Dear Dr. Debbie,
A full night’s sleep is rare and precious for us parents. Our children often ask to join Mommy and Daddy in the middle of the night. This interrupts our slumbers but seems to be important to theirs. They’re four-years-old and one-and-a-half.
If we allow bedsharing now, does it harm them somehow?
Welcome or Not
—-
Dear WoN,
There are many opinions about this but it boils down to what works for each family.
Valid Reasons
Although most children will sleep through the night after six months, there are many reasons that a child under the age of five would wake up and want to be with her parents.
Teething is one. The so-called two-year-old molars push, recede, and push their way through the back gums somewhere around 23 to 33 months. The pain is worse at night. Hugs are well-known to alleviate pain.
Hunger and or thirst can interrupt sleep. Hunger can increase with a growth spurt or after a day of heavy exercise. A midnight hunger call signals you to keep better pace with appetite fluctuations from day to day. Thirst intensifies with heat and with dry air. Keep a re-usable water bottle where a child can reach it. Or add a humidifier to the bedroom. A humidifier helps to relieve a dry stuffy nose which can also interfere with sleeping. Little ones can’t make these adjustments on their own.
The temperature of the house can affect comfort during sleep, so experiment with the thermostat, the weight of pajamas, and the thickness of blankets to achieve the perfect climate.
Bad dreams occur for many reasons. The human brain is capable of imagination by around age two, so even if a child has had a perfect day with all her needs completely met, she can still concoct fictitious dangers in a dream. She needs to know that you will always protect her from harm – real or imagined.
Bedwetting typically abates by age five though it is inconvenient at any age. Add a bath towel or beach towel between the bottom sheet and the mattress cover to absorb the urine. This might help your child sleep through it. At least you’ll get a few more hours of shuteye before you have to take care of the wet child and the laundry.
A tummy ache or headache could cause a child to awaken and call for a parent. She instinctively knows that healing comes from you.
Anthropologists and proponents of “natural parenting” tell us that human babies crave contact with parents for physical and psychological security. Parents like the closeness, too. Being alone in the dark just doesn’t feel right.
Cultural Differences
Much of the world is not even asking about this. Whether it’s the economics of smaller homes with fewer bedrooms, or just tradition, young children sleeping with their parents is the norm for many cultures.
Historically, separate beds and separate rooms have only been an option quite recently for the human species. Co-sleeping supports breast-feeding, keeping warm, protection against predators (when humans lived in nature), and a healthy dose of psychological security.
Surveys of parents in the United States by the Centers for Disease Control reveal that although in western societies it is considered unnecessary or even harmful, about 68% of babies here co-sleep at least some of the time. In other parts of the world this goes on for a couple of years, or more, and no one bats an eye.
Room Sharing
If being close through the night is something that your family values, you could compromise by arranging sleeping spaces for a child or two near, but not in, your bed. This could be as simple as leaving a spare couch cushion on the floor in your bedroom. Add a small blanket there if needed.
Alternatively, if an adult-size mattress fits on the floor of the children’s room, this could be where you start your slumbers when the children start theirs, before you tiptoe away between dreams to find your own bed. Or the mattress could provide you with a soft landing when answering a middle of the night call for “Mommy, I need you!”.
Bed Hopping
Let’s face it. It is quite normal for children to need their parents in the night. An oft-practiced solution for sleep-starved parents is for one parent to welcome the whimpering child into the parents’ bed and for the other to simply find a bed no one is sleeping in. You could take turns to start out the night in this fashion for a longer stretch of uninterrupted sleep. (A couch in the basement could serve this purpose.)
Eventually children crave independence more than overnight contact. The practice may shift into a routine of Sunday morning snuggles or Friday night stories in the parents’ bed, with uninterrupted overnights in their own beds becoming the standard.
Being there when they need you helps to build their self-confidence. Fortunately, or unfortunately, young children grow out of wanting nighttime snuggles with their parents. As long as parents and children work out who sleeps where and when, there’s no wrong way to manage this stage of parenting.
Dr. Debbie
Deborah Wood, Ph.D. is a child development specialist and founding director of Chesapeake Children’s Museum.
The museum is open daily from 10 am to 4 pm. Online reservations are available or call: 410-990-1993. Each Thursday there is a guided nature walk at 10:30 am. Art and Story Times with Mrs. Spears are on Monday mornings at 10:30 am.
Read more of Dr. Wood’s Good Parenting columns by clicking here.
