To think that our expectations of babies behaviour in this country are too high?

[Tryharder]

There seems to have been a lot of threads around at the moment along the lines of "my baby is 5 weeks old and still won't sleep through the night" and "my baby won't go 4 hours between feeds, is she just greedy" or "my baby wants to be picked up a lot - is she just manipulative?" You get the picture....

Have just read a post about someone who left a very young baby to cry it out (don't ask me to link) and they are all smug about it because "it worked".

It makes me so cross and sad for the babies concerned who are subject to draconian regimes. Why are we so negative about babies in this country and so determined from Day one to impose on them a routine that makes our lives convenient, not theirs.

I know I will be flamed .

YANBU, but then my ten day old already owns me

Read the definition of a troll from MN. I did not pose as a social worker or a PO.

Well Giddy, thats your opinion and you have expressed.

It won't be my opinion if you link to the academic journal article's that you have taken your claims from.

I do not need to justify my opinion and will not ask anyone to do so. Anyway i'm off, my baby needs me.

pesky parenting getting in the way of mumsnetting

No, i don't think expectations are too high- babies need to be taught a lot of things, that they otherwise wouldn't figure out by themselves. Some babies are able to work out their own rhythm that luckily conincides with mums daily life- but some babies would happily stick to a 2 hour feeding schedule 24hrs a day for months and months on end, and some babies would have a similar sleeping patterns.
I was a maternity nurse and nightnanny/sleeptrainer BC and was kept in full time work helping desperate sleep deprived parents whose 'babies' at 3 or 4 years were still waking every 2 -3 hours. These were parents who all thought " he/she will get it eventually".
Some babies do- but more don't.
It makes total sense to me that parents would want their children to sleep as much as they can at night. I am not advocating leaving a tiny baby to cry for hours on end- but I am saying that it is not cruel for a parent to slowly begin to 'tweak' the amount of time between feeds and putting a baby to sleep at a time that is more convenient to the parent.
All of my children were sleeping through 7pm ( having a dream feed at 11pm) until 6.30 am. from the age of 8 weeks. They were not starved, I didn't leave them to cry alone for hours and hours ( they were carried around on my back in a sling all day- and slept in their cots at night) they have all been very secure and happy babies /toddlers/children. As they slept so well, daytime life was so much easier and I know that I was a much better parent to them than if I had been up every two hours every night feeling resentment and totally exhausted.
I often think parents who frown upon routine and discipline for children do so because they enjoy being martyrs. They enjoy the dependency the child has upon them and are reluctant to teach the child independence when they get older.This has been my experience when I was a 'trouble shooter nanny' and it comes as a shock to the mollycoddled child, when at the age of 4, they suddenly have to go to school, having learnt few of the necessary skills to cope with being in a structured routine.

But Benny if you are trying to save babies from what you see as abuse; why not make us all privy to to the information that you are aware of?

Containher what you say makes perfect sense to me.

"babies need to be taught a lot of things, that they otherwise wouldn't figure out by themselves."

No offense containher but convincing people that this is the case is exactly why you had a job and I disagree with you. A baby will eventually space out its feeds and sleep longer - whether or not it does this within the parents' ideal timeframe is another matter. They do not NEED to be taught these things - they will learn them with time. If you HAD to teach them then many of our 4/5/6/7 etc year olds would all still be waking every 2 hours for a feed and not sleeping all night because a lot of us have done NOTHING to 'tweak' their feeding/sleeping habits and guess what - they don't!

Also, you are making the mistake that some other posters have made that those who do not like forced routines do not have ANY routine and this is not the case.

I sincerely hope you are not generalising and saying that any child who is not forced into a routine is 'mollycoddled'. I actually find it very sad that more and more people feel the need to force their children into early independence and to be quite frank I think people in careers like yours are party to blame for the ridiculous expectations that society has of our children. Let our children be children and our babies be babies. They will become independent when they are ready and they most certainly do not need to be forced into it!

I also hope that you didn't start experimenting with sleep training/spreading out feeds on an 8 week old. That is very sad if you did. :(

Thought I would add here. I have only just read the last page but I do have a view on the subject.

I think babies need a routine but I do agree that people have really high expectations and it does make me laugh when breast feeding mothers say things like "he is so greedy he wakes up every 3 hours at night". I would never complain about a baby waking up to feed because if they don't feed they won't gain weight.

Also, I don't actually think you need to do much to get babies to sleep. The only things I have done with my two are basic things like turning lights off when putting them to bed and keeping curtains open during the day. That way I am teaching them a routine - that night time is for sleeping and the day is for playing.

containher I really think it's terms like 'mollycoddled' that really get people's back up...kind of like the term 'cruelty' coming from the other side.

God forbid a baby should be mollycoddled before the harsh reality of institutional schooling is thrust upon them!

Ok. My baby (when he was one)could stay awake for literally hours at a time, from about two weeks old.
Once I counted that he was awake for ten hours at a stretch. At three weeks.
His eyes would be out on stalks. He would get so overtired he would cry and cry.
I would take him into a dark quiet room and rock him or hold him for hours. He just found it really hard to drop off.

Maybe it was that I had quite a stressful pregnancy, or that he had a bit of a traumatic birth, but it was really distressing for both of us.

I didnt have unrealistic expectations, and fully expected him to wake for feeds over 24 hours, but I did need to formulate a plan to help him both nap during the day, and sleep at night.

I would rock him to sleep for about an hour until he was about five months, but then he got too heavy and I was sooo tired)
So I stopped rocking him and just held him, which he didnt like, and he would cry and cry.
Eventually he would calm a bit, so I put him in the cot. After a few minutes, more crying, more holding, putting him down each time he calmed.
(this was just to get him to sleep at all, not sleep thru)
the first day it took from 7 pm until 11 pm. The third he slept at about 9.30 and so on until he was going to bed at eight every night.
This was my invented form of sleep training (I did mild cc later at ten months to help him sleep thru, which was really easy)

What I am saying is that not all babies "just naturally" get how to sleep. Not all babies sleep when they are tired.

And not all parents can cope with no sleep. I couldn't.

I mean when he was a baby, not when he was a one year old!

northernrock that sounds very sensible - it must have been such a relief to see him get some sleep.

I'm thinking of trying to come up with my own plan at the moment to try and get my 10 month old to stop waking up every hour and wanting to be picked up and cuddled. Up until now we have travelled quite a bit so haven't had a secure enough environment (always felt a bit cruel to mess about with a jet lagged baby's comfort!) but now we are back in the uk for a bit and I think it's time to try and help him sleep for longer periods. I'm not sure how yet but I think we can find a way that doesn't feel to horrid to me and is gentle for him.I don't mind how long it takes.

I agree with OP, a past six months is one thing, but under three is cruel. A friend of mine let her DD cry it out when she woke at night (and she cried for well over an hour) and she wast just over two months. She is a strict routine fan, her DS slept through at six weeks and as her DD wasn't, she did that. I was a bit for her DD. It was just too young, and she was adjusting from BF to FF.

I think there will always be polarised opinions on this subject.

AliGryls 'I would never complain about waking up to feed because if they don't feed they won't gain weight'.
How do you reckon that?

My DD rarely feeds at night, only in sickness or a genuine growth spurt, and has remained on the same weight percentile since birth. She just gets what she needs throughout the day. And this is an EBF, baby led weaned (so barely eats yet!) 7 month old.

My baby eats three HUGE meals during the day (yes, never ceases to amaze me how much he puts away!!!), two snacks and breastfeeds in the morning and afternoon and about three times through the night. He's a lean little thing and I worry that he doesn't get enough because he is so incredibly voracious. So, I can understand what AliGryls means. I think he is in the midst of a huge growth spurt (seemingly neverending) and he just seems to need more than other babies the same age. Surely that is the same for everyone, babies and adults alike- we have different appetites and different metabolisms for food.
I think a mother would know if her baby didn't actually 'need' the breastmilk or bottle. It's very obvious when it's genuine hunger don't you think?

I get that some babies need more food, but you can't say that if you don't feed a baby who wakes in the night they won't gain weight. That's a sweeping generalisation which won't be true for many babies.

I do agree though that it's very obvious when it's genuine hunger. I know when my DD hasn't fed as much as usual before she goes to sleep so if she does wake in the night I will feed her as she is more likely to be hungry. If she wakes in the night when she's fed as normal before bed I just pat her and she falls back asleep almost instantly. Feeding would be unnecessary on those occasions and is more likely to get DD into a cycle of relying on the breast to fall asleep.

I do think that's there too much emphasis on self-improvement in the meedja (changing rooms, clean your house, dress better etc etc which somehow seems to have spread to bring up your baby better too...) Just generally, much more chilling out is necessary, I think (not to mention minding one's own business)

Runs away v quickly!

I don't think that any of this is a recent phenomenon though. Magazines and the Internet might be relatively new, but parenting books have been around for a few generations, and well meaning (or not) MILs etc have been around forever. More parents have children without any exposure to babies now, but I suspect that new mothers have been taken aback by their offsprings needs and/or desires pretty much forever.

I have two little kids and I have been always there for them when they cry. There is a reason why the kids cry, especially small babies(they have dirty nappies, they want to eat/drink, they want to feel you, they do not feel well, the bottom is sore, they have stomach ache, they want to vomit, they are frightened etc, etc). You just cannot leave them to fall asleep again. Imagine your husband would ask you for your help and you would leave him at his place to shut up. This sort of behaviour also exists in the hospitals where patient starve and even die because of the neglect.
Sorry but I also do not understand this routine when parents kick out their babies out of the bedroom when they are four or six months old.
I was feeding my babies on demand not every three to four hours. I certainly do not have that routine for myself. I always have a drink or a snack between the big meals. And what is the big meal for a baby or a snack? They are the same: milk.
I also do not understand parents who in this weather and season let their daughters come to school wearing a short skirt and no tights. Mind you the parents keep themselves warm. One mum brings her kid in the pushchair without shoes, just socks. She has to spend approx. 30 min outside. I cannot look at those feet not even covered with a blanket. Does it not sound as a neglect?

Have had 2 children.

With my first child (DS), I felt compelled to impose some kind of routine and 'train' him ... he wasn't having any of it and we were both bloody miserable whilst I tried. There was so much pressure from DH, MIL (and the stupid books I read), but it was mainly a load of bollocks which did nothing but upset us.

With my second child (DD), I swung the other way, resolved to let her set the pace and we have been much happier.

HOWEVER ... even though my DS did resist a large part of what I tried to impose, some of it worked (like, being happy with whichever parent put him to bed), which allowed me some occasional freedom in the evenings. With DD, I have been housebound every day after 6pm since I had her, as she is so very traumatised if I am not around when bedtime approaches.

I am going out next week, for the first time in a year. I am dreading leaving her with her Dad for bedtime, although I really feel I should, because the balance has swung too far the other way. She is over 2 now ... surely the time has come!