For my wife, Karen, trying to get any sleep with our first baby was a nightmare. She was breastfeeding him so I wasn’t much help. We couldn’t take turns feeding him in shifts. So every night Karen would have to get up several times, grab the little guy and sit in the rocking chair feeding time.
During maternity leave this was bearable because Karen could catch up on some of the sleep during the day. When the baby napped, Karen napped. But once Karen’s maternity leave ended, so did any thought of ever feeling rested again. Our baby didn’t know that his mom’s maternity leave had ended. He just kept up his normal sleeping and eating pattern which meant that Karen was up every couple hours feeding the baby.
After a long night of very little sleep, Karen had to be up early and spend most of the day on her feet teaching her High School English Class. Somehow Karen made it through the first year of our newborn’s life without losing her sanity.
So when we had our second baby boy, Karen wanted to try something different. She decided to try co sleeping with our newborn. At first I was a little worried. I thought what if I roll over and crush him. What if I’m awake all night and can’t sleep. It’s bad enough already having one of us going without much sleep.
But soon I put those worries to rest. Instead of having sleepless nights, both Karen and I actually get much more sleep. Now whenever our little guy is hungry Karen is right there to feed him. She doesn’t have to get out of bed and sit in a chair for a good part of the night. We don’t have a baby that needs to get into full cry mode to be heard by his mom and dad.
And that worry about rolling on him has never been a problem with either of us. It almost seems that Karen intuitively knows where he is. I think that might be just part of being a mom.
But there was one worry that Karen had about co sleeping with our baby. It was that our baby boy would roll out of bed and get hurt. Karen began doing some research to see if there were any co sleeper products that would protect a baby from rolling off a bed.
After some searching, Karen found an original co sleeper pillow. The co sleeper pillow is about five feet long and about 12 inches in diameter. It lays on the edge of our bed attached to a sheet that we sleep on. It works incredibly well as a barrier to keep our baby boy on the bed. And since the pillow lays right on the bed there is no worry about the baby getting stuck between the co sleeper pillow and the bed. In fact the co sleeper pillow is a patented design and is doctor recommended.
There are other co sleeper bassinets available for parents who want to co sleep with their babies. And if you worry about having your baby in your bed you can get one of the original co sleeper products, a bassinet co sleeper that can be placed right next to your bed. extra tall bassinet