AIBU to wonder if sleep training negatively impacts a child (attachment theory)?

I totally agree. Mine is 15 months and only sleeps through the night maybe twice a month. The rest of the time, she can wake up anywhere between 2 and 10 times a night. We tried The Ferber method for 3 nights but it just made her even more upset and she became hysterical even just going near her bedroom, so we had to scrap that.
She is a very strong character with a huge vocabulary and can express her wants and opinions very well. I don’t see how we can get out of this cycle with any form of ‘training’ until she is old enough to understand verbal explanations as to why she can’t keep doing this. There is no way she would do half the suggestions on here, such as lying down and being soothed until she drops off.
A while ago, we were able to wean her off the night feeds and being fed to sleep by having only DH attend to her. We thought she would soon realise there is no gain to waking up, but alas no. The rocking to sleep we could handle, as long as the rest of the night was unbroken, but no such luck. And owing to winter illness and molars cutting through for the last two months, she is back to requiring breastfeeds and wakes up the rest of DC by shrieking for it!

Just my experience but I honestly wish I had never discovered heysleepybaby. She is so judgemental about sleep training and I was in absolute fear of doing it with my second because she convinced me I would permanently damage my child. I was at absolute rock bottom until logic (and desperation) told me that I had sleep trained my first child and he was absolutely fine so it was okay to do it again. I have noticed that the sleep training accounts I follow don't criticise people who choose not to sleep train but the anti-sleep training brigade are on some sort of a crusade to convince everyone that it's child abuse. I would spend nights crying because those accounts convinced me I had damaged my first and kept me from sleep training my second. Also, nothing that heysleepbaby suggests resulted in ANY improved sleep for me and my baby (I tried it all!).

That's quite a leap! The toddler may have been sick in their sleep and just carried on sleeping then sat up when they woke up.

There are plenty of posters on here (myself included) whose children have been sleep trained and will always call us when they are ill or need us for some reason.

I was utterly broken when my 12 month old continued to wake every hour to be fed back to sleep. She was also incredibly sleep deprived. I look back at photos of her and she looked so tired bless her. We were both much happier once we started to get a full night's sleep.

My dc is same era and it was Gina Ford/Baby whisperer. I wouldn’t say I sleep trained my dd and I certainly didn’t leave her to cry but it was all about establishing a feeding and nap/sleep routine so she thrived.
It never reached omg baby won’t sleep I need to sleep train stage.
Sleep does get overlooked, it’s essential to good health and baby’s development.

With controlled crying you DO attend to their distress, you just have periods of time waiting to attend to them. The whole idea is that they learn that you will come back.

There are myriad reasons why babies are not immediately tended to during any instance of crying day or night. Siblings that need attention, showers needing to be taken, cooking dinner, pet broken a vase, <insert thing that needs taking care of here>. How do you think twins cope when the solo parent has another newborn to attend to at all times of the day and night?

Ds1 had 3 nights of sleep training, he fell asleep after 20 mins the first night, 15ish, the 2nd and in under 10 the 3rd night. If it had been any longer the first night than 20/30 minutes we might not have continued. Dh and i were sat on the stairs crying

up until then he had been sleeping in our bed for a year (king size, dh slept in the floor 😀) and we really needed him in his own bed

he was certainly as attached as any other two children who didn’t have sleep training

I think it depends on the child to be honest. I have friends who sleep trained and their kids were fine, got it in 2-3 days and that was it. Others had to "re train" after every illness, holiday etc.

I regret doing it with mine. It didn't work - we read the book, did it all properly, were consistent with it all. But he's a sensitive kid, he never soothed he just screamed and became scared of going up to his room so we stopped and carried on feeding, rocking, cuddling to sleep.

He's 4 now and has recently started sleeping really well after falling asleep with a story.

Some of the friends who sleep trained as babies are now struggling with 4 year olds who are hyper or kicking off at bed time and they're struggling because they're suddenly having to be in their room again to help them settle down.

I think it's all down to the individual.

Once upon a bedtime has links to some papers.
The thing about them just learning their cries won't get a response is nonsense. My kids have been sleep trained and they still woke up and cried after sleep training when there was something wrong that needed attention (eg dirty nappy). It just put a stop to all the endless wakeups that arose from the feeding to sleep association.

😂

That was me 😂

I suppose I should have said “just like adults….”

I promise I gave birth to human babies 😂

We did gentle sleep training with DD at 11 months. No leaving her alone when she cried but we stopped rocking or feeding her to sleep and patted her back instead. She really didn’t like it but at 3 she’s a great sleeper.

Her little brother is 12 months and still co sleeping. We will try the same with him when we have a time when both DH and I are less exhausted.

I have no idea if there are long term negative effects. I think the answer is no, DD is a happy little girl who loves us, but (a) it’s too early to tell and (b) you’ll never know whether a negative thing later is an effect of sleep training, one of the thousands of other parenting decisions you’ve made or nothing to do with you.

That's the thing, sleep training is such a broad term.

I used aspects of Gina Ford and the Baby Whisperer for my DS who is 1 since birth. I've never used controlled crying such as Ferber but I did use the pick up/put down method (way before 6 months) to teach him how to self settle and I've always encouraged a strict routine.

That's sleep training to me but people generally seem to think it is always the likes of Ferber.

"Just like humans"

Not exactly sleep training - but I had a baby who cried constantly. And I genuinely mean when they were awake they were crying. They slept for 30 minute intervals overnight & during the day it was about 10 minutes if I was lucky. I was on my own as her dad worked abroad until she was 6 and only come back 4 days a month. I had quite significant PND & had to let her cry to go for a shower/eat etc. I was a mess. I sometimes used to put earphones in when out with her in the pram/tidying with her in the sling because I couldn't listen to the crying anymore. There were times when I realised why people shake their babies & if I hadn't left her to cry I would have lost it. I think people who respond to their babies with only care and love are very fortunate to be in the position that their babies aren't crying 24/7. Anyway, the point of this is that we turned a corner at about 8months old & our bond hasn't been affected whatsoever. My DD is now a pre teen & we are very close, she is confident, social, outgoing, clever & kind. In no way has our bumpy start affected her until now. I don't know if it will lead to problems when she is older but we did what was necessary to survive at the time.

After we had sleep trained, the baby was getting 6 hours more sleep per 24 hours than he did before training.

Six more hours sleep per 24 hours is a huge amount!!

Sleep is so important for babies to grow and develop properly, and just like humans, they need to be rested.

As well as getting 6 hours more sleep every day, my baby was also much happier and settled after the training. Life was pleasant again for him and me.

The child waking up to dried vomit - it is possible for a child to be in a deep sleep and vomit without waking up properly (deeper sleep at the start of the sleep cycle for example which would tie in with it being dried up). I think it's a bit of a stretch to jump to Romanian orphanage comparisons which involve complete neglect

I'm in my 40s and most kids in my generation were sleep trained and most of us still love our parents and aren't psychologically damaged.

I sleep trained mine, the second time at 7 months. My youngest was waking up 7x a night for 7 months. They were like a different baby afterwards - happier, more alert, actually ate some food in the day because they weren't full from grazing all night. The important things for me were -

They were NOT left alone for hours to cry it out, which is what a lot of people think about sleep training. We did the disappearing chair method so were right next to them, soothing them, just didn't pick them up

Babies every cry isn't a need. Sometimes it is boredom and sometimes they feed to sleep because it's comforting and because its habit, not because they 'need' to do this

Most importantly if the baby was ill and cried longer than normal or at a time we weren't expecting, we did go back in and pick up / put them in bed with us. The narrative that the baby will no longer cry because 'they've learned no one comes' is in my opinion and experience, complete bullshit, unless they have been properly neglected. At night they just learn that they aren't going to be picked up or fed just for the sake of it

We sleep trained my first accidentally...I did my back in, and my husband had to go and get the baby and bring them to me. He would try and sooth them a bit first but if they didn't fall straight back asleep would bring them in for a feed. 3 days later they were sleep trained

I think it's more before 6 months you're not meant to leave them to cry as perhaps they're not necessarily ready to be left, but honestly I never asked why. I just remember anything younger than 6 months is meant to be too young. I also don't think what you were doing was necessarily sleep training as you just had a baby that easily slept, I actually did too until the 8 month regression. Mine I'd just put in his bassinet or cot and he'd play for a bit then fall asleep. Would also just wake to him happily playing too. No crying, no fuss. Until 8 months then it was all over 😅

This is interesting DS ( born 2004) was a Gina Ford baby. He was never left to cry ( well once aged 6 weeks for 5 minutes- very overtired). But was always put to sleep in his own cot/ moses basketfrom birth. So if/when he fell asleep after a feed I always put him down in his moses basket. He slept 7 hours @ 8 weeks, is that sleep training ? All happenedca long time before 6 months. Of course when he occasionally at night I would go to him and usually breastfeed him, but it was v. rare after 10 weeks or so.

You definitely need to deal with the CMPA and reflux pain before you can think about sleep training. I would keep going back to the GP about changing the milk because its clearly not working. Your poor baby, and poor you.

I used old-school ‘cry it out’ with DD. After a tricky few weeks she became a great sleeper and a very happy little girl! We have a very close bond to this day. I suspect there are many different factors in forming / breaking attachment and sleep is only one of them.

My thought is actually that there are quite a lot of children who don't have ADHD, what they have is severe sleep deprivation.

Baby reflux can often be caused by an insufficiently developed aesophegeal sphincter. Which means the acid just rises up their throat. Does the baby relax and settle after a while if upright (we used to use a sling- good thing it was a summer baby I tell you).

Our GP recommended putting books under one end of the crib so she would be at a slant. He did say 45 degrees but we weren’t comfortable with that so she slept on around a 15 degree slope. That + omeprazole sorted it, and then we sleep trained her once the reflux was under control. Keep pushing for the care you and the baby need. They are right, your baby WILL grow out of it, but that doesn’t mean you can’t do something now to help.

Sleep training is not your issue here OP!
The CMPA is!
Both of mine had it with different symptoms to each other - I spent 5 months of DS1 screaming and GPs prescribing loads of reflux meds which didn’t work and no one believed me that he was in pain, not pooing for days and then exploding along with throwing everything up all of the time. I was at the end of my tether when a health visitor found me crying at the weigh in clinic and asked about the smell of his breastfed poo and then called my GP and demanded they prescribe Nutramigen.
24 hours later I had a new baby and a few weeks later he slept through!
We did sleep train after that gently when needed but there was no point when he was in pain.

DS2 wasn’t putting on weight, diarrhoea constantly and silent reflux. I went to GP on day 6 and said he was in pain with wind too and for my health I needed Nutramigen again. GP awful but as soon as I mentioned mental health she gave it. Then midwives finally sent us to paediatrician (like it was a threat because he wasn’t putting on weight even though every appointment I was telling them about the diarrhoea). I was told not to go back to BF (I was pumping while trying to get all the dairy out of my system while he began the formula) and they prescribed Neocate - problem solved and was under dietician. Saw her and mentioned the wind he was left with and she said all good bacteria would have been wiped by the diarrhoea and she prescribed neocate syneo which has a probiotic in.

It can be really tough having CMPA babies but just know you’re not going mad and keep fighting!

From the sound of your parenting style I recommend you look up 'heysleepybaby' on instagram, very supportive with real sleep expectations appropriate to age x

Sleep training is a far better option than parents and children who can barely function through lack of sleep.