How the couple cohabits
The core of the family, what sustains and nourishes it, is the couple. In this sense many see the co-sleeping as an intrusion into married life. Whether it is or not depends on the couple. The co-sleeping in a mature couple is lived as a decision made by both. Parents share the bed with the baby and this does not cause them difficulty when having sex (apart from the difficulties of the breeding season itself, usually derived from the fatigue of both).
They are aware of the need to seek intimate moments and the good that this implies. At any given time they decide that it is appropriate to take the child out of bed and do so as one more aspect of their child's education (just as they will have put it and will set limits on other aspects).
Colecho and couple
In couples with some basic dysfunction (immaturity, lack of communication, great difference in criteria, defense at all costs of an ideology ...), co-sleeping can be a perfect excuse for sexual relations to disappear or even to sleep separately. In these cases, the co-sleeping ends up distancing the man and the woman, sometimes seriously, forgetting that what most nurtures his son is the love between his parents.
We also find couples in which the expectations of one and the other about postpartum and parenting are very different and have not been previously discussed. A woman can only sleep for a while with her baby, but maybe not her husband, and this is a source of short-term conflicts (if the husband expresses himself) or long-term (if he does not express it but he leaves charging with anger or resentment).
Sleeping with the baby, a couple's decision
Perhaps the co-sleeping is not an expression of a decision of the parents but a difficulty to establish the orders of love in the family (the parents love with a love that guides the children, and not vice versa). This difficulty will manifest itself not only in a drama when facing co-sleeping, but in many other aspects of parenting.
In any case, the option for co-sleeping is a decision that parents must make together, within the framework of their relationship, taking into account all the factors we have discussed (couple's well-being, child's well-being and safety).
Carmela Baeza. Family doctor. Sexologist Raices Family Care Center.
