The document discusses perspectives on infant sleep and co-sleeping. It notes that views have changed over time, from recommendations that infants sleep alone and not be held frequently, to current research showing benefits of co-sleeping for both infant and parent sleep and development. The document questions common assumptions that solitary infant sleep promotes independence and whether independence is truly the goal for very young infants.

1. Sleep Like A Baby? What Does That Really Mean? James J. McKenna Ph.D. Edmund P Joyce CSE Chair in Anthropology Director, Mother-Baby Behavioral Sleep Laboratory University of Notre Dame 2003

2. Babyhood …….by Paul Reiser “ Getting your child to sleep becomes a blinding obsession. I myself would often loose sight of the larger picture.What is the actual goal here? Constant sleep? No awake time? Zero consciousness? I mean, we must accept that at some point babies have to be awake.They did not come to the planet just to sleep. Are we determined to get them asleep just so we can get a taste of what life was like before we had a kid? Because, if we are, then why did we have a kid? Just to lie there to look soft and fuzzy? We could have gotten, say, just a peach. A St Bernard? A narcoleptic houseguest? Or why not just a chenille bathrobe? Chenille bathrobes are fuzzy and just lie there”?

5. Infant Care Is A”Moral Good” benefits, risks, what’s safe what “problems” are worth and not worth solving ..depends on…. P E R S P E C T I V E

7. In pediatric sleep medicine and research into sleeping arrangements…. Does social ideology masquerade as science?

8. Changing perceptions….of what’s good for baby… “THE CONSTANT HANDLING OF AN INFANT IS NOT GOOD FOR HIM. THE LESS HE IS LIFTED, HELD AND PASSED FROM ONE PAIR OF HANDS TO ANOTHER, THE BETTER, AS WHILE HE IS YOUNG HIS BONES ARE SOFT AND CONSTANT HANDLING DOES NOT TEND TO IMPROVE THEIR DEVELOPMENT NOR THE SHAPLINESS OF HIS LITTLE BODY. THE NEWBORN INFANT SHOULD SPEND THE GREATER PRORTION OF HIS LIFE ON THE BED” FROM: THE BABY MARIANNA WHEELER 1901 HARPER BROS: NEW YPRK LONDON

9. CHANGING PERCEPTIONS OF WHAT INFANTS NEED... THE MOTHERHOOD BOOK (1935) “ BABIES SHOULD BE TRAINED FROM THEIR EARLIEST DAYS TO SLEEP REGULARLY AND SHOULD NEVER BE WOKEN IN THE NIGHT FOR FEEDING…. BABY SHOULD BE GIVEN HIS OWN BEDROOM FROM THE VERY BEGINNING. HE SHOULD NEVER BE BROUGHT INTO THE LIVING ROOM AT NIGHT”

10. “… SLEEPING IN YOUR BED CAN MAKE an infant confused and anxious rather than relaxed and reassured. Even a toddler may find this repeated experience overly stimulating” R. FERBER (1886,1999) SOLVE YOUR CHILD’S SLEEP PROBLEMS

11. BENJAMIN SPOCK: SPEAKING TO MOTHERS IN: BABY CARE (THE UNDERMINING OF MATERNAL CONFIDENCE AND KNOWLEDGE) “ YOU KNOW MORE THAN YOU THINK YOU DO…. DON’T BE AFRIAD TO TRUST YOUR COMMON SENSE. BRINGING UP BABY WON’T BE A COMPLICATED JOB IF YOU TAKE IT EASY, TRUST YOUR OWN INSTINCTS, AND FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS YOUR (MALE) DOCTOR GIVES YOU! CITED BY TINA THENEVIN,1993, MOTHERING AND FATHERING

14. ON RESPONDING TO INFANT CRIES... “ A RAPID AND SYMPATHETIC RESPONSE TO OUR BABIES CRIES IS THE FOUNDATION OF STRONG FAMILY VALUES, NOT THE UNDERMINING OF THEM”... FROM: HARVEY KARP … HAPPIEST BABY ON THE BLOCK (2002)

15. Cultural Scientific Public Health Family Interacting factors--all important--determine and influence where and how, or if, and to what degree any given baby “co-sleeps” Where babies sleep is determined by Infant and Parental Biology (infant temperament, too)

19. Consider the ideological salience (embedded cultural assumptions) of this recommendation put forth by the American Academy of Pediatrics … “ Never let a baby fall asleep at the breast” (the very context within which the human infant’s “falling asleep” evolved! (AAP Guide To Infant sleep 1999)

26. Why Do Babies Co-sleep? because they are supposed to…!

30. What Is Co-sleeping? “ When my two lovely daughters are sleeping at the same time” Robert Hahn, Ph.D. ( Center for Disease Control )

31. Arousals Stage 1-2 (light) sleep Stage 3-4 (deep) sleep Breast Feeding Crying Non-breast feeding interventions Sensitivity to mother Sleep duration Routinely bedsharing/breast feeding infants (findings published in refereed articles)

32. Diversity of Co-sleeping ( requires taxonomic distinctions) Co-bedding twins (within sensory range) partial, mixed bedsharing with Dad

33. Parent -infant co-sleeping is biologically and psychologically expectable, if not inevitable.

34. if... sleeping alone through the night is “good” for babies then “good” babies sleep alone, don’t they?

35. If solitary infant sleep is needed for “good adult sleep hygiene” as all western sleep training advocates like Ferber maintain.. Why are western adults (the Spock generation) and especially Americans the most “sleep deprived” people in the world with 60-70 percent adults claiming to be sleep deprived (tired), according to the 2001 National Sleep Foundation ? Can’t have it both ways….can you?

43. But, is “independence” really best in the long run.. that is, is “independence” from parental intervention at 13 or 14 years of age as desirable as it is, say, at 2 months? Does sleeping alone actually correlate with autonomy, competence, and/or confidence, or happiness or to any other desirable personality attribute not obtainable through some other arrangement or other childhood socialization experiences?

45. “ Autonomy in the sense of psychotherapy, implies taking control of one’s life…emotional autonomy does not mean isolation or avoidance of dependency. On the contrary, the lonely schizoid individual who preserves his “independence” at all cots may well be in a state of emotional heteronomy, unable to bear closeness with another person because of inner dread and confusion”….Jeremy Holmes When dependence IS autonomy

46. … .the psychopath… is unaware of the feelings of others. The emotionally autonomous individual does not suppress her feelings, including the need for dependence, but takes cognizance of them, ruling rather than being ruled by them” (Homes and Lindley 1989)* dependency AS autonomy and AS good mental health * The Value of Psychotherapy (1991) J.Holmes and R.Lindley. Oxford University Press

48. Infant Sleep and Infant Sleeping Arrangements It’s Only History, It’s Only Prehistory?