Good Nights: The Happy Parents' Guide to the Family Bed (and a Peaceful Night's Sleep!) [Paperback]

Maria Goodavage (Author), Jay Gordon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 24, 2002

Your baby sleeps in your bed, and you love it. Except for those nagging worries about safety. ("She's so small, I'm so big!") And what your relatives are saying. ("She'll never leave your bed!") And that little foot that always ends up on your face.

Worry no more! Good Nights puts your concerns about the family bed to rest, with fun and easy-to-use guidance on safety, coping with criticism, and even keeping the spark in your marriage (albeit outside the bedroom). With warmth and humor, Dr. Jay Gordon, a nationally recognized pediatrician who has endorsed the family bed for decades, and Maria Goodavage, a former USA Today staff writer with training in sleep research, give you everything you'll need in order to thrive - and at times, simply survive - with the family bed. Good Nights provides a comprehensive look at:

- SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH - Science is uncovering a wealth of advantages, including possible protection from SIDS, for babies who share their parents' bed.

- SURPRISING BENEFITS - Parents of young babies get much more sleep with the family bed! And little ones who spend time sleeping next to parents end up more independent (you read that right!) and closer to their parents than their cribbed peers.

- SAFETY - The authors give simple-to-follow advice on how to make your family bed at least as safe as a crib.

- SOUND SLEEP - Yes, it can be had. Good Nights lets you know how to overcome the obstacles.

- SEX - Ditto.

- SAYING GOOD-BYE - Your child really will leave your bed! Good Nights helps you help your child move on when the time is right.

If you're among the record number of parents turning to the family bed, turn to Good Nights. It's a bedside companion you won't want to be without.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Parents of babies and toddlers hope for a good night's rest after a demanding day, but they rarely get it. Books like Richard Ferber's Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems argue that if bedtime becomes a problem, parents should put children in their own beds and let them cry it out. Here, pediatrician Gordon (UCLA Medical Sch.) and former USA Today writer Goodavage offer a gentler approach: put kids in the "family bed" every night, they say. Children will feel secure and happy, Mom can nurse without getting out of bed, Dad will relax, and a good night's rest for all will follow. Covered in full are "beducation," the problems that may arise, how to childproof the bed, dealing with intimacy, and coping with "naysayers." The text also offers reassuring comments from current and past family bedders. Skeptical? So was this reviewer, but the authors conducted impressive research and present it convincingly. Though not for everyone, this book provides a good alternative to dealing with those difficult "night nights." Recommended. Annette V. Janes, Hamilton, MA
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

About the Author

Jay Gordon, M.D., is a pediatrician, and a teaching and attending faculty member at UCLA Medical School. He is a frequent expert guest on network television, and writes medical columns for national parenting magazines and web sites. He has acted as CBS TV's Medical Consultant for Children's Programming, and also worked for five years on ABC Television as the on-air medical correspondent for the "Home Show." He continues to consult regularly for television and movies, and is the author of three other books about children. His medical practice is based in Santa Monica, California, where he lives with his wife and daughter.

Maria Goodavage is a former USA Today staff writer and the author of three popular books. Her interest in sleep research started at Northwestern University, where she worked at the school's sleep laboratory and studied the science of sleep. She lives in San Francisco with her husband, daughter, and dog. The latter two no longer share the family bed.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin; 1st edition (July 24, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0312275188
• ISBN-13: 978-0312275181
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.8 x 8.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (46 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #445,454 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

189 of 191 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Grandma Approves! August 24, 2002

By "grammykate"

Format:Paperback

I was tickled when I found this book while browsing for sleep books for the youngest of my five children, who is about to have a baby. Back when she and her siblings were babies, they shared a bed with my my husband and I, and our family ended up incredibly close. I'm not saying the closeness was because of what people now call the family bed but it was a vital part of our children's young lives, to be able to sleep next to their loved ones and not have to be alone in a crib somewhere else. My mother told me I shared the bed with my parents when I was a baby in Ireland, so on it goes. My other children who have children have all brought them into bed as babies. My youngest wants to, but she is getting alot of pressure from people in her future mom's class not to do this. So I got her this book and I read it first, and it's charming and so very helpful, kind, caring, funny, fully of tips I wish I'd had when they my own were little.

She read some of it while I was visiting and she laughed and underlined and gave me such a hard hug I thought I'd pop. She brought it to her future moms group and showed them the first chapter full of scientific evidence that shows the powerful positive effects of letting your baby sleep next to you. The teacher said she was going to have to get a copy. She said the chapter on safety was "worth the price of admission." Now that's saying something, considering how she is one of those Ferber people. The book isn't preachy, as someone else who wrote a review mentioned, and that and it's sense of humor will probably help it break through alot of barriers with people like my daughter's teacher.

If you're wondering, my children left our bed fairly easily when it was time for another baby to move in.... They all loved sleeping in the same room together after that until they became old enough to separate the girls from the boys. It was like a big reward for them to get to sleep in the big kids room. The book Good Nights also has a whole chapter on the process of helping a child move out of your bed, and I think parents will find this very helpful, as I know it can be an issue.

I hope it was alright to mention my personal experiences with this topic in a review. I haven't done reviewing before, but I think that personal experience in my case as a reader of the book is very important to the review.
Thank you. Read more ›

80 of 83 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Extremely Helpful!!!!! September 13, 2002

By Kelly TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Paperback

This book is a great introduction to the family bed. It includes guidelines for safe co-sleeping, scientific and medical reasons why cosleeping is so good for baby, enjoying a great sex life even during the famiy bed years, and a section on 'trouble shooting' that includes a great explanation of why "crying it out" is a terrible thing to do to babies. It also covers transitioning a baby/child to their own bed and a great section on dealing with criticism from others. It is very "breastfeeding positive" and approaches breastfeeding as the "normal" way to feed babies/toddlers.

Some folks have raised a concern over the chapter on helping an older baby/child sleep through the night. This book did include Dr. Jay's "10 nights" plan to get a baby/child over 12 months of age to sleep through the night [for 7 hours]. It is *extremely* well done and the authors make it very clear that they would prefer you just leave the child to his/her own time table and relax about the whole thing. They state clearly that they are only offering this as an alternative for families that are seriously considering 'cry it out' out of desperation and they give a great explanation of why this method is FAR preferable to the Cry It Out stuff.

The plan is VERY gentle - the baby/child is never left alone, parents maintain physical and voice contact with baby [first by nursing, after 3 nights cut out nursing but use holding/cuddling, on 7th night don't pick up but touch and rub back while talking soothingly to child, etc]. I think this plan is very in keeping with what is reasonable for a child over 12 months - and very gentle and Attachment Parenting oriented....

"Good Nights" is VERY clear that family bed, breastfeeding and constant physical contact for babies are extremely beneficial and desirable and "sleep training" of any kind is strongly discouraged for all children but absolutely discouraged for a baby under 1 year of age. The book also recognizes that children have different temperaments and that parents MUST be able to work with their child's temperament and that this plan might not work for all children and should be _immediately_ abandoned if it seems to be having a detrimental effect on a child. This book is absolutely great and extremely AP.

I know several families that have used Dr. Jay's sleep plan with their children and it has worked very, very well for them and for their children. I think it is a very gentle way to encourage less night waking for families who truly are desperate with frequent night waking toddlers. I am extremely reluctant to use any kind of sleep training with my night waking children [I doubt I ever will], but if I did, I would feel good as an AP parent using Dr. Jay's steps.

This book is perfect for any family considering Co-Sleeping and would also be wonderful for any family who is rethinking a decision to solitary sleep and/or "cry it out". Read more ›

47 of 51 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars We are so grateful for this book! September 21, 2002

By Jennifer Welsh

Format:Paperback

A few weeks ago I bought Good Nights. At that time my DH and I were sharing our bed with our 5 yr old and our 18 month old. Between the bouncing of the bed anytime anyone moved and the tight quarters and my little guy's night nursing every two hours, sleep quality was poor. I'd wake up every morning so tired, and my little guy would be out of sorts often, and my DH had a back ache from sleeping in wierd positions just to have room. My 5 year old said he never wanted to leave the family bed. We all loved it, but I had come to the point where it was time to move on! I'm no good to anyone when I'm that sleep deprived. I know that probably sounds awful to a lot of hardcore attachment parenters, but it was too much to take any more.

I read the book, and as they say, I laughed and I cried. I felt very affirmed for having slept beside our guys for so long, and I felt relieved; finally there was a book with tons and tons of practical information on how to deal with the not so perfect aspects of co-sleeping. (Love the title of the chapter on solutions to common family bed sleep problems -- "The Sandman Cometh.")

The chapter on helping a child wean from the family bed was a tremendous help to us. It gave us so many ideas for moving Ty to his own space that we were able to transition him to his own ROOM by using a few of the tips. Room, yes room! We got him bunk beds (Dr. Gordon and his co-author say it's the number one successful method family bedders have used!) for his previously unused bedroom. He was very excited and slept in there from the first night! After a week or so he got a little scared after watching a Scooby Doo movie, and wanted to return to our room for one night. By then we'd set up a bed beside ours, and we welcomed him back for what we hoped was only one night. Dr.... Gordon says to realize kids will sometimes come back for a night or a part of the night, and to welcome them. I agree. If we'd pushed him out, it would have been like the forbidden fruit. The next night he was back in his room. I followed another tip in the chapter and when he was apprehensive about going to sleep, I promised to do some work in the family room right next door to his room (our BABY was now sleeping through the night most of the time and I could do this! - more on this in a minute) and this was very comforting to him. Next time I checked, it was sleep city in his room. Since then, he hasn't revisited. All he asks is that I lie in bed with him after shutting out the light after booktime, so I can be with him as his eyes adjust!

As far as Zach, we did end up using the 10 Nights method. I couldn't really do that when Ty was in the room, because I knew it would mean some crying. But it really worked for us! By night 8, Zach was snoozing for five hours straight. He is now happily sleeping through the night in our bed. It is SO much easier this way, and everyone is so much better rested. My DH no longer has back aches! This is all like some kind of miracle. (I felt awful, awful, awful the first few nights of 10 nights because Zach was indeed protesting, but I was right there and I think he "got" it that he wasn't going to have to go through this alone. I'm glad I didn't do this when he was younger, because I could actually explain it to him a little and I think that helped.) In addition, the book helped us decide to replace our mattress with a futon because everytime one of us moved, the others moved too and it was bad for sleep. With the futon on our box spring, there's a tremendous improvement! You just don't feel every move of the other bodies.

We worked hard to make all this work. (We paid a tidy sum to the bed store(s) for the bunk beds, the twin bed in our room, and the futon!) But oh, was it worth it! I never regret for a minute doing the family bed. There are so many memories I'll treasure, and so much good has come to us all from it. (I loved the quotes from all the former family bed kids in the last chapter of the book. If you have doubts about how these kids can turn out, read this!) However, I also don't regret for a minute having followed the advice in Dr. Gordon's book. Life is good when you get enough sleep!

I recommend Good Nights to anyone who 1) wants to co-sleep and wants to know all the great benefits or 2) is co-sleeping and wants help with dealing with the everyday problems or the big weaning stuff. Read more ›