Sleeping in Same Room as Baby Can Be Hard on Mom
Sleeping in Same Room as Baby Can Be Hard on Mom
October 14, 2015
NPR — Mothers have been warned for years that sleeping with their newborn infant, also called co-sleeping, is a bad idea because it increases the risk the baby might die unexpectedly during the night.
But now BGU researchers are reporting that even sleeping in the same room can have negative consequences: not for the child, but for the mother.
BGU researchers are reporting that sleeping in the same room can have negative consequences: not for the child, but for the mother.
A group of researchers from BGU’s Department of Psychology and Faculty of Health Sciences wanted to see whether sleeping in the same room as their newborn affected mothers’ or babies’ sleep. To measure sleep patterns, both mom and baby wore wristbands designed to measure movement during the night, a measurement that gives an accurate indication of sleep patterns for both mother and child.
Mothers who slept in the same room as their infants, whether in the same bed or just the same room, had poorer sleep than mothers whose babies slept elsewhere in the house. They woke up more frequently (approximately three times per night versus two), were awake approximately 20 minutes longer per night, and had shorter periods of uninterrupted sleep (approximately 136 minutes versus 166 minutes).
The study, recently published in the journal Sleep Medicine, concludes that mothers of co-sleeping infants report more infant night-wakings and experience poorer sleep than mothers of solitary sleeping infants. The quality of maternal sleep should be taken into clinical consideration when parents consult about co-sleeping.
To reduce the risk of sudden infant death syndrome,the American Academy of Pediatrics current recommends that mothers who wish to sleep near their babies not sleep in the same beds, but rather in the same room. Nevertheless, the BGU study suggests that doing so may be best for baby, but may take a toll on Mom having a good night’s sleep.
Read more on the NPR website >>
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