Please say a prayer for my father-in-law. He was in an accident. Hit by a plow. It doesn’t sound critical. They’re deciding whether or not to admit him. But still.
Update:
He’s home from the hospital. No broken bones or internal damage. Just some serious bruising. Evidently the plow plowed into the driver’s side door.
There was something on CNN a while back about SIDS. It may be that sleeping position has nothing to do with it; rather, SIDS may be the result of an underdevlopment in the brain stem. Normally, when you’re asleep and something blocks your breathing or makes you low on oxygen, you wake up and remedy the situation (hence, Lisa waking Bart up my holding his nose in a Simpsons episode). But in SIDS babies, that wake-up reflex isn’t there in the brain stem.
Now, I could be remembering this wrong, and CNN was reporting on a new development, so the implications hadn’t been worked out, but I thought it was a fascinating report all the same. Maybe it’s something to look up?
It does sound interesting, worth tracking down. But I have seen that several studies have shown that for whatever reason the incidence of SIDS is reduced when babies are put on their back.
I’ve wondered if it might be exactly because of the problem we’re having with Bella: babies don’t sleep as deeply on their backs, therefore they might have an easier time waking and readjusting when they are back sleeping than front sleeping.
Of course the big problem is that no one understands SIDS and it’s scary because there seems to be no way to predict it. A seemingly perfectly healthy baby just goes to sleep and doesn’t wake up: every parent’s worst nightmare.
But I’ll definitely try to find that news story. Thanks. (I’ll report back here if I do find anything.)
This seems to be it: <blockquote class=“blockquote”>Exactly why SIDS occurs remains elusive. Over the years, researchers have investigated a number of possible causes, including suffocation, vomiting or choking, birth defects, metabolic abnormalities and infection. A 2006 study found that infants who die of SIDS have abnormalities in a part of the brain that helps control breathing and arousal. Other research has focused on the way babies breathe while they’re asleep � especially their response to low blood oxygen levels (hypoxia) � and on heart problems.</blockquote>
It does go on to say that by the time a baby can roll over both ways, the chance of SIDS is greatly decreased and you shouldn’t worry about them being on their tummies.
You’re lucky you can get her to sleep on her back at all. Both of my girls from the get-go, would not sleep on their backs. It was not a question of getting enough sleep, it was about getting ANY sleep.
With daughter number 2, I think I figured it out. My husband is a snorer when he sleeps on his back. I have never been able to sleep on my back, and one of the difficulties with pregnancy for me is that I have to sleep on my side. Daughter #2 fell asleep in her car seat carrier while we were driving, and when I brought her in, she stayed asleep. So I left her there. About an hour later she began to snore just a little bit. Then she woke up. So I think my girls are like their dad, snorers. And as soon as they start to snore, they wake up. For the eldest it was usually within 10 minutes, and the baby will usually wake up within 20, but will sleep on an incline (the eldest generally wouldn’t). I know, we’re supposed to put them on their backs, but super-sleep deprived parents are also a danger. Thankfully, we’ve never had the nightmare happen for real (though it has awakened me several million times with enough fear that I MUST go and check on them, even the almost four year-old!).