Don’t buy crib company spin on recall—babies are OK in bed

Crib manufacturer Simplicity, recently tried to spin news about a crib recall to take a jab at co-sleeping—a healthy and safe practice done by millions of families around the world every night, and done in our house.

We use an Arm’s Reach Co-sleeper next to our bed, and also have a crib in a separate room for her (maybe someday) but in reality, our baby ends up in bed with us most nights after her first waking. I usually pick her up out of the co-sleeper and place her next to me to nurse lying down and we both fall asleep. It’s a wonderful feeling and it’s just so easy. Sometimes I will lean over the co-sleeper and nurse her there, but honestly, it's so much more comfortable to have her right by my side. I can’t imagine how parents who have their babies sleeping in another room manage when they wake at night and cry out for them, which most babies just naturally do when they are very young. It’s much more tiring, I think, to have to get out of bed and go to the crying baby than to be gently woken by the baby’s persistent stirring and then be able to tend to her before she gets worked up.

According to Attachment Parenting International (API), there are many benefits to co-sleeping. Co-sleeping helps babies regulate some of their bodies’ functions. The API website cites studies showing that parents being so close by may help the infant’s immature nervous system learn to self-regulate during sleep and that it may also help prevent SIDS by preventing the infant from entering into sleep states that are too deep.

Babies get more care with the co-sleeping arrangement, as well. Co-sleeping increases breastfeeding, and in addition to the known benefits of breast milk itself, the act of sucking increases oxygen flow, which is beneficial for both growth and immune functions.
Long-term benefits include higher self-esteem, less discomfort about physical contact and affection as adults and general improved adjustment to life. Another study showed co-sleeping children received higher evaluations from their teachers than did solitary sleeping children. Furthermore, a large, cross-cultural study conducted on five different ethnic groups in large U.S. cities found that, across all groups, co-sleepers exhibited a general feeling of satisfaction with life.

Some critics say children will never want to leave the bed, but according to API, many co-sleeping parents report that their children become willing to leave, with little or no persuasion, on their own around age two or three, as they mature physically, emotionally and cognitively.

With regard to safety, the API site explains that existing studies do not prove that co-sleeping is inherently hazardous. Rather, certain characteristics of the sleeping environment that can contribute to danger—smoking, drugs, alcohol, and unsuitable bedding, for example. Basically, you have to actually pay attention and be aware of your baby, even through the night, rather than setting her aside "safely" (or not) in her separate space.

One of the biggest problems with the perception of co-sleeping probably stems from a cultural bias. America's emphasis on independence, technology, and consumerism, as well as parents’ needs for time and privacy, may as contribute to the bias against co-sleeping.

Simplicity, the company that manufactured the recalled cribs, played on this bias in their statement about the recall. Seemingly trying to temper the bad news about their cribs, they called upon “child advocate” Nancy A. Cowles to express her concern that, “the recall could lead parents to let their children sleep in less safe environments, such in the parents’ bed.” Riiiiiight.

This statement comes straight from the crib company’s press release, but at least most news outlets had the sense not to use the following bit of misinformation on co-sleeping the company slipped in: "According to First Candle, a leading promoter of infant health, infants who sleep in an adult bed with their parents are up to 40 times more likely to die through suffocation or other means than infants who sleep in a crib," the company president is quoted. "Parents need to know that babies are safest in a separate sleeping space designed for them." Mmmm-kay.

So why do the crib makers try to scare parents into thinking their babies aren’t safe in bed with them? To sell cribs, of course. Yay, America!

I don't have anything against cribs, and some day we may even use ours. What I do have something against is misinformation being used to scare parents into thinking they have to buy and use certain products, especially in the wake of news of problems with these products.

Looking into the recall and into facts about co-sleeping did prompt me to do a check of how I arranged my baby's bedding, both in the sleeper and in our bed (in addition to checking our crib). The API site notes the following basic guidelines: infants should sleep on firm surfaces, clean surfaces, in the absence of smoke, under light a blanket; their heads should never be covered; the bed should not have any stuffed animals or pillows around the infant; and the infant should never be placed to sleep on top of a pillow. Sheepskins or other fluffy material and especially beanbag mattresses should never be used.