Parenting is filled with choices. It seems that everyday brings a new decision, some big and some small. While I am not convinced that any of these decisions, independently, are earth-shattering. They do, as a whole, shape who we are as parents, and what kind of an upbringing our child will have. I believe this is true even at the very young age at which Ewan is right now.

As a classroom teacher, it was always said that the first few weeks were the most important. This is when you established the tone and routines for the classroom. Many educators believe that if the teacher doesn’t do well during those first few weeks to create a good learning environment and establish good behavior management, it will be difficult to recover during the remainder of the year. While hope need not be lost if those first few weeks don’t go well, the teacher will have to work much harder over the course of the school year to make up for the bad start.

I believe the same is true of parenting. It is in the first few months that we establish what kind of parents we are going to be and what kind of relationship we are going to have with our son. As with teaching, I don’t believe that there is a tipping point. Nor do I believe that things are not malleable, open to change and evolution as a family and child changes and evolves. However, just like in the classroom, I do think it is in the early weeks and months that we make the choices that makes the most impact, that establishes the tone, and lays the groundwork for the years to come.

As I mentioned, parenting is just jam-packed with choices. Some, for us, were made easily. Cloth diapers, for example. Others were more difficult. And none more controversial than where the baby would sleep.

I guess I knew, before we started sleeping with our son, how controversial (in America) that choice is. Having had experience in the past with only two co-sleeping families, the family I nannied for and the family of the autistic boy I did behavioral therapy with, I actually remember personally thinking how odd it was. After all, in America at least, babies sleeping in cribs is the norm. All the babies that I knew slept in cribs, the sitcoms and movies that I watched showed the same. Time after time I saw happy families putting their cheerful babies in their cribs, kissing them goodnight, and walking out the door, not to return until the following morning.

Obviously, despite the fact that sleeping separately is the norm in America, we decided to do things a bit differently. The other thing that we decided to do a bit differently was that we decided we wouldn’t keep our choice of sleeping arrangement quiet as many co-sleeping families do.

We had a few reasons for not keeping our choice a secret. First of all, we aren’t really secretive people. And why should our choice of where the baby should sleep be secret? Just because people don’t agree with that choice doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be able to talk about it, discuss that, and other, choices of parenting. After all, discussion and debate helps others to understand our choices and helps us to be sure that we are making the right ones for our family.

Second, it was logistically impossible to keep it a secret. We live in an apartment that is less than 400 square feet and for five weeks of Ewan’s early infancy we had family visiting. With paper thin walls and no crib in sight, it was impossible to keep our sleeping habits private.

Third, as we prepare for our return to the U.S. we’ve had any number of offers for cribs when we return, and turning down those cribs ends up requiring a discussion of why we don’t want one and how sleeping works in our family.

Out of all the decisions that we’ve made as Ewan’s parents, our decision to sleep with our son, has received the most raised eyebrows, the most people reaching out with concern. Most people are respectful, of course, but just the same I have been surprised at what a fuss is made. So, I thought that here, in this space, I could take some time to discuss and talk through co-sleeping. I will write about why, personally, we initially chose to make the decision to sleep with our son. I will talk about why this decision continues to work for our family and what co-sleeping in our house looks like. I also want to talk about co-sleeping from an international perspective and de-bunk some of the myths about it that exist.

I’m not doing this to convince anyone that what we are doing is the one-and-only right answer or that they should do what we are doing. Instead I am going to write this series in order to help others understand that the decision about where a child is to sleep, like any other parenting decision, must be carefully considered. Each family must decide, for themselves, what works best for them and their child. The fact that there is very little consideration given to this question in the U.S. does not mean that the right place for the child is in the crib, rather it means that separate sleep is so culturally ingrained that few even think to consider it as a choice to be made.