The Times closes out a piece on infant sleep habits and co-sleeping with this quote.

“With no intended disrespect to Dr. Ferber, I do not need his opinion to validate my view that co-sleeping is the healthiest, safest and most natural sleep situation for my child,” Kristi Buxton, 29, a microbiology researcher in Portland, Ore., wrote in an e-mail message. “The individual who has most influenced (and radically changed) my beliefs about co-sleeping is my child.”

The article also notes that co-sleeping is common practice in most of the rest of the world. Perhaps it is the American obsession of rugged individualism that makes parents want their kids capable of putting themselves to sleep through the night in their own room from as young an age as possible.

One explanation cited for the recent resurgence of co-sleeping (the supposed resurgence at least — no statistics in the Styles section…) is that working, breastfeeding mothers are better able to get sleep while still feeding the baby. That’s definitely true for us.

I wonder if that’s the core of the co-sleeping thing – nourishment vs. teaching independence…. Both worthy and laudable no doubt, but when I think of my little one, nourishment and health is Job #1, while teaching independence and character in general comes after that.

Thanks to daddytypes for the pointer to the piece.