Jim McKenna asked me to post this
Rob
"Dear Everyone:
As late I have come to realize that one huge advantage the
anti-bedsharing camp has against those of us who support the parent's
right to cosleep--are "numbers of deaths" without any numbers of how
many infants or children survived cosleeping---and numbers of
instances in which the cosleeping (with parental presence) might
have actually saved an infant's life. The only evidence that coroners
and forensic pathologists come across, of course, failures of the
worst kind, ---which almost always occur in very dangerous urban
environments environments. It is easy to understand why so many
forensic pathologists have such a bad opinion of cosleeping in the
form of "bedsharing".
Of course, any infant deaths--whether small or large, under any
circumstance are tragic and impressive. What I am hoping is that we
in the lactation/infant sleep research fields can begin to provide a
different set of numbers. What I have in mind as a counter defense
is also anecdotal--but all of the bedsharing death statistics that
are making the news likewise are also anecdotal.
So hear is the plan. Any improvements to it--are welcome but here goes.
I am interested in hearing and collecting (and categorizing) success
stories, especially, numbers of parents who successfully co-slept
with any or all of their children, and learning how they did it, how
long they did it, why they did it, and, in retrospect, what they now
think about it. Moreover, I am also interested in knowing--as would
the audiences I speak to and write for---how their children sleep now
or, if the case is such, how they sleep as adults or teenagers. It
would be important to know if the parents were breastfeeding or
not--and whether or not they smoked.
The most important additional question for which I am asking your
assistance is in collecting/tracking down stories from parents
concerning whether or if by cosleeping, they think that they may have
saved their infants life. Through the years, at least on 25 times or
so--parents have come up to me after a lecture and said that they
felt that if they had not been cosleeping, they are sure that their
infant or child would have died., as miost woke up to find their
infant choking or turning blue. What would be extremely helpful in
these days in which bedsharing and various kinds of cosleeping are
getting such a bad name, by such a few number of people, is to
provide the "good news'--some good numbers...to be able to provide
documented success stories. Do you think you can help me?
If you can, what I am asking is for you to use any or all of your
resources--and your internet connections/chat rooms or whatever, to
collect on line--such stories. I would ask the mother or father to
talk about exactly what happened, in as much detail as possible,
including th enature of their "beds" and characteristics of their
sleep environment or anything they they think was important to the
outcome.
Either you could put out some questions in some standard
questionnaire out to your own personal network or listserv --or
simply that--if there is a story to be told, that Professor McKenna
([log in to unmask]) would love to receive it--in order to
document. Of course, if any of this is relevant to you, too--please
provide your own personal experience too. I will print it off my
computer and tabulate! Although all names would never be published,
it would be most useful to have them, if people feel comfortable
giving them. But I leave this to you. In any event--any help you can
give here will be appreciated.
Thank you for your help,
jim mckenna "
Robert Cordes, D.O.
general pediatrician
Wilkes Barre, PA
mailto:[log in to unmask]
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