“Sleep tight, sweet dreams.”  Sweet, simple words parents utter to their children every day.  But when it comes to infant sleep, much of the advice parents receive is neither sweet nor simple.  In his new book Sleeping with Your Baby:  A Parent’s guide to Cosleeping, James J. McKenna, Ph.D., dispels the myths about infant sleep and provides a guide to help parents make informed decisions about where their babies should sleep.

McKenna is an anthropologist an the University of Notre Dame, internationally renowned for his pioneering research on infant sleep.  His studies of infant-parent cosleeping and breastfeeding reveal the cultural biases endemic to much of the rhetoric surrounding nighttime parenting.  For decades, he asserts, the advice U.S. women received from their doctors, mothers, and magazines weren’t based an any empirical data, but on outdated cultural ideas promoted by male physicians who themselves were almost never involved in taking care of a baby.  The legacy of this advice is a cultural bias to keep mothers and babies apart during the night.  An emphasis on fostering independence and self-reliance, the notion that the parental bed is scared, and an emphasis on privacy all supersede a baby’s normal, biological, mammalian need to be with his or her mama. 

Of course, many mothers do sleep with their babies – but often in secret.  McKenna thus wrote this book to “provide a balanced, comprehensive and holistic perspective on cosleeping and bedsharing, specifically while breastfeeding.”  He readily admits that one size advice does not fit all and that bed sharing can be risky.  So too, though, can solitary sleep in a crib be risky.  The key is to make choices based on sound information.  

McKenna wants families to understand not only how to make sure babies sleep safely, but what happens while a baby sleeps and how cosleeping and solitary sleeping have different effects on a developing baby.  How does cosleeping affect neurological and physical development?  What is the relationship between breastfeeding, cosleeping and SIDS?  Why is there so much fear surrounding shared sleep?  When is it not a good idea to sleep with your baby?   

Sleeping with Your Baby answers these questions and many others.  An excellent (fully referenced) resource, McKenna’s book should become high on the list of recommended reading to expectant parents and health care providers alike.

Here are a few more articles about nighttime parenting. 

http://www.breastfeedingcafe.com/Articles/Article-ParentingintheDark.htm

http://www.breastfeedingcafe.com/Articles/Article-SIDSandCoSleeping.htm

http://www.breastfeedingcafe.com/Articles/Article-IntheDarkAboutInfantSleep.htm

Back to Parents'Lounge Research Updates

Back to The Clinicians' Corner News and Research Updates