When it comes to co-sleeping, a little hysteria goes a long way. As many moms will attest, co-sleeping is a wonderful opportunity for breastfeeding and bonding.
And although many parenting manuals advise against sleeping with baby in your bed, if done responsibly, there is nothing cooler than cuddling up with your little cooing bundle -- responsibly being the operative word.
Booze and babies don't mix, especially where co-sleeping is involved, since the "risk of smothering or crushing the baby skyrockets". As one British mom recently learned the hard way.
She'd had a whole bottle of wine on an empty stomach and then passed out with her little girl in her arms. When her husband got home, he found her unconscious "with the infant dead at her side".
Incredibly, because the formal inquest into the girl’s death couldn’t conclusively pin her death on the mother’s actions, no charges were laid, in spite of the mom's guilty admission in her testimony:
"I am not proud of my behaviour," she cried. "No mother should be drinking at all. Since that day I have not taken one drop of alcohol. I should have been 100 per cent sober and that is what I have to live with. It has happened and I believe I have failed completely because I am her mum."
Many moms, including Jeanne at The Stir, believe this mom should go to prison for her negligence. Obviously she made a mistake, one that will haunt her for the rest of her life. However, it's unclear what a prison term would accomplish now that the damage has been done; especially given this mom has two other children to look after.
Think co-sleeping deserve its bad rep? Do headlines like these make you think twice about sharing your bed with your baby?
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