Co-sleeping with Children (2024)

FAQs

What age should you stop co-sleeping with your child? ›

Co-sleeping should stop when you start to see your child's body begin to transition in puberty, said Fisk. Prepubescence is the stage when sexual characteristics start to develop, like budding breasts and the growth of armpit hair.

Co-sleeping is not recommended, but a 7-year-old child sleeping with parents is considered normal in many families and cultures. The American Association of Pediatrics (AAP) warns against co-sleeping at any age, especially if the infant is younger than four months.

The impact of chronic co-sleeping on a person's functioning—younger and older—can run the gamut from memory loss, fatigue, low energy, depression, and obesity. The reasons for parents allowing older children to co-sleep are complex and not completely understood.

Co-sleeping is highly common in anxious school-aged children, with more than 1 in 3 found to co-sleep at least sometimes (2–4 times a week). Co-sleeping was even more common for youth with greater anxiety severity.

As long as there are no obligations – both parties are doing it because they want to – there is no issue. both parent and child can stop co-sleeping when they want.

From parents' reports (CBCL), early childhood co-sleeping is associated with more severe internalizing (anxious/depressed, p = . 021; withdrawal/depressed, p = . 006) problems, externalizing (aggressive behavior, p < . 001) problems, as well as all four DSM-oriented subscale problems (affective problems, p = .

According to Liz Nissim-Matheis, a clinical psychologist in New Jersey, it's best to end co-sleeping when a person reaches puberty, or at around 11. “Once we get into that territory of bodies changing, that's when you really want to take a step back and say, 'What is going on here?

Transitioning from co-sleeping with parents to sleeping alone in a crib can cause separation anxiety. Some studies suggest that co-sleeping babies have less anxiety, higher self-esteem, and are more comfortable with affection.

In psychoanalytic theory, the Jocasta complex is the incestuous sexual desire of a mother towards her son. The Electra complex is a psychoanalytic term used to describe a girl's sense of competition with her mother for the affections of her father.

Other concerns with co-sleeping involve the delayed development of infant independence and sleep issues. For example, an infant who falls asleep with its parents in the same bed has been observed to have more sleep problems associated with shorter and more fragmented sleep.

Is it okay to cosleep with an 8 year old? ›

Co-sleeping with older children can be especially detrimental as it can create stress for the entire family, lead to poor sleep patterns for both parents and children, and inhibit the ability of children to develop independence.

On average, children who bedshare do tend to transition to sleeping independently about a year later than other children, but they may be more independent, self-reliant, and confident in their daily lives than children who did not bedshare.

While conventional wisdom may emphasize that your teenage child should sleep alone, it is not necessary to force it in every case. In certain cases, having a teenage child sleep next to the parent(s) may work better.

Stop Bedsharing When Your Child Is One-Year-Old

In the given scenario, I would suggest parents stop sleeping with kids when they reach one year of age, because this is the age when infants start to develop habits and their learning process starts to become more efficient.

The child fears many things including: Being alone, what others think of them, how they will perform, and trying new things. Often when I probe deeper I learn that for many of these children, more nights than not, they are sleeping in their parents' bed and into their double digits years.

Let Your Child Sleep on Their Own by Age Five

Parents should introduce sleeping in their own spaces as early as five years old. This is when they are fully grown, and still young enough to get used to the norm of having their bed and space.

Age: Most sleep away camps start accepting children from the age of 7, but many parents wait until their children are a bit older before sending them away for the first time. It's important to consider your child's maturity level and ability to handle being away from home for an extended period of time.

“There isn't a specific age cut-off that requires that opposite-sex children separate rooms,” she says. “Parents should monitor where their children are, developmentally, and make decisions from there.