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Can My Child Use a Baby Pillow or Regular Pillow

My first child happily slept in her crib until she was almost 3. The only reason we moved her to a normal bed was because her baby brother arrived. While she was in the crib, we did not have to worry about things like baby pillows and blankets. She happily slept snugly in a sleep sack and pajamas. She could not swing her legs over the rail, while wearing the sleep sack. She was so happy in the crib, I don't think she would have even if she was not wearing one. When we moved her to her bed, there was no drama. After getting her used to the big bed with a few naps, we transitioned her to nighttime too. It was a full size bed in a beautiful wooden frame. She had two pillows and a big comforter. Because she was almost 3, we did not have to mess with those little baby pillows or toddler pillows.

My son was an entirely different story. Early on, he learned to unzip his sleep sack. He could easily swing his leg up on the crib rail. He was happy to just do that exercise for months and months. One night, he finally flung the other leg over too. We immediately took the crib mattress out of the crib and set it up on the floor.

Moving him to a bed presented all these obstacles that we did not have to deal with when we moved our daughter to a bed. It was a rough transition, because he was so young. He was a couple months shy of his second birthday. So he would not hurt himself, we had to take a lot of things out of his room. We also put a gate on the door, which was the best advice we received. He was so stubborn that for the first couple days, he would fall asleep sitting in the middle of the wood floor of his room. After a very LONG week, he was back in his routine.

He was digging his new bed when people started doling out the advice. "Oh, he is not old enough to be sleeping in a big bed." "It is dangerous." "Do not use pillows and bedding." Wait. What? He can not use a pillow? How is he going to be comfortable? Can he use a tiny airline baby pillow? Being an overly cautious mom, I checked in our medical baby books and online. Indeed, it is NOT recommended that you give children under the age of 2 any pillows or heavy blankets. Once a child is 2 or they move to a big bed, you can introduce them then.

Since my son was not yet 2, I decided to follow the advice and start with one of those baby pillows. It was the size of an airline pillow and did not look very useful to me. It got lost in the full size bed and my son did not seem to know it was really a pillow to put his head on. I think the need to put a pillow and bedding on his bed was due to my own notion of what a bed is supposed to look like. We finally put pillows and a comforter on his bed after about a month. He loved sitting up with the pillows and snuggling like he did in our bed. And he actually used the pillows for his head, so he was happy to have a normal pillow instead of that baby pillow.