Are there benefits to co-sleeping with my baby?

There have been debates going on for years over the issue of a baby sleeping in the room with parents. It is very natural for a baby to co-sleep with parents and it provides safety as well as convenience for breast feeding mothers.

When your baby sleeps in the same room as you, both of you will have a better night’s sleep. A baby that can feel his mother close by has a much sounder sleep and a mother will sleep much sounder knowing that her baby is close enough to hear should he wake. When a baby co-sleeps with his mother it provides a safety factor and they learn to sleep knowing their mother is close by.

A mother and baby will usually begin to sleep on the same schedule. When they sleep in the same space it eases the mother to know that she will be alerted should the baby be wakened or disturbed while sleeping. It is much easier to hear your baby cry if you are sleeping in the same room as him.

If you are breastfeeding, when you co-sleep with your baby it will be much easier to know when it is time to feed him as opposed to waiting to hear the crying from another room. When you are co-sleeping with your baby and breastfeeding it is less stressful to simply roll over and feed your baby as opposed to getting up and going into another room.

When your baby is about a year old it will be easier to move him into the nursery, but until that time the decision to co-sleep with your baby is one that provides comfort and better sleeping for both mother and baby.