I was a "bad mommy" today. The Little Man was fussing after his mid-day meal and I couldn't figure out what he wanted. I'd put him on my shoulder - usually a surefire way to get him to stop yelling at least for a minute and he'd fuss and kick and push and roll so much that I thought he was trying to actually GO somewhere. I moved him around as he tried moving and kicking some more. Finally, when I didn't know what else to do, I laid him down on my bed on his tummy. He hadn't had tummy time in awhile, so I had been planning to have him do some of that before his nap, but I needed to finish putting away the laundry in my room, so the bed was the place for the moment. Within seconds, he was settled. Withing a few minutes, he was asleep.
I let him sleep. On my soft bed, on his tummy. Technically, a "no-no" from that whole "back to sleep" campaign they promote to help w/ SIDS. An hour later (around his usual nap time, he was still sleeping. I had just gotten Fuss down for her nap (yes, I even left him there! I told you I was a bad mommy) and I had a pounding headache. (Which began somewhere around 3am, mind you. It had been a rough day already by that point.) So I picked him up, transferred him to his bassinet and laid him - again - on his tummy. He fussed when I picked him up, because I had turned him over. When he was back on his tummy, he quieted down almost immediately and drifted back to sleep. I laid down and slept, too. He slept really good, really quietly. He was content. (this should not shock me. we are a whole family of tummy sleepers.)
When he began to wake nearly 3 hours after his original tummy moment, he had his hand up to his mouth and was trying to suck on his fingers. His eyes were still closed and when I picked him up, instead of making the quiet sucking, easy stirring noises he had been making, he wailed as I turned him back over. He loves to lay on his tummy, apparently. He ate well (may have even eaten better than he did if his sister hadn't kept demanding my attention and my getting up and moving around while he was eating, which kept disturbing him) and has been pretty happy the rest of the afternoon thus far.
I don't know that I'm ready to risk putting him to sleep on his tummy at night yet, but I'm seeing more tummy naps in his future. Fuss did that a bunch, too, since I could keep a better eye on her while I was awake and could easily verify that she wasn't suffocating herself.
When do you think it's okay to let them sleep on their tummies? Only when they can roll over? He has done that occasionally since he was 2 weeks old. It's not consistent, but he does it.
I've been letting Henry nap on his tummy for the last month to six weeks. It started that he would only fall asleep on my chest, so I would slide him off of me and onto the bed next to me so I'd have better use of my hands. Then he started tummy time and fell asleep constantly during that. Just this morning he started getting fussy while Christen was getting ready for work so I got him out of his cradle and laid him on his tummy next to me - I just needed 10 minutes more of sleep!! I just make sure there aren't any blankets or pillows around that could smother him.
ReplyDeleteI don't let him sleep that way at night because I can't keep an eye on him, but I know several moms that (recently) bucked the research and let their babies sleep on their tummies through the night and they're fine. I think the rule is that you always put them down to sleep on their back, but if they roll over to the tummy it's okay. I don't know. I'm winging it much more with this one than I did with Spencer.