No toys or blankets in allowed in cot as they can cause cot deaths?

A question about : No toys or blankets in allowed in cot as they can cause cot deaths?

I recently went to New York to visit my son daughter in law and 18th month old grand daughter. I took with me a hand crocheted cot blanket. My dil has previously turned down cot bumpers as a safety risk and now she told me that the latest advice from US paediatricians was that there should be no blankets or toys in a child's cot as these placed the baby at risk of a cot death. Is this also true in the UK? It seems to make the baby's cot a pretty grim place to be

Best answers:

• The bumpers advice holds true here (and has been for at least 13 years - shops still sell them though
  Not the bit about blankets or toys, but just to make sure the baby can't accidentally get trapped under anything
• If they're using sleeping bags, then probably the baby doesn't need any other bedding. The guidelines do advise not to have any toys, pillows or other soft objects in the cot.
• I never used to put toys in my babies cots either- mine are 13 and 10. I was always concerned they could wriggle their way to have their face pressed up against a soft toy but not be able to wriggle their way out of it.
• I didn't know the no bumpers thing, though I don't have any kids yet.
  Pregnant atm though and this is the first I have come across it, glad I have as it saves me time and money looking for some if they are a no-no.
• To be honest, it is good advice. There is no need for lots of fluffy toys and extra blankets. Guidance in UK is the less the better really.... if not using sleeping bags, then basic blankets and sheets are sufficent. Does it really matter? Sure she could use it in the pram etc.....
• My son as a toddler had a panel toy which screwed onto the side of his cot with lot of lights and sounds he could press and a little mirror , and another where he could play little tunes and he also had a toy hanging on the side whose string he could pull and its arms and legs flapped up and down. Plus he had a soft cuddly toy in the shape of a small dog which went everywhere with him including to bed. He loved these and played with them for ages when he woke up instead of crying to be entertained.
  As soon as my granddaughter wakes she demands to be played with. Their household is entirely run around the little girl at present, they have no life at all outside catering to her demands. There is another one on the way so I wonder how they will cope. I suppose I am old fashioned, but I do feel some sense of proportion is being lost here and I wonder if a generation of children is growing up who will so cossetted and protected from all potential danger that it will stifle a desire to explore and an adventurous spirit.
  My dil is quite highly strung and I think all this emphasis on what might happen to the baby if she does not follow all the guidance to the letter is having rather a negative impact on her. Her mother agrees with me by the way. She was one of 8 and says they had to get on with their own entertainment a lot of the time. Her mother would never have had time to fuss over and indulge them all like this.
• Its not really to do with fuss or indulgance... its more to do with a LOT of research into what MAY cause cot death and/or infant suffocation...
  There plenty of things that were done "back in the day"... just because people survived, should we simply ignore modern research and fact because of this??
  For example: we didn't wear seatbelts "back in the day". We didn't all die, admittedly, but if we had a crash without a belt on, its more likely that the result would have been fatal.
  Another, is the more recent issue with blind cords. Ask one of the parents of children who have been strangled whether they wish that they had taken safety advice more seriously and simply popped a blind cleat on the wall to reduce the risk......
  I would agree that these days, sometimes health & safety do seem to have gone a bit overboard.... but if its a case of preventing risks which are proven by research to have a possible fatal effect on my child and I am afraid that I will go with fact and not "what my mums generation used to do".....
  Oh and yes - a plastic flat toy which makes noises on the side of the cot would be fine. Not so sure about something with a string in a bed with an unsupervised child who could at best, wrap it round their finger and cause blood loss and at worse, possibly strangly themselves (dependant of course on how long the cord is)
  Really its all about knowing the risks and ensuring your childs safety without going overboard - perhaps instead of speaking behind this first time mums back with her mother in law, you should just gently be helping her and encouraging her not to be so worried all the time
• Not having a soft toy in their cots doesn't mean they will never experience cuddling up to a teddy at night. As I've already said I never put any toys inside my kids cots. When DD was 3 or 4 she was bought a large winnie the pooh bear. She's now 10 and still sleeps with it every night, it even went on a school residential with her 2 weeks ago, hidden inside a cushion cover though cos she didn't want the other girls she dormed with to know she still slept with it.
• I agree with bigmomma: Times change, and some of the things we did with our babies 20-odd years ago aren't recommended these days. Plus every child is unique and every mum has her own methods, and as grannies we are there to support and encourage.
  The last thing a new, anxious mum needs is her MIL's criticism, even if it is "constructive".
• Having just read the ' having your baby home' part of my birth book, it does advise no bumpers and says the best thing is the blankets they use in the hospital as they are breathable. Seems the grobags are becoming popular now though.
• Those of us born in the 1940s/50s were put in cots painted with lead paint, we were swaddled in woollen blankets, we had hot water bottles in our cots; we were parked outside in the garden regardless of whether, and our mothers followed Dr Truby King's advice and we were fed every 4 hours on the dot - not a moment earlier, not a moment later.
  When we had our children in the 1960s/70s, we had central heating in our homes, so our babies did not wear little hats when they went into their non-lead painted cots. But they had lovely cot bumpers, lovely cotton cellular blankets, we laid them in their cots, on their sides (in fact I would put mine down on different sides to remind me which boob to offer first). They had no pillow in their cots - just two cellular blankets and a quilt(!) And, by the time baby no 2 arrived in 1969, babygros had replaced the wincyette nighties that I so lovingly made for No 1 son.
  They were still parked out on the porch during all weathers (apart from fog), snugly wrapped in their big coach-built prams - complete with cotton cellular blankets, pram quilt, witch pram cover over the top. And, of course, Dr Spock reigned supreme!
  My older grandcihildren were born in the far east, where they were dressed only in nappies & vests, went out only in carry seats and cars, then buggies - not exposed to !fresh air" as it was either too hot or too polluted. And the middlies have come through the less is more ethos. Tiny one has a mum who has two teenagers - so tiny has been treated as babies were in the 90s.
  But heigh ho - we've all survived - but in order to survive, we have to adapt and change. Are the babies any better for these changes? Possibly. Are babies harmed if these new regimes are not followed Possibly not. But in order to survive, we must evolve!
• Maybe your dil is highly strung because her mother did not have time to fuss over her.
  Perhaps she is following current official advice because she felt that she was not kept safe and paid attention to as a child.
  When my son was a baby his grandmother put honey in his bottle despite there being warnings on honey jars not to give to children under one, and despite her being told not to. Okay, he did not get botulism from it but I would have still rather she had not gone against the warning.
• Our lads had fairly bare cots initially, as they only went into them asleep. The toys were for being awake with. The special personal blankets were for the transition beween awake & asleep, for comfort, for innoculations, for reassurance at family gatherings (both child & mother!) and do forth.
  Wish we'd had growbags!
• I just remembered though that relatively recently we were told that DD needed to be on her back to sleep. That was fine but we didn't pick up that she was meant to be on her front for playing to build up chest muscles etc for crawling and the like. I think we extrapolated that she should never be on her front. The hv actually said that babies nowadays were weaker in that respect. It wasn't that the advice was wrong; it was being interpreted incorrectly.
• I have not made a single comment or suggestion to my dil, about how to raise her daughter. I would not dream of it but she is hard work. My son has even warned me off suggesting names for the new baby on the way as her own mother and sister got frozen out for doing that.
  My dil was one of two girls, it was her mother who was one of 8, and who agrees with me that her daughter has rather gone over the top on rearing the perfect child. Just because the authorities tell us something is right, does not automatically make it so. My dil was told by the natural childbirth trainers that she had to breast feed for the first 6 months to give her baby the best possible start. She struggled to produce enough milk and the baby was not thriving and my dil was getting stressed out. The breast is best lobby still insisted she try harder and it was only when her mother intervened that things got sorted out (the baby had to have supplemental feeds which were discouraged by the breast feeding trainers. My dil was made to feel a failure.)
  I have two concerns, there is so much responsibility heaped on young mothers today that they have no time to enjoy the baby, they are too worried about getting everything right. I baby sat one evening and the baby screamed the minute they left, which they said would happen so we sat on the sofa and watched a harmless French cartoon which she loves and she sat on my lap quite happily and we chatted and played with her toys and she had a drink and fell asleep quite happily. When my son and dil got in they were surprised when I said we had a nice evening. When I said we had been watching tv together, the dil was furious and said she is only allowed to watch 10 minutes tv a day. (They had not told me that beforehand btw). She did not speak to me for the next 24 hours as a result.
  I also think couples should try and keep a bit of their adult life and relationship going. It is hard for my dil as she has no mother or mother in law to baby sit either and will not trust my granddaughter to anyone else. I have never ever made any suggestions to her about her parenting skills. And even my son says she is highly strung.
  My mother indulged my son no end, fed him any amount of sweets, let him stay up late, but she adored him and hey she was his grandmother and she did not get to do it very often. So I was quite relaxed about it. I think today's mothers should also be more relaxed about their parenting skills that is all I am saying.
  And while I realise that attachment parenting is now popular, and its fans make all sorts of claims for it, I am not aware of any studies which bear this out. It may be true, but at present it is only based on their claims and indeed the leading exponent in america, the actress mayim bialik, recently separated from her husband which has led some people to say attachment parenting neglects the father.
• If I got the impression my MIL was telling strangers on a forum that I was highly strung, I'd be mighty peeved off, but maybe that means I am indeed highly strung.
  Leave them to it is my advice. My son is 21 months old, and everything we do is wrong in the eyes of family, we can't do anything right, and the things we do want to happen or don't just get ignored, we don't want him to have masses of junk to eat, I'm not a nazi, and he does get chocolate but not until it's coming out of his ears, and when I say, not him, but the minute I'm not there they're all shovelling it in like no tomorrow because I'm so cruel that he doesn't get it *sigh*
  Also could it be possible your son and his wife are attachment parents? This has proven to actually make children feel secure and create confident children.