British Parent Bloggers

An article by guest author Joanna Cake 

Nearly thirteen years ago, when A moved from her carry cot into a proper cot, we bought her a special organic coconut mattress to sleep on, rather than one of the plasticky common or garden variety.  When T was born, A moved into a lovely new single bed, her old cot mattress was discarded and a similar expensive new coconut mattress was purchased for the new baby.

At 11 weeks, we were preparing to move T from his carrycot in our bedroom and into his new cot in his own bedroom when a news article on the radio caught my attention.  Apparently, there were fears about the safety of a chemical used to, I think, waterproof cot mattresses and it was being linked to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome  or cot death as we knew it then.  The famous and respected journalist, Roger Cook, had done a programme about it which would be shown the following evening.

As the day wore on, more and more stations were covering the story and it was a major item on both the BBC and ITV news at 6 and again at 9 and 10.  The newspapers the following morning were full of it.  Each article more scary than its predecessor until, by the time the programme was shown, the beleaguered parents of the UK were beside themselves with terror.  The programme itself had some shocking tales and statistics that seemed to categorically link incidents of cot death with the presence of the suspicious chemical in both new and previously-used mattresses.  It did not however specifically mention the special coconut version that we had purchased.  All varieties were being tarred with the same brush.  There was no distinction qualifying which brands contained the chemical and which did not.  Cot mattresses were dangerous! Full stop. 

Running around like a headless chicken, I was beside myself.  I just didn’t know what to do for the best.  There was my beautiful baby boy.  There was his lovely new cot in his nice new room.  But I couldn’t put the two of them together without the terrible fear that I might be signing his death warrant.

In the end, we decided that T would sleep with me in the double bed in his room until such time as we could get further clarification regarding safety.  The whole scandal rumbled on for several months… before it was replaced with something else and parents were left in this terrible place with fear but no proper facts.  Eventually, we moved T into the cot anyway but, of course, the damage of allowing him to go to sleep in the same bed as a parent was already done.  He had got used to dozing off with a warm, comforting presence and, deprived of it, he would cry heartrendingly.  It was not until he was three years old that I managed to get him to sleep through the night.  Yes, I tried letting him cry and going in at regular intervals to reassure but not to pick up.  He would cry and cry and eventually my husband would barge past me standing outside the door and pick him up, undoing any good that I had achieved.  When T was three, my husband had to go into hospital for a few days and in that time, I went back to the crying and reassuring.  One night he cried for three hours but, although I stayed outside the door, I would not pick him up.  The following night, he cried for two hours, and the next night for one.  By the time my husband returned, he understood that crying was not going to make me pick him up and he started sleeping - not right through the night but at least for reasonable chunks of it.

I’m sure that investigative journalists make these assertions with all the right motives, but once the sensation has reached its zenith, they move onto the next story leaving us to try to deal with all the problems they have stirred up.  And you cannot help but be left with the feeling that they have preyed shamelessly on our insecurities as parents, as other journalists jump onto the bandwagon and each subsequent report cranks up the pressure of our hysteria until we just don’t know what to believe or do for the best.

This is an example of media meddling that directly affected me but I will address others that have had a huge impact on all parents in a couple of weeks.