I may be missing some of the subtext here. Are we talking about Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, or are there more general concerns wrt to infants?
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Two years ago we had parents, and grandparents, put a 2 year old to bedā¦of course he was scared and agitatated to be placed in a strange place all by himself. ( I have a house / not a room. ). Child found a pencil in a drawer and proceed to smash little holes in all the furniture tops and walls. The walls were repaired, the furniture required granite tops to be purchased, cut, and placed permanently. Since then I have placed granite ( or glass ) on every furniture top in the house. BUT - the moral of the story is = young children and toddlers cause damage. They fingerprint walls, they pee in beds ( yes that happened to and parents covered it up and switched beds ), they leave chocolate under furniture cushions, they break things. So now you know and it is your decision.
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The small ones also vomit frequently. Sometimes diapers arenāt up to the task of handling the diarrhea.
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Does āsmallā include a one month old infant?
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Weāve hosted several parents with toddlers. As we have two twin beds; the parents sleep with the toddlers. Almost without exception, weāve really enjoyed hosting children. We had one who was not under the control of his parents. The rest have been lovely. I like how children usually look at new surroundings and experiences as delightful. Weāve only had one guest request to book with an infant. We declined him because he wanted us to pick him up at the airport which we donāt do and we donāt have an infant seat in our car. We would welcome an infant and I donāt think their sleeping arrangement is any of my business.
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Yupā¦only the vomit is more of a milk spit-up, 
ā¦ Once they can stand upright that spitting up seems to subside. Parents who are conscientious would always bring blankets and clean-up wipes with them, but accidents do happen.
Weāre discussing a somewhat new trend here to have babies sleep in the bed with parents (co-sleeping). Then the exhausted, sleeping parent rolls onto the child and the child is smothered. I donāt know the data behind how often this happens, just the one report from the ER doc, info from my sisterās pediatrician, and my own thinking.
Proponents rave about how vital the bonding that happens with co-sleeping is.
Iāve had three kids - 1 biological who was in the nicu on a ventilator for 10 days - 1 adopted at 3.5 from loving foster parents (in China) and 1 adopted at 12.5 from not-loving foster parents. In my view ābondingā is not something that happens, it is something that is always happening, every day, with every decision we make. And, at a certain age, with every decision they make.
And for the record, I often make the wrong oneā¦but weāre still doing fine.
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No SIDS is something else. I think they are speaking mainly of co sleeping with babies. I never did it ā¦but then again I had twins! Me, I was after the most sleep for myself when the opportunity arose ā¦and putting the boys down in their cribs gave me the best chance for that.
When we did travel with them (rare) weād take our fold up portacribsā¦
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Hi @dcmooney,
This is a new trend? I thought it was a common thing, especially with young children. And I donāt think Iāve heard the term āco-sleepingā before.
Yes, I see. And SIDS happens to unsupervised babies sleeping separately?
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Yesā¦ In cribs. So they have been trying to figure out what it is that causes SIDS. The kind of bedding? Putting a baby on their back or side?
maybe itās just a new term. Of course it has been practiced across cultures and generations, but now there are many proponents of it here as being the best thing for the baby. Yet many in the medical profession disagree.
My typical guests are a couple with two children, and over 28 completed stays, I never had a problem.
I also provide a cot and a high chair if needed (you must provide them if youāre registered as a vacation rental in my country).
I do have waterproof mattress protectors just in case (but an adult could spill coffee or coke on a bed too).I have sturdy furniture and materials in my rental but that should be the case in all vacation rentals, people are hard on things. Obviously the foundation fingerprints I often find on the bathroom door were not made by toddlers.
Hi dcmooney,
I am a child of the sixties and Iāve been hearing the term cosleeping for decades. From what Iāve read it can be dangerous if the parents are overweight and/or drink heavily. Otherwise, itās pretty safe. Remember that emergency room physicians, by definition, see the worst outcome of any situation and are probably not the most objective observers of any specific activity. The most important thing, I believe, is to not judge every decision parents make (sleeping arrangements, food choices, bedtimes, etc.).
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I remember my pediatrician constantly warning me (and I assume all patients) to never ever ever put children in shopping carts as they are inherently unstable, and he would have at least three to five ER calls weekly for children who had fallen from them and hit their heads, some with tragic results. I remember wanting to shop at Safeway just because they had carts with two child seats built in.
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The evidence, and associated discussion, on SIDS and the danger/benefit of co-sleeping is divisive, inconclusive and changes constantly with every new study. I would suggest keeping it simple from an Airhost perspective! Either you accept kids and babies and trust the parents to know whatās best for their family or you donāt accept them at all. I know most of the hosts on here are from USA and there is the whole subject of litigation but could a parent really sue because they agreed (in writing) that they all slept in a double bed? Really?
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Seems a bit ridiculous to me. Could they really sue? Itās not you putting the child in the bed. Itās the parent. Plus wouldnāt the liability insurance cover it. Iām from the UK and we donāt sue as much as Americans. I donāt think anywhere does. So Iām clueless on why a host could get sued.
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Can you even sue here in the UK? Iāve never heard of it
No kids. Ever. Anymore. Totally not worth my excessive worry.
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Not only should you not allow kids, you should make it abundantly clear in your rules that this means no babies and there are no exceptions. With any less you will get some yahoo showing up with an infant without telling you just assuming their little noisy, messy, accident-prone offspring are welcome for free anywhere they go because being a parent is such a precious gift they are giving to the world. Just say no.
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