Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Child-safe in minutes.

Meet the Other Phone.
Child-safe in minutes.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Upset by friends facebook status - I know I probably am but find it genuienely distressing!

256 replies

RoseGarden123 · 03/03/2013 20:49

Saw friends facebook status about leaving her 6 week old DS to CIO to get him onto a healthy routine. this baby was born 4 weeks early. I text her to see if everything was ok. When she said she couldn't deal with doing the CIO but thought it was the best thing to establish a routine early ,I sent her a link to some info which I said had found really helpful in the early days. I'll admit the link was to some unconditional/ AP type parenting approach, her response was she didn't go in for the 'hippy' stuff and she wanted to make sure that her DS knew who was boss from day one and wasn't going to 'win' and after 3 hours he had gone to sleep.
I am not upset at all about her rejecting the info link, I sent it very tactfully and everyone chooses their own path in parenting but seriously CIO with a prem 6 week old, am I completely off the mark when I think this is very upsetting and worrying?!

OP posts:
OutsideOverThere · 04/03/2013 14:03

we can but hope.

DonderandBlitzen · 04/03/2013 14:09

I don't think it really matters whether or not MNetters are crying or raiding the biscuit barrel. It is the baby most people are concerned about, not how many tears have been shed by Mnetters.

FellNel · 04/03/2013 14:13

I could never ever do it, and I don't understand a mother who can, to be honest. Either they really need help or they have a heart of stone.

RandallPinkFloyd · 04/03/2013 14:55

Dear god, is there really any need for the keening and wailing and competitive upset?

I don't believe for a single second that this woman left her 6 week old baby completely alone and screaming for 3 hours. Don't believe a word of it.

Not one person on here apart from the OP knows this woman at all. Yet you are all happy to condemn her as an abuser because she said something overly defensive.

Have none of you ever said something daft when you felt criticised or pushed into a corner? I certainly have.

I've heard no mention of a father at all so can only presume she is an LP. Can any of you imagine what it must be like to be a lone parent to a newborn baby? I'm not surprised she's being defensive I'd be she feels judged every step she takes.

OP if you really do want to be a good friend, and you haven't started this thread just to show what a wonderful person you are for being so terribly upset, then go round and see her. Hold the baby for 10 minutes so she can have a shower. Make her a cup of tea, maybe even talk to her in a completely non-judgemental way rather than as the parent she so obviously admires and offer to go round in the evening a few times to give her some moral support.

As for all the "I'm so upset", "well I'm in tears", "well I feel sick", "well I've actually been sick", "well I feel faint at the horror" nonsense, words fail me.

FellNel · 04/03/2013 14:59

As for all the "I'm so upset", "well I'm in tears", "well I feel sick", "well I've actually been sick", "well I feel faint at the horror" nonsense, words fail me.

I did a proper LOL at that.

But this is Mumsnet. What would it be without a bit of hysterical over-reaction? Grin

FellNel · 04/03/2013 15:01

Actually, come to think of it, the frequency of hysterical over-reactions to things is the main reason I post on here only 25% as much as I used to. Most of you are all mad/wrong.

babanouche · 04/03/2013 15:05

Felnel, yes they are, aren't they? Grin

RandallPinkFloyd · 04/03/2013 15:08

It would be hilarious if it wasn't actual grown adults!

INeedThatForkOff · 04/03/2013 15:10

I need to get back to DD and can't read the thread, but send her a link to this (I'm sure it's been suggested already). Better still, put it on her FB status.

Vodkapleasenurse · 04/03/2013 15:30

I personally think her post was a load of bollocks.
I don't think anyone would leave a newborn to cry for 3 hours and then post about it on bragbook.
She probably doesn't understand the term CIO maybe she meant that she was trying to get the baby to go down to sleep for 3 hours and is proud that she persevered despite some crying?!
Would a baby that young even have the energy to cry constantly for 3 hours?
Maybe you need to stop taking people's stupid facebook comments as an absolute testament to what has happened, not sure many people who abuse children would advertise the fact to there 'friends' Hmm
I also think that sending her articles about AP was very patronising.

mylittlepuds · 04/03/2013 15:48

Some people have very strange and annoying ideas re. 'showing the baby who is boss' and 'spoiling' babies. It makes me feel very angry but I'm sure they will slag me off for being a 'soft touch' and 'making a rod for my own back' etc etc. When it comes to parenting it pays just to keep schtum about other people's ideas and methods. They won't thank you for them.

crashdoll · 04/03/2013 16:19

Please do NOT ever link her to this thread. There have been some vile posts on here, hysterical doesn't even come close. Apparently, if you don't call this mum a cunt, it means you condone letting her letting her newborn CIO.

whoneedssleepanyway · 04/03/2013 16:38

I personally highly doubt that she left her baby crying for 3 hours without any intervention. People have a tendancy to massively over-exxagerate things on FB to get sympathy and attention.

I went through hideous sleep deprivation with DD2 and even at my lowest ebb I could not deal with the crying for more than minutes at a time.

What I imagine the 3 hours refers to is how long the baby took to fully settle, I imagine that there were periods of quiet, whimpering etc and other bits of full blown crying.

I genuinely think there is no way the vast majority of people could leave a baby screaming its lungs out for 3 hours, I also doubt that a newborn baby would have enough energy to scream it out for 3 hours and would have fallen asleep much before that. I know I am making some huge assumptions here but I find her FB post a bit hard to believe.

I don't agree with CIO for a baby that young or even much older and as others say I wouldn't leave an older child crying for that long.

whoneedssleepanyway · 04/03/2013 16:39

Vodka just seen you pretty much said what I was thinking already.

slatternlymother · 04/03/2013 16:45

I seriously, SERIOUSLY doubt that baby was crying for 3 hours.

*What I imagine the 3 hours refers to is how long the baby took to fully settle, I imagine that there were periods of quiet, whimpering etc and other bits of full blown crying.

I genuinely think there is no way the vast majority of people could leave a baby screaming its lungs out for 3 hours, I also doubt that a newborn baby would have enough energy to scream it out for 3 hours and would have fallen asleep much before that.*

I think that is what happened. It probably wasn't 3 hours either; I bet that was a massive exaggeration by either the OP, or the Facebook friend.

OutsideOverThere · 04/03/2013 16:46

'I've heard no mention of a father at all so can only presume she is an LP. Can any of you imagine what it must be like to be a lone parent to a newborn baby?' er...yes Hmm and I imagine many of us are in a similar position.

It's bloody hard.

Goldenbear · 04/03/2013 16:48

Miaow, there is a difference between showing compassion and self - obssessed melodrama. Save your custard creams for your support group for parents who neglect their newborn babies!

Goldenbear · 04/03/2013 16:58

What I find difficult to understand is how someone CAN'T understand the term CIO. It is pretty obvious what Cry It Out means unless you haven't two brain cells to rub together. Anyway, the OP said that had texted that her friend was not very keen on doing it but would anyway. So there is no misunderstanding.

RandallPinkFloyd · 04/03/2013 17:01

Well if there are many people on here who know what it's like to be a lone parent to a newborn I would suggest they quit the hysteria and think a bit more rationally.

I don't, my DS was 4mo when I became an LP so the newborn stage was over by then.

I do remember feeling very defensive though, if I'm honest I still can be if I think someone is judging me for their own gratification. I'm not presuming the mother in question is feeling like that but it's a pretty safe assumption going by some of the hand-wringing crap being spouted on here.

Competing over who is the most upset about a half story that is highly unlikely to be what it seems is not what I would term rational behaviour.

Sometimes the things people post on FB aren't a completely full account of their lives. Crazy thought I know, but it's true.

OutsideOverThere · 04/03/2013 17:01

Reading the OP again this is why I hate the books that propose that the best thing for a baby is a routine.

It kind of filters through to the possibly less educated people on the planet and they start doing it off the cuff and too early and so on - like people giving a child food at 6 weeks old.

It makes me so angry that people try and promote these routine ideas to make money when it's nothing to do with the welfare of babies whatsoever - vis all the brilliant, happy and well adjusted good sleepers out there who never ever had a routine imposed on them in their short life.

It's all BOLLOCKS.

OutsideOverThere · 04/03/2013 17:03

I'm not being hysterical at all. And I missed the bit where there was a competition. Sorry.

Yes it can make you feel very vulnerable, and alone and desperate. I don't get what that has to do with doing CIO though?

Vodkapleasenurse · 04/03/2013 17:07

Great minds whoneeds, although you put it far more eloquently than me. Grin

RandallPinkFloyd · 04/03/2013 17:08

I agree that baby books are bollocks, I also don't agree with CIO. I agree that the mother must feel very stressed and very vulnerable, that's why I believe what she's said is nothing more than defensiveness.

What I don't believe is that this baby was left alone and crying for 3hours.

LineRunner · 04/03/2013 17:10

36 weeks is moderately premature, Cansu.

OutsideOverThere · 04/03/2013 17:13

I see Randall - yes you may be right on that, we don't know what exactly happened.

I do think CIO with a 6 week old is verging on abuse though - sorry. I don't mean intentional abuse as I said earlier on. But I think an intervention is probably required by the HV or such if this poor gal thinks it's the answer.

It isn't just the fact that the baby will be emotionally affected. It could quite easily be dangerous if she does actually leave it by itself for any length of time, crying - they can get into a terrible state, vomit, choke, etc etc.

I really hope her difficulty in carrying on with it (as referenced in OP) serves to stop her from doing this again. I really do. And you never know.