To try cry it out

[Pippinsqueak]

Please be gentle, first time chronically sleep deprived mum of a 14th month old baby that is breast fed to sleep and when she wakes. She wakes almost hourly and has done since birth. I'm starting to loose it.

Aibu to try gentle cry it out? I don't even know where to start as I've always avoided it as I was told it's not the right thing to do by health visitors/gps etc. She is also still in our room in a cot bed on the other side so was thinking to move her in there soon.

Any advice on cry it out ? Also I am seeing a breastfeeding specialist when c-19 is over to wean off boob

Thanks in advance.

Only I never said I loved my child more than others ffs

Sunshiness there was no ‘convincing’ in it! I wholeheartedly agreed with my sleep consultant that he had a sleep problem (or I should say she agreed with me: I engaged her services because I thought that his sleep was problematic).

I should say I also absolutely judge you for saying you don’t value your job and colleagues that highly. You are, presumably, paid to do a job of work - and you should do it to the best of your ability. Which includes not being chronically sleep deprived. I’m afraid that people you, who are content not to be fully on top of your job, really give working mothers a bad name.

Yes totally agree pentium, all I'm saying is that this shouldn't make us downplay the risks of sleep training and pretend it's no biggie. Or silence those who find it horrible by calling them guilt trippers. Then there'll be even less understanding by employers over time, and even more pressure that everyone has to sleep train. Surely it should be acceptable to talk about how horrible it is for mums to do, advise others on any possible alternatives, and hence keep some pressure up on employers to grant more flexibility for parents. Again the ones we also silence when we silence mothers intuitions are the children, who can't speak up for themselves.

@Sunshiness it's possible for @Piglet89 to value her role as a mother as well as the one at work. The two are not mutually exclusive.

It's digs like this that undermine any point you are trying to make. Because it just comes across as 'I'm a better mum because I don't train and suffer' or 'you're a selfish mum for wanting to sleep' and not about how to improve baby/toddler sleep at all.

@Sunshiness You keep reiterating the risks of sleep training... what are these exactly? Are you able to tell a sleep trained child from one that isn't?

And what about parents with more than one child to tend to? What if you have three and one is crying while you deal with another? Will they be 'damaged' because you can't instantly drop everything to tend to them?

I value my mum role and my relationship with my child more highly for now than this one year of my career and my relationship with my colleagues your words Sunshiness
Also do you only have one child? It’s easier to sit for hours comforting a 14 month old if you don’t have another child to feed, help with homework, get ready for bed etc!

@yulertula

I can answer that question for you.

As a teacher, I cannot tell the children who were sleep trained, in exactly the same way I can't tell which children were breastfed.

There are so so so many other factors which contribute to a child be raised in a secure and loving household.

piglet Of course she wasn't pushy, she needed you to trust her and she may well have been absolutely well meaning. I mean the sleep training industry as a whole has an incentive to create a sleep training culture that skews what we as a society see as normal infant sleep. Then sleep consultant artificially becomes an important "expert role" in that kind of society. Who benefits is that industry, and all our employers (because we do a less rubbish job, despite having children). But who suffers is the children who don't have a voice (and certainly many mums too). The alternative would be a society that regards children as so important that it values caring responsibilities and makes allowances for parents to be a bit less productive for a while.

Sarah Ockwell Smith writes about this in Why your baby's sleep matters

I think what @Sunshiness is trying to say is that sometimes society expects us to raise a certain 'type' of child, and the phase "do you have a good sleeper?" can innately make you feel that you only have a 'good' child if they sleep well, and it is such an often asked question, that some parents feel they must get their child to sleep through whatever means possible so they can turn around and say "yes, my darling child sleeps 12 hours straight" etc etc. And sometimes, often due to previous generations, we are taught leaving a child to cry is the only option.

However, I think in this instance OP was simply saying, understandably, she is at her wits end and has tried everything else. So to cry it out now feels like the only viable option to grab decent nights kip, that will also hopefully produce results in pretty sharpish speed.

Pentium85 as a teacher can you tell which children have had a good nights sleep?

yulertula But I never said the two roles were mutually exclusive?! I think it's great for piglet to feel the way she does about her career - I never passed any judgement on it.

Only I value my relationship with my child more highly THAN THAT WITH MY COLLEAGUES (at least for now while my DD is still small)

Not more highly than other mums

I honestly do not think the sleep training industry is doing anything but providing services for which parents at their wits’ end are crying out. They don’t need to push!!!

Neurologist Matthew Walker also explains in his excellent book “Why we Sleep” why good adult sleep really matters.

Exactly pentium

I value my relationship with my child more highly THAN THAT WITH MY COLLEAGUES (at least for now while my DD is still small) the implication of your statement is that women who choose to train their child to sleep Train, who have to work and can’t be asleep at their desks don’t!

I myself felt close to my wits end when I still believed my child had to be a "good sleeper" like that. Once I let go of that I was no longer at my wits end because I didn't stress about it anymore, and found other ways to cope. Just in case the same might happen to the OP, I shared that perspective. She can take it or leave it - not my business and she knows her own situation best.

What @OnlyFoolsnMothers said.

Only No, it just implies that they might have more alternative ways to cope. For example I am happy to cope with my child's night wakings by losing my own evening downtime or by being rubbish at work. Those who don't want to lose those things or who cannot (because they would lose their job otherwise) don't have those at their disposal. I just described the alternatives that worked for me, it doesn't mean that someone for whom they don't work is a lesser human being than me, I never said anything like that! I just think it's important to consider alternatives to sleep training, rather than making it look as if there are none (for anyone, no matter their circumstances, type of job etc) or they are not worth considering because sleep training is no biggie anyway.

Yes @Sunshiness but it's what's implied, which is different to what is said.

Also we've already established that Sarah Ockwell-Smith is not a sleep expert. She's a mum of 4 with an undergraduate degree in psychology, that happens to write books about parenting.

@onlyfoolsnmothers

Of course I can, slightly silly question.

just think it's important to consider alternatives to sleep training, rather than making it look as if there are none which is fine to say, but when you use the words and phrases just as “value your child”, talk about damaging the mother child bond, etc then you are going to get decent mothers backs up!

As I read it, I said I would in the first instance try to cope by being rubbish at work (lowering my standards at work). Piglet said she would never want to do that as she values her work so much. All the power to her for that. But the implication was that she'd then rather sleep train than lower her standards at work. What did I misunderstand here if that's not what the point was. To me this makes sense, and its a choice - why not own it then!

But there are accounts from mums who were pushed to sleep train and felt it had affected their bond with their child. I didn't make that up! Would you rather those never got talked about? And then that might happen to more mums because everyone is made to believe that it doesn't happen? Why not talk about all sides to the story, and all mothers' experiences, and then everyone can make an informed choice based on their individual situation?

@Sunshiness where are these accounts?

I've read a few over time. Quite a few by people who had used sleep clinics and consultants and couldn't go through with it. Sorry I don't have precise references. Do you honestly believe I am just making this up?

If anyone is interested you can also take a look at The Beyond Sleep Training Project which was mentioned upthread.