Issue Of Parents Co-Sleeping With Their Kids - Research Paper Example

Issue Of Parents Co-Sleeping With Their Kids Kids require freedom right from the very beginning. This freedom is given to them when they carry out different chores and activities in their childhood. They need to be provided a sense of being on their own so that they could become confident. Similarly, the role of the parents must be such that they encourage the kids to enjoy their lives in accordance with their wishes and desires. However there must be some limitations with respect to the fulfillment of these desires. When it comes to sleeping with their parents, the kids should be forbidden on this premise. The reason for this is that they must learn to sleep on their own, in their rooms so that they could defeat any fears that they have. They need to give quality time to their parents’ love life as well. Their marital bliss is dependent on their romance and this cannot take place if the kids sleep with them for long. Thus it is advisable that the kids need to be given a room of their own, where they could sleep and enjoy their night time (Author Unknown 2008). They will be confident and will learn to bury their fears once and for all. This must start immediately because parents cannot wait for a 7 year old kid to be shown the door when darkness descends. The teaching must begin right from the beginning. Parents must disallow their kids to sleep with them. This will make the kids feel that they have a responsibility to stay away from the lives of their parents at night and allow them the space that they require between one another. The kids must be told openly that it the parents’ time and hence the kids should understand this premise more than anything else. Co-sleeping with kids raises quite a few questions. It could induce SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) which is the death caused by unexplained events happening at night, for the kids aged between one month to one year (Holler 2008). Then there is the discussion of the young ones having problems sleeping on the adult bed. The adult bed is prepared in such a way that it could easily provide solace and comfort for the elders but is not suited to the sleeping needs of the kids. Therefore it is advisable that even if the young ones are made to sleep in the parents’ room during the earliest stages, they should be given a cot of their own (Author Unknown 2006). These kids must not sleep on the adult bed as it is deemed as dangerous for them. One of the other reasons why co-sleeping with kids is fatal because the parents might just push off the kid from the bed when they are asleep and this could mean that the child is not on the same bed as their parents in the middle of the night. Sometimes individuals move a lot whilst they are sleeping which is indeed dangerous for their partners. They might push and kick one another and a baby in between means an even more severe case nonetheless. One of the other aspects behind co-sleeping with kids is that parents give them dependence. If these kids are told to sleep in their own rooms, they would feel less dependence which is indeed a positive sign for their growth and development phases. The kids should be given their space and this would mean that they are told that their own rooms are meant for their freedom and hence they must move out as soon as the parents find it viable for their good measure. Separate rooms for the kids are a good idea because co-sleeping with kids could lead to serious issues, not only for the kids but also their parents as well (Griffiths 2006). Similarly co-sleeping with kids could mean that both the parents as well as the kids are having a serious compromise on their health regimes. The sleep disorder can creep in within the related equation and thus the implications for this aspect seem to be imminent once the child stays with the parents in their own room and on their own bed. Therefore it is best for the parents and their kids to keep away from one another as soon as the kids are old enough to move out to their own rooms (Author Unknown). Being dependent on the parents could mean serious issues and more so if the children become dependent on their parents for each and everything. They must be told as to how they can use the bathroom while at night and these aspects could be bracketed alongside the phenomenon of co-sleeping with kids which is being discussed here. On the same token, sleep disorder could mean problems for the parents, more so if they have to follow a 9-5 regime the following day. The disturbances at night mean that the parents lose out on their sleep patterns and this could make them feel itchy and irritated the next day. Therefore an alternative should be adopted in the form of a schedule which asks of the parents to disallow their kids to enter their rooms after a certain amount of time in the night. This would make the kids feel independent as well as give both the parents and the kids the much needed space that each of them richly deserves (Gavin 2008). Parents’ relationships get affected in a very negative manner and more so when they have decided to continue with their family development regimes. They would not get the time and space for each other and this would mean that the family growing phases are put on a hold. It is not a good phenomenon within the parents’ relationship because they also need love and care of one another and hence the space that comes about when the kids move out from their room is something that they feel cherished about as well. Therefore it is best advisable to allow the kids to become independent and take the difficult things in the middle of the night on their own (Martin). Their rooms should be nearby to their parents so that if they feel they need anything or if they feel frightened due to nightmares, they can always come back to their parents for comfort and solace. Some parents co-sleep with kids because they feel that their kids might wake up very often in the night. For this, the parents should devise such mechanisms that their kids do not get up quite often in the night. They must not allow their kids to sleep well before they hit the bed. Also they could decide on their sleeping patterns with the assistance of food timings and so on. In the end, it would be proper to suggest that co-sleeping with kids has more drawbacks than any positives that one can think of. It is therefore in the best interests of both the parents and the kids to keep away from one another at night. The kids should be told in a very clear manner that the parents need their time at night and the kids should sleep on their own. The kids usually understand this point if they are told with love and care, to be delivered on the part of the parents (Wolfson). All said and done, co-sleeping with kids is a very touchy subject for some parents because they feel that their kids are everything for them and hence they would not like them to go away at night. These parents should weigh the pros and cons before deciding what is in the best interests of their kids as well as their own selves. Works Cited Author Unknown. Sleep Problems. Found Online at: http://www.askdrsears.com/html/7/T071000.asp 2006 Author Unknown. Co-Sleeping. Found Online at: http://www.drhull.com/EncyMaster/C/co-sleeping.html Author Unknown. Children's Bed News. Found Online at: http://www.silentnight.co.uk/news_ext/18787870/co-sleeping-with-kids-divides-parents 19 September 2008 Gavin, Mary L. Cosleeping and Your Baby. Found Online at: http://kidshealth.org/parent/general/sleep/cosleeping.html May 2008 Griffiths, Sian. Children 'should sleep with parents until they're five'. Found Online at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1083020.ece 14 May 2006 Holler, Madeline. They Say: Co-Sleeping Kills Kids. Found Online at: http://www.babble.com/CS/blogs/strollerderby/archive/2008/04/28/they-say-co-sleeping-kills-kids.aspx 28 April 2008 Martin, Susan. Co-Sleeping. Found Online at: http://parenting.ivillage.com/baby/bsleep/0,,429t,00.html Wolfson, Esther Boylan. Co-Sleeping: Bad for Parents, Bad for Children. Found Online at: http://www.wholefamily.com/aboutyourkids/child/cosleeping.html Word Count: 1,288 Read More