When Marie Poggi left home, she’d spent 15 years sharing a bed with her mother.
“I left home when I was 19, so from four to 19-years-old we slept in the same bed,” she said.
The co-sleeping started after her parents separated and “never stopped”.
“I slept in my own bed before my father kicked us out and we went to live with my grandparents because we had nowhere to go,” she said.
The French mother and daughter shared a bedroom in her grandparent’s house in Marseille.
“We didn’t have any other choice but to share the same bedroom, so we were sleeping in the same bed, and then my Pop passed away and my Grandma was on her own, so we decided to all sleep together in the same bedroom,” she said.
The 29-year-old said she didn’t want her grandmother, who was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease, to sleep alone.
Years passed. By the time Marie was turned 16, her grandmother had also passed away.
“I had my own bedroom but I didn’t want to sleep on my own. I didn’t know what it was like to sleep alone. I don’t even remember that,” she said.
“I could have slept on my own if I wanted to. We tried, but I would always go into my Grandma’s bed.”
Marie was in the middle of her “horrible” teenage years and formed a “love, hate” relationship with her mother, Evelyne.
Marie is an only child. Image supplied.
"I don't even know why, but I was so angry at everything and I hated the world and my life, and who I was, so I feel sorry for what I did to her [my mother].
"I was a very bad teenager, I did a lot of things. I was just a rebel," said Mrs Poggi.
But every night - even in those years - Marie would sleep in the same bed as her mother - in her grandmother's room.
The co-sleeping arrangement was rarely quality sleep.
"My mum was annoyed with me because I was moving a lot and I remember her telling me to stop moving. So I'd be in the bed trying to not move, and I couldn't sleep because I was focusing on how much I was moving. It wasn't good sleep at all."
Marie moved to Sydney years ago but still worries about her mother in France.
"We talk every single day and I push her to find someone as a companion because I don't like knowing she's on her own."
Even now, the 29-year-old offers her bed to Evelyne when she visits.
"My husband sleeps on the couch and Mum sleeps with me," says Marie.
"He is really nice, I'm really lucky. He never says anything, he knows how close we are."
The Sydneysider says she was raised with healthy boundaries as a daughter - not as a friend.
"I know my mum had to struggle with her divorce, with me, and her parents being sick, so it was a lot on her plate. [Co-sleeping] wasn't a bad experience - that's just the way it was.
"Sometimes things happen and that's life. She did her best."
We answer the age-old question: Are you getting enough sleep?
Top Comments
The tone of the article makes it sound like it is something unenviable or wrong. Sleeping was never a solo sport. We are social creatures and the comfort of someone close is highly desirable by some. My kids have regularly co slept with my husband, me or both. These days one of us gets out as the bed isn't big enough. My son is 16 and I slept in his bed with him quite recently as he was upset. I had intended to get up but ended up falling asleep there. Nothing wrong with it. My daughter is 13 and is a nervous perso.. She feels safe coming into our bed most nights. One day they will have partners and sleep with them and so it goes. Why did we arrive to relegate kids to their own rooms and beds?
You're totally right - putting children in beds by themselves is relatively new thing. Societies for thousands of years had multiple people/children in families sleeping near each other. It's natural for us to seek non sexual comfort from our families.
No need to make it seem weird.
I slept in the same bed as my mumma whenever I could, I left home at 17 and still miss it. Whenever I stay with her, my sisters and I and mum all sleep on the same bed. It is lovely bond to share.