How to keep your baby at the right temperature in the night
Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) and Sudden Unexpected Death in Infancy (SUDI) can be hard to talk about, because the thought of any precious little baby dying is distressing. But some things are important to know.
You can find out why putting babies down to sleep on their backs matters so much here, and how to keep sleep places as safe as possible here. You can read about sharing the bed with your mostly breastfed baby here, and with your mostly formula fed baby here.
How to make sure your baby's bedroom temperature doesn't result in overheating
You might have heard that the best bedroom temperature for your baby is between 20 to 22 degrees Celsius (or 68 to 72 degrees Fahrenheit). This isn't evidence-based advice and isn't applicable across all climates, though it's a setting some aim for when heating a home in severe winter conditions. Others argue that aiming for 20 degrees Celsius inside the home in winter is too high, and not adaptive to a low carbon emission future.
What I do know is that millions of human babies, over thousands of generations, lived and slept in climates that were for long periods of the year either much colder or much hotter than 20 to 22 degrees Celsius. In my view there are important advantages to acclimitisation, which is the biological process of habituating our bodies, including our babies' bodies, to the climate in which we're actually living.
I know you'll weigh this all up and work out what's sensible in your own situation, taking into account where you live and your own family's unique needs. Here are my suggestions.
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Dress your baby in warmer clothing for the Big Sleep at nights to avoid the need for extra bedding. It's simpler and safer to do this, to the extent that you can.
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Keep the room in which you and your baby sleep well-ventilated, with windows at least somewhat open and night air flowing in and out, if at all possible or sensible, depending on where you live and the time of year.
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Use heating or cooling only at the more extreme ends of the temperature variation in your local climate (if you need to at all, depending on where you live).
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Bear in mind that habituating our baby (and ourselves) to a carefully controlled micro-climate inside the house may make life outside the home unnecessarily uncomfortable. This matters for a number of reasons, one of which is that babies are typically much more dialled down if the primary carer and the baby spend their days outside the home.
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Unnecessary use of air-conditioning and internal heating contributes to carbon dioxide emissions and the climate emergency, which affects all of us on this small blue planet.
How to make sure your baby doesn't accidentally overheat
To protect baby from overheating, you'll need to avoid
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Too many layers of clothing
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Too many layers of sleeping covers
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Beanies or head covers
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Accidental overheating of the bedroom.
How to make sure wrapping or swaddling doesn't result in overheating
Babies regulate their body temperature by being close to a loving adult's body, and by changing the way they lie on a surface in response to the air temperature around them. This is why wrapping isn't safe when your baby
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Shares your bed
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Has a fever or infection
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Has too many layers of clothing under the wrap
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Is wearing a beanie or head cover.
How to make sure baby's bedclothes don't result in overheating
A rule of thumb is that your baby needs about the same or one layer more of clothing than you do. If it's cold, you could use a baby sleeping bag with fitted neck and arm holes and no hood, and which leaves your baby's arms free.
Our babies' heads, which are quite large relative to their little bodies, are a surface from which they lose heat to regulate their temperature. The flip side to this is that covering their heads can quickly result in overheating.
How to make sure blankets and covers don't result in overheating
You might like to use layered light blankets tucked in firmly at level of your baby's shoulders or lower, keeping them away from your baby's face. You'd position your baby's feet at the foot or the bottom of the bassinet or cot, and tuck the blanket or cover in tightly, to reduce the risk of bedding covering your baby's head.
The following items increase babies' risk of SIDS or SUDI and are not safe in your baby's sleeping place
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Doonas and duvets
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Heavy thick blankets (either under or over baby)
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Electric blankets
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Hot water bottles
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Wheat bags.
Acknowledgements
The photo above is from the Baby Info Sleep Source basisonline.org.uk, taken by Beverley Latter.
Recommended resources
The website Baby Sleep Information Source, by the Durham Infancy and Sleep Centre (DISC) UK, is the world's leading source of information and photographs for parents about safer infant sleep.
You might be interested in a podcast conversation I had with Professor Helen Ball, from DISC, in which we discuss sleeping babies safely available here.
Always put babies down to sleep on their backs (with a word about rolling and reflux, too)
How to keep the place where your baby sleeps as safe as possible
When your breastfeeding or breast milk feeding baby comes into bed with you
When your formula-feeding baby comes into bed with you
What about bedsharing when you have a baby whose breathing is more vulnerable?
Why is there so much conflicting advice about bringing your baby into bed?