Co-Sleeping vs. Crying It Out; the science of CIO

Hey there,

Following is FWD'ed e-mail I happened to receive from Molly (friend with the baby on the way and the toddler, like you!) today!

I thought the studies were very interesting. I have not been to the links but know some of the sites are good.

I'll be interested to hear what others think! (And frankly, have they ever done a study on a mother who's been doing extended co-sleeping with twins? I will guarantee you that cortisol levels can rise pretty high, right there in our big cozy family bed!) Though ultimately I feel this article and the information this presents take the theories behind CS into the realm of absolute fact in terms of an infant's, baby's, or toddler's reaction to feeling alone and helpless, and should be important for many who might be on the fence about CS.

I had a friend say once, quoting someone I can't remember, that "A child's natural response to terror is sleep." I'd chew on that for a while before I sleep-trained an infant or baby, for sure.

Laura


"Studies show that a mother's blood pressure actually goes up when she hears an infant crying...why? Anthropologists say it's biology's way of telling her she should respond. This is just one item in a volume of research showing the detrimental effects of this century's new idea of letting infants "cry-it-out"....You wouldn't leave your best friend to cry scared and alone, why would you do this to your own baby?"


http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth/content...


http://www.mothering.com/discussions/for...


http://www.mothering.com/discussions/for...


http://www.kellymom.com/store/freehandou...


http://www.hno.harvard.edu/gazette/1998/...


http://www.canada.com/calgaryherald/news...


The Sunday Times
May 14, 2006

Children 'should sleep with parents until they're five'
Sian Griffiths

ONE of Britain's leading experts on children's mental health has advised parents to reject years of convention and allow children to sleep in bed with them until the age of five.

Margot Sunderland, director of education at the Centre for Child Mental Health in London, says the practice, known as "co-sleeping", makes children more likely to grow up as calm, healthy adults.

Sunderland, author of 20 books, outlines her advice in The Science of
Parenting, to be published later this month. She is so sure of the findings in the new book, based on 800 scientific studies, that she is calling for health
organizations to be issued with fact sheets to educate parents about
co-sleeping.

"These studies should be widely disseminated to parents," said Sunderland. "I am sympathetic to parenting gurus — why should they know the science? Ninety per cent of it is so new they bloody well need to know it now. There is absolutely no study saying it is good to let your child cry."

She argues that the practice common in Britain of training children to sleep alone from a few weeks old is harmful because any separation from parents increases the flow of stress hormones such as cortisol.

Her findings are based on advances in scientific understanding over the past 20 years of how children's brains develop, and on studies using scans to analyse how they react in particular circumstances.

For example, a neurological study three years ago showed that a child
separated from a parent experienced similar brain activity to one in physical pain.

Sunderland also believes current practice is based on social attitudes
that should be abandoned. "There is a taboo in this country about children sleeping with their parents," she said. "What I have done in this book is present the
science. Studies from around the world show that co-sleeping until the age
of five is an investment for the child. They can have separation anxiety up to the
age of five and beyond, which can affect them in later life. This is calmed by co-sleeping."

Symptoms can also be physical. Sunderland quotes one study that found some 70% of women who had not been comforted when they cried as children developed digestive difficulties as adults.

Sunderland's book puts her at odds with widely read parenting gurus such as Gina Ford, whose advice is followed by thousands. Ford advocates establishing sleep routines for babies from a very early age in cots "away from the rest of the house"
and teaching babies to sleep "without the assistance of adults".

In her book The Complete Sleep Guide for Contented Babies and Toddlers
she writes that parents need time by themselves: "Bed sharing . . .more often than not ends up with parents sleeping in separate rooms" and exhausted mothers, a situation that "puts enormous pressure on the family as a whole".

Annette Mountford, chief executive of the parenting organisation Family Links, confirmed that the norm for children in Britain was to be encouraged to sleep in cots and beds, often in separate bedrooms, from an early age. "Parents need their space," she said. "There are definite benefits from encouraging children into
their own sleep routine in their own space."

Sunderland says moving children to their own beds from a few weeks old, even if they cry in the night, has been shown to increase the flow of cortisol. Studies of children under five have shown that for more than 90%, cortisol rises when they go to nursery. For 75%, it falls whenever they go home.

Professor Jaak Panksepp, a neuroscientist at Washington State University, who has written a foreword to the book, said Sunderland's arguments were "a coherent story that is consistent with neuroscience. A wise society will take it to heart".

Sunderland argues that putting children to sleep alone is a peculiarly western phenomenon that may increase the chance of cot death, also known as sudden infant death syndrome (Sids). This may be because the child misses the calming effect on breathing and heart function of lying next to its mother.

"In the UK, 500 children a year die of Sids," Sunderland writes. "In China, where it [co-sleeping] is taken for granted, Sids is so rare itdoes not have a name."