A few months ago we talked about colecho, about the act of sleeping with children, in Asian countries, specifically in China, where they don't know what sudden death is.
To know more about this practice, very common throughout the world throughout history (much more common than the current fashion of sleeping apart from them), we speak today of a country, of a culture, where they have never stopped do what: why in Japan children sleep up to 6 years or more with parents and why children become independent by day.
Why in Japan they sleep with children
Well, the truth is that it should be the other way around. It should be the Japanese who asked us why do we sleep without children. They do what they have done throughout history. We had always slept like this, but at one point in history we decided to separate ourselves from them, from the children, thus changing the strategy, with the intention of helping our children to be more independent.
So the answer is very easy: the Japanese sleep with their children by habit, because they have always done it and never thought that separating would be better for anyone. In fact, if you ask them about it, they are very clear: "Children should sleep with their parents for as long as they want." And it is that the majority sleep up to about 6 years with them, sometimes more, sometimes less, which is the age at which most children prefer to go to sleep in their own rooms. That is to say, it's the children who leave.
But ... the Japanese are not very affectionate either, right?
If someone knows Japanese culture a little, they will know that, in general, they are not too given to show affection, to hug, to touch, as we do. They are colder in general than us and something similar happens with children. While they are babies, they do carry them and even carry them, but when they walk the contact begins to be avoided. One way to recover contact, caresses and signs of affection that have not been given for the day is sleep together at night.
It would be something like us, but vice versa. Westerners try to avoid contact with the baby at night but compensate for the day, because we are more than snatching, hugging and kissing our children, while they avoid it by day and promote it at night.
Seeing it this way it seems that we are facing a technical tie. The problem is that Westerners have been decades also avoiding contact for the day (I define it as "we are becoming gilip ..."): "put it in the stroller", "do not take him in his arms", "let him cry", "that he learns that he cannot have everything in life", "that sleep in the crib and not with you ", etc. At least we do it this way while they are babies, then when they are older we are closer (luckily).
And how do they get their children to be independent?
We have been here for years saying that our children have to sleep alone, even if they are afraid, even if they are going badly, even if they cry a little, because they become more independent (very useful, taking into account that they do not leave home until after the thirty). In Japan they don't do it that way, because they make their children independent in everyday life, when they are awake (which seems to make a lot more sense).
There, when it comes to making their children autonomous, they take us centuries of advantage: the bottle is used until six months and then it is already difficult to see a baby with one, before the age of the year, which is the time to they begin to share the table and family food, they must have learned to eat alone (some will do better and others worse, but they have to be able to eat for themselves), personal hygiene is encouraged since they walk, they allow them to make the decisions that concern them and are immediately responsible for their own actions.
Come on, no doubt, Japanese children are much more autonomous and independent than ours, and they are also before ours.
And what is better?
I dont know. This is not a competition, right? But if you ask me which is better, I would say that it would be best to be able to put both cultures in a blender and hope that the result would be the following:
A culture in which the parents were affectionate, empathetic and respectful of the children during the day and also at night. That would allow them to sleep with the parents until they wanted to (this is also to be independent, since it is the child who makes the decision to, when ready, go to sleep alone) and that will foster autonomy at the times when the children They can really learn to be autonomous (because at night, with your eyes closed and your mouth wide open you'll tell me). By this I mean that it would be nice something that approximates a little to the Japanese model, with certain licenses. Likewise, we should look for the middle ground, that they take the bottle out after 6 months and Here are children who take a bottle with 6 years... that there you have to wash and dress alone (or at least try) and here if we do not wash anything, and if we do not dress them do not dress: 5-year-old children dressed by their mothers? Of course, everywhere.
It makes no sense to impose the idea that children have to sleep alone and then see them with 2 years who do not know or take a spoon because parents give them so they do not get stained, or the examples I have explained (parents butlers, in summary), so maybe we should be more flexible at night and less flexible in the day, leaving them room for them to do things themselves.
I don't want to live like the Japanese because I don't feel life and relationships that way. Here we are much closer with others. But as far as children are concerned, yes we have much to learn from them.
More information | Article "Sleeping in the form of a river", by Gisele Fernández Lázaro, in the magazine Lactando nº3, Natural Child, Babble
Photos | iStock
In Babies and more | Colecho with the baby: why sleeping together is beneficial, How to reduce the risk of sudden infant death, The safest way to sleep for babies is in their crib, face up and near their parents' bed, pediatricians recommend
