[philbarr]

What affects my sleep isn't me setting my alarm for the wrong time, it's my 13 week old baby.

I'm sure I've seen a few things like this in the past. I wonder if they could adopt it for use as a baby monitor? We do currently have a sleep monitor but that just sets off an alarm if she hasn't moved in 20 seconds (or I pick her up and forget to turn the damn thing off, grrrr).

I could see this being a really useful baby monitor that:

- sets off an alarm if no movement in 20 seconds (important one this, obviously)

- lets you know if your baby is drifting off into sleep or is basically just messing about and still wide awake. Like, are you going to be able to go to bed now or should you just make a brew?

- a recording of and detailed description of sleep patterns during the night, so you've got an idea of how to organise your nights; like maybe you could work out when she's more likely to wake up at?

- a history and some kind of comparison chart, because with babies it changes all the time, so you might be able to predict and adapt in advance.

- an advance warning of when she's coming out of sleep. Babies go from slightly peckish to screaming their head off hungry in a couple of minutes, and it takes 5 minutes to warm a bottle. Having a "she's gonna need feeding soon alarm" would be really handy.

[YZF]

Babies need to eat/nurse frequently. We've evolved to be highly dependent on our parents until a fairly old age. The solution that worked for us was for the baby to sleep in our bed next to mom. Then this whole wake/nurse cycles basically happens without fully waking up. I realize some people are concerned about rolling on the baby but this is extremely rare/improbable for normal/healthy people. It's a somewhat controversial topic but do your own research... As a dad that had to go to work I also took some breaks and slept in another room (mom would also sleep during the day when the baby was sleeping). YMMV. Good luck and enjoy!

[r00fus]

As for the rollover issue, many folks co-sleep with their babies. We did it with all 3 of ours. Apparently babies really really like your breath - the CO2 helps them develop their lung motion.

The key is to not be inebriated or taking sleeping meds while doing so.

There are also co-sleeper attachments that make cribs accessible to mommy without having the baby sleep on the bed and thus not ever in danger of rollover.

[gdubs]

Dr McKenna at Notre Dame does research in this area [1].

Apparently the biggest risks (from what I recall) is the typical 'western' bed contains a lot of obstructions and places to get trapped: headboards, blankets and sheets, etc. Japan has one of the lower SIDS rates, and co-sleeping is very common there -- but beds are low to the ground, and I guess heavy bedding is uncommon.

http://cosleeping.nd.edu

[r00fus]

Are SIDS and co-sleeping linked? It appears that SIDS is actually reduced by properly co-sleeping (non-smoking, non-drug-impaired parent) [1]

[1] http://www.askdrsears.com/topics/health-concerns/sleep-probl...

[apierre]

We were very worried about SIDS when our daughter was born (11 months ago). We had all sort of monitors and sensors you can think of, only to realise with time that it was actually a source of stress for all of us.

[wise_young_man]

A family member was lost to SIDS so I understand your worry. Hopefully the peace of mind far outweighed any stress.

[josefresco]

While a gadget would be fun to help with your new-baby concerns, a bunch of your issues are simply fixed by caring for, and observing your child (aka parenting)

Also, a good deal of "training" or learning has to be done for your child to understand when it's sleep time, and when it's time to eat. Just because your baby thinks he/she is hungry, or not tired does not mean you should accommodate 100%.

It's a constant give and take. You need to care for and console an upset child, but at the same time educate them so that they are able to sleep/eat at times that benefit them overall.

Sometimes that means letting them cry in their crib, sometimes that means picking them up and rocking them back to sleep.

The kicker is eat child is different, so no gadget can help with your particular child's tendencies.

Source: Have 2 kids.

[philbarr]

Hey wow - thanks for the awesome condescending tone! I didn't realise I had to do any parenting as you call it? Weird...I was just gonna try and gadget my way through it all.

[contingencies]

Haha, 3 weeks here! I feel your pain. Work output on complex abstract thinking tasks has descended to terrible. It's not just the sleep, either. It's constant interruption when you do get going...

[philbarr]

Ouch! 3 weeks was hard! Believe me I'm much happier now at 13 weeks than I was at 3.

They tell you it gets easier but it really does, honest!

I work from home so it's a constant thing. We also have a Golden Retriever who likes to run in and jump around and see what's going on when the screaming gets going just to add a little extra stress to the situation :)

Wouldn't change it, though. I know that's a cliche but it is true.

[sosborn]

With my first child it was the constant background stress of "Oh my God I don't know what I am doing" that really threw me off. The second one was so much easier!

[gingerlime]

I know this thing is personal/individual, and different books give difference advice, but we just had our baby boy sleep with us, until he was about 8 months old (quite long, I know, and our bed is pretty small).

You really learn a lot about his patterns, movements, and you just feel him around. No need for monitors, setting things on/off, and no. We didn't suffocate him or squashed him. It was very natural to us (and him).

I can wholeheartedly recommend it to new parents, and I can honestly say I miss him around now that he sleeps in his own bed just next to ours.

[philbarr]

Yeah I think that would have been a nice thing to do, but there's no way we could after all the scare stories we were told.

[zephjc]

Unless you sleepwalk, or are a 'flailer' there's little risk to sleeping with an infant in bed with you.

Idea for testing it out:

get a cabbage patch doll, hard boil an egg and shell it, put the egg in a clear ziplock bag, and tape the bag to doll. Check if it's squished in the morning. You may need multiple eggs on different limbs, maybe multiple eggs per bag, to account for the full size of the doll.

[philbarr]

The problem is you would need to repeat this experiment every day for 8 months - and even then that's not enough data for a new parent to be confident. It only needs to go wrong once remember.

You're playing the odds. Some children die because they get accidentally smothered in their parent's beds. You can either take the (very small) risk that this will happen and sleep with your child in bed, or you can just not play the game at all.

And for most, I think whilst the reward is "good", the failure is just unthinkably horrific.

[bnejad]

I'm confused about your alarm. Why does it go off when your baby has stopped moving(=asleep)? Is that a sign of something bad happening?

[mlent]

If it's sensitive enough to detect breathing as movement, then it would make sense for the alarm to go off if there's absolutely no movement, yes?

[bnejad]

Right on, similar to what I was thinking but I'm curious if that's actually feasible.

[philbarr]

That's right, it's sensitive enough to pick up when she's breathing. Babies can get sleep apnea which is ok as long as it lasts no longer than 15 seconds. Longer than that and you've got problems and you need to get there straight away.

[bnejad]

Gotcha, thanks for the explanation.

[hoopism]

Been there recently.

Have you seen this? http://mimobaby.com/

I ultimately decided more monitoring (we have audio/video/nest) was not going to help us. But still thought this product was cool.

[philbarr]

That is a cool product, but on reflection I think you're right with the monitoring. I'm not a huge fan of the monitoring system we have now, but my wife won't live without it. We even have her room only two meters away from our bedroom, but we still have an audio monitor on and turned up.

Like, 'cos when she starts crying I need to hear it in stereo ;)

[hoopism]

I hear ya.

Gets better. I am @ 13 months. Getting regular sleep between teeth coming in and bouts of illness.

I highly recommend eventual sleep training (interval or whatever)... just make sure you have plenty of whiskey handy... can take it's toll on your nerves.