour or two of sleep, which is nice for both of us because we still get a little of that close sleeping time.
If you are going to do this, I definitely think that you should start now, before the move.
Good Luck!

We used this bed rail because we had a King bed and a thicker mattress. http://www.snugtuckpillow.com/

My daughter never managed to move very far in bed without my awaking for it. However, around 1 year, we moved her from sleeping on the edge between the rail and me to sleeping between my husband and me and dispensed with the bed rail.