SIDS: Overcoming the Worry

As a new parent, I have the joy of experiencing whole new types of worrying. During my pregnancy I got to worry about whether our daughter would make it to birth healthily, and now that she's nearly 6 weeks old, I get to worry about whether she'll make it to childhood alive and well. Being a parent has already shown me that I have to pick and choose my battles, and (just as I couldn't prevent my first miscarriage) I've decided to give up trying to control whether or not our daughter will die from SIDS.

For some reason, the internet is inundated with information about SIDS, a mysterious natural cause of death in infants. The AAP says that since the "Back to Sleep" campaign in the 90's, the risk of SIDS has been cut in half. (From 2 in 1,000 to 1 in 1,000.) They recommend putting your baby to sleep on their back on a flat surface with no extra blankets, pillows, stuffed animals, etc. to reduce the risk of SIDS... To reduce the risk of death by an unexplained reason that they have no idea of the cause.

I feel like since becoming a mom, I've been on the internet trying to figure out the best practices to avoid SIDS, but it has finally come to a head for me. Apparently the temperature of the room can reduce the risk. Putting the baby to bed with a pacifier can supposedly help. Co-sleeping in the same room, but definitely not the same bed, but only for a certain amount of time. Swaddling your baby... The list goes on and on. It was overwhelming for me as I tried to absorb all the best practices for my baby.

The day we brought Evelyn home, we put her on her back on the pack and play mattress and she immediately rolled to her side. My husband and I tried to figure out if the floor was uneven or if the mattress was skewed, but couldn't figure out why she kept rolling over. So, we rolled up two towels and put them under both sides of the mattress to "stabilize" the baby, but I was too scared to let her try to sleep there since it wasn't a flat, firm surface. The first night home she slept on her stomach on my chest in our bed, and she has every night since.

Our first day home

At night when Evelyn begins to wake up to eat, she doesn't have to scream and cry to get my attention. I naturally wake up as she begins to stir, and I scoot myself back, rearrange my pillows and feed her right then and there. She drifts back to sleep, I shift myself and my pillows back into sleeping position, and the process repeats every 3 hours or so (with me going to the nursery to change her diaper every other time). I feel this has had a direct impact on the extremely small amount of time she spends crying. She has cooed and grunted whenever she has needed me pretty much since she was born. Not to mention her days and nights have never been confused, nor does she have much issue at all falling asleep. I just follow her cues every step of the way.

There's a hypothesis that SIDS could be caused by an underdeveloped area in the brain that effects the baby's ability to rouse themselves from sleep. That's why they think stomach sleeping can cause SIDS - the baby sleeps better when they're on their stomach. But better means deeper, which means their slumber may become so deep they forget to breath... or something. They don't actually know.

Within all of this, it's important to remember and know that a 'SIDS' death is different than suffocation. If a child is put to bed with a blanket and that blanket gets pulled up over their face while they sleep, that would be ruled an 'accidental death by suffocation,' NOT a 'natural death by SIDS.' I don't understand how or why there is so much fear mongering over SIDS if it truly is a natural death, similar to passing from old age.

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"...It's important to remember and

know that a 'SIDS' death is

different than suffocation."

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I was discussing with my husband that I think there are too many variables when it comes to trying to isolate sleep position (or anything for that matter) in "controlled studies" when it comes to trying to 'reduce SIDS.' I've even read that putting a baby to sleep on their stomach is only a risk if they're not used to sleeping on their stomach... Maybe the unfortunate deaths had to do with putting a drop of whiskey in the baby's bottle. Maybe the babies who died would wake up and not be attended to immediately... I could see how hyperventilating-type crying face down could pose a problem... Or maybe it had to do with the diet of the mother, or type of formula given to the baby, or emissions from diesel engines. Who knows? The fact of the matter is: They don't!

Even with the Back to Sleep campaign, 1 in 1,000 babies still die from SIDS. With it being a natural cause of death, it seems like it wouldn't be preventable very easily, and if it's going to happen to my baby then I'm not sure there's much I could feasibly do to stop it. I feel like trying to reduce the chance of a natural cause of death is a way that humans try to control the uncontrollable.

I could do everything "right." I could put Evelyn in her pack n play on her back and have her wake up every 5 minutes all throughout the night. I could put her in a room at 65 degrees. I could force her arms down by her side and swaddle her in a way that would make her cry every time she tried to move. I could do all of these things to cause her and myself discomfort, and she could still die from SIDS.

My choice, as a mother, has been to make sure my daughter experiences nothing but love and security from me during her time here on earth. Could that happen by putting the baby on their back in their crib in a separate room? If they don't mind it, sure! But babies do not have the physiological development to even understand that they're a separate being from their mother until they're 2-4 months old.

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"I could do everything 'right...' and she could still die from SIDS."

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I will say that when we sleep, I roll the covers down and hold them in my hand under her waist. I make sure she cannot wedge herself in between my arm and a pillow to suffocate herself. Yes, I follow safe co-bed sleeping. (Even tho technically she doesn't even sleep on the bed at this point, she literally sleeps on top of me.) I will say that, per the recommendations, I do try to put her on her back on a flat surface every day, and maybe one of these times she'll be ready to stay asleep longer than half a second. ;)

When it comes down to it, I've just decided that I don't want my baby girl to feel like she needs to bawl to get my attention. I've decided that if I was on an island with no internet and had to raise her based on instinct, she would sleep in my arms on my chest as she does now. I believe we should do what lines up with our intuition and convictions, and trust that God has it all in his hands. At least, that's what I'm trying to do.