Name: How To Stop Co-sleeping So You And Your Child Can Sleep Better
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How To Stop Co-sleeping So You And Your Child Can Sleep Better

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Crawling into bed with your child after a long day can be comforting. But this habit might interfere with her ability to sleep alone. Learn how to transition a child out of your bed and stop co-sleeping for good, even if your child has always slept with you.
In an earlier post, I reviewed reasons why you might want to avoid&nbsp;co-sleeping, because of SIDS risk in infancy, and the fact that it can be associated with poor sleep as children get older.
Co-sleeping&nbsp;is simply sharing a bed with your child. Some would argue that it is imprecise, and that “bedsharing” (as opposed to “roomsharing”) would be more precise.&nbsp;
In many parts of the world, cosleeping is the norm, either for cultural reasons or space reasons– some families sleep in a one bedroom home. Other families due it for closeness. Many parents who are interesting in attachment parenting cosleep.&nbsp;
I was just interviewed by Good Morning America about the actress Alicia Silverstone, who still cosleeps with her 11 year old son.&nbsp;(The full interview is here).&nbsp;
Co-sleeping never worked with our kids as they never slept well in our bed. People I know and respect have chosen to co-sleep with their children and have been happy to do so. One great example is Dr. Claire McCarthy, who wrote about co-sleeping with her children on the Huffington Post.
This made me reflect on what would make me OK with ongoing co-sleeping if a family asked my opinion. My goal for families is good enough sleep, which in this case means:
If all of these circumstances are not met, then I think you should stop cosleeping. (In the case of the last criteria, a child that cannot separate may struggle from separation anxiety. Cosleeping doesn’t cause separation anxiety, but if your child cannot be without you at night without having a breakdown, I think you should work towards some independence at bedtime). 
If your child is less than a year of age, I would recommend immediately transitioning your child to a&nbsp;crib&nbsp;or&nbsp;bassinet&nbsp;(if your child is less than a year, preferably in your room.) 
For older children (think toddlers and up), you may want to plan a bit for when and how to make the change. Read on for more and how to do this.&nbsp;
For very young infants (less than three months) you can simply soothe your child to sleep and put her down in the&nbsp;crib. At four months of age, I would recommend putting her down drowsy but awake. If this is a struggle, you may want to consider sleep training your child.&nbsp;
For more on this see “Sleep training in infancy: Flipping the switch“
Generally, I recommend addressing the co-sleeping first. This will stop your child from grazing all night long. Once you establish your child sleeping independently, you can work on weaning night feeds. For more on this, here’s how to stop feeding your child at night so you can sleep better. 
There is no magic bullet for fixing sleep problems. How you address this issue depends on how and why you are cosleeping with your child. But no matter your circumstance, there are some important elements to a successful transition. For more on why people fail to fix sleep issues, please read my post on Sleep Training Mistakes and Pitfalls.
If child&nbsp;sleeps in your bed every night for the whole night, and this is a long-standing pattern. In this scenario, many families want to stop once they are expecting another child, or their child hits a milestone such as kindergarten. In this scenario, you need to go gradually. Why is this different? Often your child does not know another way to sleep. 
Separation anxiety is the most common type of anxiety in children. If your child is afraid of sleeping without you, he may be suffering from separation anxiety. Commonly children with separation anxiety insist that they sleep with a parent, or that a parent sleep near them. Often, they may be afraid of being awake when their parents are asleep, and may demand that parents stay awake until they are asleep. 
Other signs of separation anxiety include dreams or nightmares about separation, and difficulty with separation in other contexts, like school drop offs. 
If your child is suffering from separation anxiety, I highly recommend you discuss it with your pediatrician. I also highly recommend the book, Breaking Free of Child Anxiety and OCD by Eli Lebowitz (affiliate link), a colleague here at Yale.  
Dr. Lebowitz also has a terrific plan for parents of anxious kids who want to break the cosleeping habit:
This involves playing a game with your kids around spending time in the bed where they pretend to fall asleep in their own bed. They should play to an imaginary audience. This should be performed at your child’s usual bedtime. Here are the steps:
Make sure the child actually has a bed and a place to go to sleep. For children with longstanding cosleeping, their bed may have been put away or repurposed. Set up the bed where you want your child to sleep with pillows and blankets. 
Have your child prepare for bed as if he is actually going to bed. Brush teeth, put on pajamas, read a story– whatever your bedtime routine consists of.  
Your child will then get into bed and pretend to fall asleep for a set period of time– usually a minute or less. They should be able to stay calm during this period. If they cannot, you have selected too long a period of time. For older children, let them decide how long this time can be. 
After the set period of time, come back in, congratulate your child, and allow them into your own bed. Don’t encourage them to stay longer even if it has gone well— don’t suggest that they “just stay there”, although they are welcome to stay longer if they like. Praise your child and invite them back into your own room. 
After two to three nights, increase the time duration by a few minutes every two to three nights
Often, once the duration gets to 15 minutes, children are falling asleep independently. If they do fall asleep, leave them in their own bed and celebrate their success in the morning. 
If they wake up at night it’s ok to welcome them into your own room, 
Continue the plan (with increasing intervals at bedtime) until independent sleep in their room is a regular occurrence. I would continue for at least a week or two. 
As per the authors:
The secret lies in the fact that by predefining the amount of time a child will lay in bed, a situation is created in which the child is in bed but is not anxious. This is because they know it is only for a limited amount of time. The natural consequence of lying in bed when not particularly anxious is falling asleep. Children could lie awake for much more than 15 minutes if they think they need to be in bed alone all night and could even keep themselves (and their parents) up by calling to the parents or crying. But by assuring the child that this is only a “game” for a set and brief amount of time, the anxiety is eliminated and the child forms a new association between being in bed and feelings of calm and relaxation.
Lebowitz, Eli R.; Omer, Haim. Treating Childhood and Adolescent Anxiety (pp. 96-97). Wiley. Kindle Edition.
If your child has trouble with going to sleep and waking up at night. Once children are successfully falling asleep in their own bed, you can then try having them stay in bed for set lengths of time with night wakings as well. 
The source for this is Treating Childhood and Adolescent Anxiety: A Guide for Caregivers, by Eli Lebowtiz and Haim Omer (affiliate link). 
If your child only cosleeps in the middle of the night, or has transitioned to falling asleep in her own bed but is still coming into your room at night, you can try the following interventions. 
So this has turned into an epic post. Let me know if you have other thoughts on this topic, or questions I have not answered. Also, if you have successfully navigated this transition, please let me know what worked for you.

Crawling into bed with your child after a long day can be comforting. But this habit might interfere with her ability to sleep alone. Learn how to transition a child out of your bed and stop co-sleeping for good, even if your child has always slept with you.
In an earlier post, I reviewed reasons why you might want to avoid&nbsp;co-sleeping, because of SIDS risk in infancy, and the fact that it can be associated with poor sleep as children get older.
Co-sleeping&nbsp;is simply sharing a bed with your child. Some would argue that it is imprecise, and that “bedsharing” (as opposed to...

How To Stop Co-sleeping So You And Your Child Can Sleep Better

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