'The only way we've sorted a sleep prob in this house is controlled crying' - fuck off!!

[Smataya]

I text friend who has two under two how hard it's been of late with Ds 11 months just not sleeping. I've explained before he is just not a sleeper and likes to be close at night, wakes a lot for milk and that I'm doing attachment parenting. She knows how against cc I am and I will not ever leave my child to cry. Ds has not slept for longer than an hour since he was 5 months which is starting to take its toll, but as I say, he's just not a sleeper and it's tough.

Why the f is she doing this pa bull shit about cc over text?? She's been like eerr have you tried sleep training to me before and I just don't want to hear it. Her two sleep through and I just find it smug- she's got lucky and now claiming its all down to cc. Am I justified in texting back to say ftfo to the far side of fuck?!?!

OP, sleep deprivation is hideous, I really feel for you and others on this thread who are going through this.

The baby whisperer methods worked for my DS. DD was a bit of a different matter and I did do CC with her. It worked very quickly.

I'm a bit baffled by the extreme discomfort - not to mention horribly judgmental opinions - a few people on this thread seem to have concerning children crying. My toddler cried for the best part of 15 minutes the other day because I wouldn't let her open the oven door when it was switched on. Despite the crying, I'm still pretty sure I made the right decision in her best interests.
So I'm not sure that sleep is much different, your role is to guide them into the behaviour that's best for them, and there may be a bit of crying because that's what babies do.
I'm tempted to say that it's not a big deal, but clearly it is indeed a really big deal to a lot of people.
Like I say - baffled.

Yep, SheWhoMustBe, I think you've nailed it: "your role is to guide them into the behaviour that's best for them"

I'm astounded my two have made it to late teens, reading some of the shit on this thread. Some of these labels are new to me - we just did what seemed right/sensible to us at the time (a little bit of most of what's been mentioned on here) and, maybe we were just lucky, but we've ended up with two happy, confident, secure and well-adjusted young adults.

Why do some people have to be so bloody nasty about other people's parenting choices? What the fuck has it got to do with anyone else? Live and let live.

I know this has been said before (MrsD said it perfectly on her first post) but the options are not as stark as leaving baby to cry for hours on end or doing AP.

There is a middle ground involving encouraging self settling (e.g. by not feeding to sleep), not rushing to baby when they are just a bit restless as opposed to full on crying, getting into a bit of a routine (but not necessarily a schedule iykwim).

I did this with both mine and it worked like a dream. I can hardly remember them crying, but then I did it from early on (I found I had to stop DD feeding to sleep because she'd fall asleep within seconds of feed starting, and then was always hungry!), so it didn't come as a shock to them.

I do feel a little bit sorry for DCs when CC or CIO is used all of a sudden after years of AP/cosleeping etc as it must be a real shock. However, very poor sleep patterns do need to be addressed for the sake of the whole family.

What do you think is waking your dc op? My dc was not a sleeper and would not go to sleep by himself - but when I watched him waking up it was seemingly triggered by his Startle reflex - getting a woombie swaddle pod was a godsend - it stopped the startle reflex waking him up and got him into the next sleep cycle.

We tried pick up put down technique which was sometimes successful but we ended up cosleeping - but that was just about getting him to sleep which is not your problem - yours is getting him to stay asleep.

Also have you considered silent reflux ? Or try patting to sleep if you can catch him before he wakes iyswim - so he doesn't wake and get milk but is eased back in to the next sleep cycle.

I've had my eye on this thread today and have read a lot of it. I am an anxious parent and a bit of an old hippy. I did a lot of baby led stuff which was great as we had very individual dc. Sticking rigidly to a method that works for other people/babies is fine if it works. This plainly isn't working and you need to accept that at nearly 1 your dc has attached to you, trusts you and needs to start existing as a separate entity.
I had a prem high needs baby who didn't sleep and it was hell. I can remember driving and being frightened that I wasn't in control. Have you thought about dc2? Will dc2 get this much attention? Will dc1 suddenly be turned loose at 2 while mummy gives total focus to the new baby?
Everyone saying it's natural is ignoring the fact that without contraception there could be a newborn competitor soon. AP is a product of the 20th century.

lennon I couldn't let your circumcision comments go.

The Australasian paediatricians and surgeons do not feel that the benefits of routine circumcision outweigh the benefits - this is their official position on the issue. There have been some recent reviews published in the 'Archives of Paediatrics' which is a UK journal.

1. recent North American studies are not finding that there's a reduction in most transmission in STIs in circumcised males. This includes herpes and genital warts. The exception is candidiasis which is easily treated.
2. HIV transmission is decreased with circumcision but is not considered a reason to circumcise in people who don't live in Africa.
3. in a boy with normal renal/urological anatomy you would need to circumcise 111 (that's one hundred and eleven!) infant boys to prevent one UTI (again from the 'Archives of Paeds') Moreover a UTI is easily treated once recognised.
4. increasingly surgeons here are uncomfortable with removing body parts when the medical benefit is not thought to outweigh the risks.

As a mother of an infant boy all of the above weighed into my decision not to even consider circumcision but for me, ultimately, it comes down to, "It's not my penis".

Sorry for the derailment.

there's nothing worse than someone who whinges but refuses to accept help

Exactly Locating Dogmatic proponents of anything whether religion or parenting theories are likely to be blinkered.

I'm definitely not AP but far too much of a softy to stick to a rigorous routine. I just tried to set up good habist for myself as much as DS.

So he always slept in his own moses basket/cot - never in bed with us;
I breastfeed but introduced a bottle early on and topped him up with formula in the evening from about 10 weeks;
I tried to stick to a regular bedtime routine of bath/bottle/bed by 7 from early days;
I'd let him grizzle in his cot & try not to rush in at the first cry to see if he'd go back to sleep;
When he still kept up his 4am waking at 7 months, long after 3 solid meals were well-establised I night weaned him and got DH to soothe him - took 2 nights of broken sleep until he slept through til 6.30!! Amazing. Now we are contending with 5.30am wakes ups but that's another story...

So I guess I fall more to the routine-y end of the spectrum than AP but I breastfeed, and I'd never leave him to cry it out... it doesn't have to be all slings and bed-sharing an feeding on demand round the clock to breastfeed and have "secure happy children"

Why isn't Pragmatic Parenting a thing? Has a lot more going for it than either of the other crazily rigid philosophies and I bet most people do it!

I agree gennz

It's funny, I hadn't heard of AP until fairly recently. I had heard of CC and various other sleep training methods, but didn't feel like they would be something I'd want to do.

But actually when it came down to it, I just used my instinct, was adaptable and never ever labeled myself as any "type" of parent.

As it goes, DS was a moderate sleeper, waking a few times a night for a breastfeed up until about 6-8 months. I just fed him as it was the quickest and easiest way to get him back to sleep. I did worry about bad habits and the like, but I think you have to do what you have to do, whatever is best for the baby, but you have to also consider yourself.

When feeding back to sleep no longer worked as he wouldn't settle and refused to unlatch, I started taking him into bed with me and feeding lying down, so I could get some rest and he would eventually fall asleep. I had previously said I would never co-sleep! Like I say, you do what you have to do.

Eventually, it was switching to formula that prompted him sleeping through. He goes 8-6.30 now (he's just turned 1), occasionally I hear him wake in the night but he manages to settle himself. If he didn't though, I guess I would be looking for answers as to how I can help to teach him how to. Would I have resorted to CC? Maybe, I don't know. I'm lucky I didn't need to.

But why am I awake at 3.12 in the morning if I have a baby who sleeps through? Well I think I need to sleep train myself. I suffer from terrible insomnia, and ironically enough I actually slept better when DS used to wake up as I used to be able to go straight back to sleep after a feed. Now I find myself awake for a big chunk of the night most nights. Grrrr!

I know this has been said before (MrsD said it perfectly on her first post) but the options are not as stark as leaving baby to cry for hours on end or doing AP

And AP doesn't mean "if your baby wakes every hour you just have to put up with it", either! A lot of us gave OP suggestions for non-CC methods to try upthread, many of which are totally compatible with AP principles (even methods involving some crying, if it's crying with a parent there comforting rather than crying alone). I hope she finds something that works for her.

I wouldn't have done CC with mine, because I know what state she very quickly got herself into if left to cry alone. If I'd had one that just grumbled and whinged a bit, or could be calmed down again without being taken out of the cot, I might have considered it. Different things work for different babies and different families. In mine, we're still cosleeping at 16 months because that's the way to everyone getting the most sleep for us - she still doesn't sleep through, but she sleeps much better than she used to.

(Although the reason I'm awake at 4.45am is because she was just talking loudly in her sleep, again, so things may change again in the near future.)

I never did any form of sleep training, but if my child were really sleeping no more than an hour at a time I'd be asking my GP for a referral to a paediatrician. I'd want to rule out a medical issue before assuming it was mother error...

I'm all for pragmatic parenting and against reading books/websites by gurus of any sort. Most either make it up or make it up and then add cherry picked research which is often completely inappropriate. AP gurus using attachment theory based on Bowlby's horrible experiments or the extremes of Romanian orphanages are I think amongst the worst because they make parents/ mothers think that they are harming their children terribly if they do not respond to their every need or murmur.

Patently this is simply not true. If you took a class of average five year olds you would not be able to tell what parenting approach their parents had taken, so long as they were loved and cared for. Children that have experienced neglect or abuse are seriously damaged. Children that have cried for a few nights are no different to those that did not. All children cry after all, and cortisol is produced when we are very tired as well as when we are upset.

I have teenagers now and believe me when I have talked to their friends parents about which children were good sleepers and which ones were not, or which ones were cuddled to sleep and which ones were left to cry for short periods there are no particular correlations to the current health or happiness. Really! The only child where I'd say early childhood had made a difference is dd's very fragile friend who spent far too long with a drug addicted mother.

Oh and for what it's worth we did CC with ds (although i think it was a bit more baby whisperer) very successfully but the same approach failed totally with dd. Different children need different approaches. It's all trial and error this parenting lark.

Peaches geldof had drug problems long before she was a parent. And lots of mainstream parents die the same way but their parenting is not seen as the cause.

Just as an example, Peaches Geldof was an advocate of AP. She might have done slightly better if she'd chosen a less stressful style of parenting which enabled her to stay off the drugs a bit more effectively.

That's a really nasty comment. I understand some posters have been rude and judgmental on this thread, while arguing against CC and so on, but I would like to suggest that those accusing me of being horrible go back and read my posts, as I don't think I was horrible in any of them.

I did state that one comment someone made was 'rubbish', for which I apologise. I still disagree with it but I shouldn't have said it like that.

For what it's worth, I do not judge people who do CC properly, at an appropriate time, with an older child. I don't know what their lives are like and it can be fine IMO when the child is really secure and knows you will come back and can get up and come to you if they really feel desperate.

I am also aware of various types of 'sleep training' such as NCSS that are far more gentle and attempt to resolve issues without any crying or upset involved. I don't think these are in the main a bad thing.

I do think that there is a heck of a lot of misinformation being disseminated by 'experts' and even health visitors, as there ever was, and we need to be very cautious about that.

Clearly when a baby is really unsettlable, it is important to sort this out and for me that would not involve a knee jerk reaction such as CC but further investigation by a HCP.

I can totally see that people get desperate. I felt desperate when I was under pressure to get my child to sleep in a different room. It was horrible, the level of sleep deprivation for me during those couple of weeks escalated like a rocket and it felt like it would kill me.

As soon as he was back in my bed or at least in my room, it all became manageable again.

THIS is the basis of my argument here. I think that it is VERY important that children and adults get sleep where possible, given the habits of your average baby this is not usually a perfect amount of sleep but that is to be expected. What I really recommend is adjusting the arrangements so that dealing with the inevitable disruption causes the minimum impact.

This is where co sleeping can actually help. Probably not in all cases, some people can't do it or don't like it. But often, it can be really helpful.

I hope that is a bit clearer for those of you who have condemned me out of hand along with 'Lennon'.

The only way we've sorted sleep in our house was using cc.
We never left her for more than three minutes, we never extended it.
And if she'd have become hysterical we'd have abandoned it.

Sleep deprivation was a killer, I was so tired after a year of no more than two hours at a time I'd have tried anything

SorchaN Sat 25-Jul-15 06:14:01

I never did any form of sleep training, but if my child were really sleeping no more than an hour at a time I'd be asking my GP for a referral to a paediatrician. I'd want to rule out a medical issue before assuming it was mother error...

Well this exactly. There has been massive condemnation, probably brought on in part by defensiveness after Lennon's posts, of attachment parenting and responding to a crying baby/not wanting to do CC.

I can see that people want to defend against an attack. Fair enough. But going too far and attacking those who don't do CC is beyond the pale IMO.

Just because the OP doesn't want to do CC it doesn't mean she is the cause of her child's issues, any more than she would be if she had already tried CC and the child continued to sleep badly.

It's just bloody bad luck and whatever she does might not 'work'.

The op is co sleeping though so in that case it obviously isn't helping. It doesn't always as a baby ds hated it at 5 he is much happier in my bed

It might very well not be helping Sirzy. That's not the same as being the cause though is it?

And equally it could be helping in that a different approach might have engendered an even worse result.

We just can't say that for sure.

But it could well be the cause. If you never try differently you won't know.

Illustration: a baby whi wakes every hour being the basis.

Would you find it easier to get out of bed and stumble into a different room, every hour, or to roll over and attend to them where you are?

There could be an element of cause and effect but we don't know that. Generally a child who co sleeps is not considered destined to wake every hour every single night. Mine certainly didn't.

That to me would suggest the cause lies elsewhere, probably, and that while CC might have an impact and provide a miraculous cure, it equally might not.

Yes she could try it (if she can get it together enough to do the research and follow it - which I don't know about if she is very sleep deprived already!) but if she doesn't want to then no one should try and force her to.

iyswim

if she'd chosen a less stressful style of parenting

I don't know that AP is a "more stressful style of parenting".
I didn't choose to "AP" although it is our family style, even my DF who was raised in the 1920s was uunknowingly "APed", as was I.

To me it was the easy option. We all slept in a family bed ( even though I was tandem breastfeeding for a long while), none of is were ever sleep deprived- a little tired on days where the kids had been sick perhaps, but generally I always had my 8-9 hours sleep a night.

TBH AP was a breeze, but again it came naturally to me, I was doing it before I had even heard the term.

I would have found it far more stressful to stick to timetables, carry out complicated sleep routines etc.

AP may sound a stressful way of life, but for us it was the easy option.

I'm not going to give my opinion on CC as it's been done to death already.

However, I would say to the OP that the biggest lesson I have learnt from parenting 2 babies, is that you have to have some flexibility. Babies are individuals and there isn't a one size fits all approach. Sometimes what you have set in your mind isn't what works and you have to try a different method.

I co-slept with both of my children and both were still breastfeeding during the night at 11 months, so I don't think that is particularly unusual. I do think that if there's no illness or teething going on, that every hour is quite frequent though. I don't think it's due to anything you're doing 'wrong', some babies just do wake frequently for whatever reason, but it is an extremely difficult thing for you to sustain and still be able to function effectively.

Take some of the advice which has been given on this thread on board. For example, have a read of the 'No Cry Sleep Solution' and see if there's anything there you could try. Also, do bear in mind that there's a lot going on developmentally wise for your baby right now and this (along with the myriad of other things!) can have a big impact on sleep patterns.

But people suggesting she asks for a referal to a pead - the first thing a GP or HV would ask is what has been tried and I doubt if you said you hadn't tried anything different you would get anywhere with a refferal.

Different things work for different babies and you can't just assume that because it works for you it will work for everyone. It's a case of trial and error. Even two siblings different approaches will work. The problem with being too rigid is it can make things harder than they need to be.