For some years now, the millenary act of sleeping with the baby in the same bed is called co-sleeping, which in Spanish we translate as colecho, which is a word that does not really exist but is used so often that we all understand it already as sleeping with the baby in the same bed or space.
Now some researchers, with decades of experience in the study of breastfeeding and breastfeeding, and seeing that they are two closely related events, have decided to baptize this conjunction as "breastsleeping", a mix of "breastfeeding" (breastfeeding) and "co-sleeping" (colecho). The reason? Try to name something that many parents do and in response to the "Safe to Sleep" campaign, which should make babies sleep more safely and is getting the opposite.
The parents of "breastsleeping"
We talk about James McKenna Y Lee Gettler. The second is little known, but the first we talked here in Babies and more on several occasions, one of them for being the author of the book "Sleeping with your baby: A guide for parents about the school", full of studies and scientific documentation that explains why the school is safe and why it is also recommendable.
Now they want to go a little further and summarize, and by the way to normalize, the term "nursing mother who sleeps with her baby" for that "breastsleeping" of difficult translation into Spanish: Lactalecho? ¿Amamalecho? (I better not follow ...).
And I say normalize because they argue that it is not only something useful, but also recommended. As they comment, the mothers who do breastsleeping better manage milk production, because the baby sucks more, they sleep more (very useful if they work), are more likely to have a closer relationship with your baby (for being in contact longer) and acquire more confidence in baby care.
The "Safe to Sleep" campaign
For years, the Safe to Sleep campaign has tried to prevent Sudden Infant Death Syndrome with information for parents that helps reduce the risk of a baby suffering from it. This information explains that the safest place to sleep with a baby is a crib next to the parents' bed, even glued together, but never the same surface.
Although it is also said that sofas and other surfaces should be avoided, people are running away from school because they are being scared and they are sleeping with their babies on sofas, rocking chairs and recliners. All in order not to collect with the baby and everything quite more dangerous than to do it.
Faced with this situation, and fearing that they are also putting obstacles to breastfeeding because babies who sleep separately from parents tend to breastfeed less time, these two researchers, who have more than 25 years of work on this issue behind their backs, defend Colecho and breastfeeding as a single act. An act that helps children to feed more and develop better, both for what nourishes them (breast milk) and for what causes security, peace and low levels of cortisol, which is the stress hormone (contact with Mother).
Sleeping with the baby is a safe practice, if done well
If you consider the practices that should be avoided: tobacco, alcohol, taking other drugs or medications, and some other things, colecho is a fairly safe practice with newborn babies and positive before the SMSL after three months. This is, at least, what emerges from a review in which the data of two studies on colecho and sudden death were analyzed, by isolating the risk variables. That is, many times studies are published that say that sleeping with the baby is very dangerous because it can cause the death of babies. And it is true, if things are not done well. But if you take into account the advice that I just left you, then the risk is not greater than sleeping in a crib alone, and after 3 months it is also considered beneficial: breastfeeding protects against sudden death and colecho also, because children who sleep with their parents have a more natural and safer sleep pattern, which is characterized by being lighter, with more awakenings and more shots. By not having such a deep sleep, the risk of SIDS is lower.
The review I commented analyzed data from 400 children who suffered sudden death and were compared with 1386 children as a control sample. They saw that at the time of death 36% of children in the SMSL group were sleeping with parents, compared to 15% of those in the control group. Seen this way it seems that the fault lies with the colecho, but then they began to defoliate the margarita (eliminate the risk variables) and they saw that:
- The odds of SMSL in babies sleeping with their parents on a sofa or next to a father who consumes more than two units of alcohol they are much (but much) higher than in cases where this did not happen (Odds Ratio of 18.3, when an Odds Ratio of 1 would say the risk does not increase, which is the same).
- If they slept next to someone who smoked and had less than 3 months the chances of SIDS were also higher (OR of 8.9), although that risk was much lower in those older than 3 months (OR of 1.4).
- If the parents slept with the baby in the absence of these practices, the risk of sudden death was not greater than those who slept in their crib (OR of 1.1, which is considered not significant), although this would have to be divided by age: children under 3 months were somewhat more at risk (OR of 1.6) and those older than 3 months much less (OR of 0.1), confirming that after 3 months the colecho is a highly recommended practice.
- The use of the pacifier was a protector against sudden death only in babies who slept with their parents and sleeping in a prone position (face down) was only more dangerous if babies slept alone.
What to do about this data?
Relax Calm down if your baby does not consent to sleeping apart and you realize that as you sleep better everyone is close, and practice breastsleeping, so that breastfeeding is established better, last longer and enjoy contact with your baby. Whether it is less than 3 months, or if it is older, avoid any habit that is negative for babies, both the father and the mother: tobacco, alcohol, medication that causes drowsiness, drugs, etc., and if it is less than 3 months, and taking into account that the risk did increase a little, make use of a cot cradle or cradle townhouse that allows minimal separation with parents (this is what the AEP recommends). Once 3 months have passed, given that the colecho is a protector of sudden death, enjoy it if mother and baby agree.
