To tell you all how much of a crock of shite sleep training is...

[Butusernamessuck]

And how unreasonable it is to propagate that utter torrid hell onto tired and desperate parents.

2 hours into what is labled as "gentle sleep training" with my ebf Velcro baby and my entire family will never be the same.

The baby in question is distraught despite constant physical and verbal reassurance from me. He's vomited all over himself, me, his cot and my bed. 35 minutes after giving up he is still shaking and sobbing (and dry heaving) in between frantic breastfeeds. Hes scratched his face to the point of bleeding and cried himself hoarse.

I was present the whole time. Shhhhing, patting and stroking as per the "suffle" method. Picking up and soothing and putting back down with a kiss and reassurance. He just screamed. And screamed. And screamed.

At the 2 hour mark he threw up and choked on it. Thats when I gave up.

Not, however before deeply traumatising my baby, myself and all my other kids.

He obviously woke them all up. The 5 year old has fallen asleep crying in my bed, the 11 year old stormed off back to bed with headphones after telling me he thinks sleep training is abusive and the 9 year old sat outside my room, shaking the whole time. Once I gave up and begun cleaning up the vomit he asked me if I did that to him as a baby. I told him no, this baby is the only one I've had as a single parent and as a result of the disrupted 3 or 4 hours a night I am really struggling. I tried this out of utter desperation because I had read on here that although it may be a bit hard going, it really works and is torally harmless.

9 year old just sighed and said he doesn't think the baby will forgive me as he couldn't if i did that to him. Hes not sure he can forgive me for doing it to the baby, apparently he didn't think he had a mean mum.

So. My review of sleep training someone who simply cannot rationalise what's happening.. Snake oil bull shit that ruins lives.

If it worked for you whoopie friggin do .. You lucked out .. Implying to parents on their knees with exhaustion that it is a one stop cure all for naughty babies manipulating love and affection is barbaric

Hes finally asleep .. Still making sobbing noises .. Or maybe that's just one of the other kids. Or me.

You sound like a fab Mum, by the way.

Beautiful baby!

I tried this with my baby a month or so ago.

I could have written your post! Baby, me and whole family traumatised. 13 year old daughter said it was abusive and I finally gave up when baby threw up and couldnt catch his breath.

I will never, ever do this again!

He is snuggled up in bed in between me and my husband and is very happy. I have come to terms with my beautiful space invader and will deal with it when he’s older and able to understand more.

I haven’t read everything so sorry if I’m repeating stuff already said but be very wary of any advice that is sold to you (books/sleep consultants) that goes against your instincts.
People who are looking to make money cash in on sleep deprived parents and are clever at doing it.
Your instincts have served you well with your older children so trust them this time too.
I don’t know any grown adults that need a boob in their mouths to sleep (at least not their mothers)
Babies don’t need to be taught to self settle, they need to be soothed until they are developmentally ready to do it on their own (not usually before 3)
People who have sleep trained need to convince themselves that it worked and it was worth it otherwise they’d all be feeling as crap as you are. I think they work so hard on convincing themselves it wasn’t a horrid thing to do to the child that they then try to convince everyone else too.
If it feels wrong it probably is!

@bellver888

aw op he is a little beauty! you’re doing a fab job, high 5 supermama x

Thank you :)

@PieInTheSky71

You sound like a fab Mum, by the way.

Thanks he really is a cutie

@Julianamechange

Beautiful baby!

I tried this with my baby a month or so ago.

I could have written your post! Baby, me and whole family traumatised. 13 year old daughter said it was abusive and I finally gave up when baby threw up and couldnt catch his breath.

I will never, ever do this again!

He is snuggled up in bed in between me and my husband and is very happy. I have come to terms with my beautiful space invader and will deal with it when he’s older and able to understand more.

Thank you :) we had a lovely night ironically, only had 2 feeds hah!!

@Wobbitcatcher

I haven’t read everything so sorry if I’m repeating stuff already said but be very wary of any advice that is sold to you (books/sleep consultants) that goes against your instincts. People who are looking to make money cash in on sleep deprived parents and are clever at doing it. Your instincts have served you well with your older children so trust them this time too. I don’t know any grown adults that need a boob in their mouths to sleep (at least not their mothers) Babies don’t need to be taught to self settle, they need to be soothed until they are developmentally ready to do it on their own (not usually before 3) People who have sleep trained need to convince themselves that it worked and it was worth it otherwise they’d all be feeling as crap as you are. I think they work so hard on convincing themselves it wasn’t a horrid thing to do to the child that they then try to convince everyone else too. If it feels wrong it probably is!

Thank you, support and validation has helped me so much through all this

I feel for you so much. My first baby never took to any type of sleep training and I always felt so angry reading on mumsnet about how easy it was. My second was an amazing sleeper and totally different personality. Rest assured, one night will not have damaged your baby. It's how you parent and love him the rest of the time that matters. Are we all perfect 100 per cent of the time?? We all have moments we want to forget and pray nobody ever witnessed. Your other children are almost certainly as fed up with lockdown as the rest of us and were venting natural frustration. Take a deep breath, carry on being a wonderful mum and keep plodding. You are doing great.

People who have sleep trained need to convince themselves that it worked and it was worth it otherwise they’d all be feeling as crap as you are. I think they work so hard on convincing themselves it wasn’t a horrid thing to do to the child that they then try to convince everyone else too.
If it feels wrong it probably is!

See, this is the sort of thing I was talking about.

Forgive me, but at least advice geared towards encouraging sleep training is usually fairly practical. This sort of stuff, the reverse side, is so judgemental and toxic.

I'm not trying to "convince" myself of anything, my DD is a very happy little girl, and never reacted anywhere close to how OPs child reacted, either.

Aw, I want one! A huge bathroom that is. Non sleeping babies I’ve had my share of.

Good luck OP, you’re doing your best x

@flossletsfloss

I feel for you so much. My first baby never took to any type of sleep training and I always felt so angry reading on mumsnet about how easy it was. My second was an amazing sleeper and totally different personality. Rest assured, one night will not have damaged your baby. It's how you parent and love him the rest of the time that matters. Are we all perfect 100 per cent of the time?? We all have moments we want to forget and pray nobody ever witnessed. Your other children are almost certainly as fed up with lockdown as the rest of us and were venting natural frustration. Take a deep breath, carry on being a wonderful mum and keep plodding. You are doing great.

I think you're 100% correct we are all totally sick of each other and that night was just horrible all round.

Everyone seems much happier today. Thank goodness.

@aSofaNearYou

*People who have sleep trained need to convince themselves that it worked and it was worth it otherwise they’d all be feeling as crap as you are. I think they work so hard on convincing themselves it wasn’t a horrid thing to do to the child that they then try to convince everyone else too. If it feels wrong it probably is!*

See, this is the sort of thing I was talking about.

Forgive me, but at least advice geared towards encouraging sleep training is usually fairly practical. This sort of stuff, the reverse side, is so judgemental and toxic.

I'm not trying to "convince" myself of anything, my DD is a very happy little girl, and never reacted anywhere close to how OPs child reacted, either.

Im so sorry if this made you feel targeted. You have been incredibly kind and respectful to me and I really appreciate that.

I cant speak for others obviously but my ire and similar disdain for the issues listed in the post that replied is more aimed at the sort of people that belittle other peoples struggles with this issue.

We all know the posts.. There's been a few on this thread. People that obviously feel the beed to be nasty to validate thier own guilt.

You dobt fall into that category by a wide margin

Thankyou OP, and likewise I really don't want to derail your thread too much, because you aren't one of the people I've talked about!

The main kind of pressure and judgment I encountered when I was vulnerable and sleep deprived from looking after a young baby, were people saying in no uncertain terms that only total responsiveness to young children is acceptable, and any other approach is shameful and cruel. It can really mess with people's heads, and the comments that such mothers should also feel a deep sense of shame in hindsight are really harmful. We all trust our instincts, and I don't feel I have let my daughter down at all. I am responsive to her, but she also has quite a strong, investigative, independent spirit. She isn't and wasn't scarred by us gently encouraging her to enjoy falling asleep by herself. She sings and plays while she drifts off.

A lot of people have talked about trusting your instincts, and it works both ways. I think if more people focused on that and didn't feel it was necessary to raise their approach up by describing the other as cruel or lazy, mother's wouldn't experience so much guilt and doubt.

I'm really glad this experience has only made you feel more confident in your own approach, wishing you all the best!

Glad the bouncer worked!

Sleep training was very effective for us for nights but not at other times. I definitely remember the horrible feeling of 'this isn't working but if I quit now I'll break it'. And DD2 was much more complicated at night than DS1.

I agree the 'if it doesn't work you're not doing it right' philosophy is unhelpful. It makes you try to suppress your instincts and you need them.

Every baby is so different. Both of mine were absolutely maddened by any attempt to stay in the room with them but leaving them alone for short periods was fairly effective.

About the sids posts; the significant risk factors for sids are smoking, front sleeping and blankets etc in the crib. There's no conclusive evidence that room sharing makes any difference. I think it is weird and unhelpful that the nhs have this in their guidelines alongside stuff that actually matters.

@aSofaNearYou it’s all about balance isn’t it?!? You get judgment on both sides. For some reason it focuses a lot on breast feeding and co sleeping/ sleep training. As I said before - we tried sleep training and like the OP it was awful. I also bf ‘Ed for two years. The amount of judgment I have come in for because of those choices. I did both because I found them to be best for our situation. I have never judged anyone for their choices. Yet.... I do push back hard when I have been so judged. Eg, a friend who said bf ‘ing past three months was unnecessary and ‘icky’. Just so happened she bf’ed for three months. To which I responded that she should apprise the NHS and WHO of her findings on the topic, as they were in contradiction with their guidance.
I don’t know why we women do this to each other.... I really don’t! Why can’t we jst think that almost all mothers try their bloody best with the circumstances, resources and children they have. And none of us are perfect. ‘Attachment parenting’ happened to be what I did. This was chosen by my child as much as anything. I had read all the contented little baby books. He did not cooperate.

OP I've been there!

3 sleep hating children.

Baby 1, we did CIO every night for about a year. He slept through for the first time when he was 5.

Baby 2, I didn't even bother to by a cot. He slept through when he was 6.

Baby 3, has a cot a d I paid someone £350 to help me get him to sleep before I went back to work when he was 12 months. It did not work.

He's now 2 years old, still breast fed, starts in his cot, ends up in my bed and still wakes 2-6 times a night.

He'll sleep through when he is 6 no doubt.

I feel you. I really really do.

Oh my god yes. Will this be the 2020s revolution of parenting styles - "Balanced Parenting"?

It feels like everything is divided into camps and god forbid you have a foot in two at once. It's like you can't just breastfeed, you have to exclusively breastfeed until they're exactly 26 weeks old before they have their first taste of broccoli (only offered via BLW on a bamboo plate of course) and then extended breastfeed until they self wean. Never ever even look at formula in the supermarket. In fact go completely off dairy products yourself because now you know what baby calves give up and you're unutterably sad about it. Otherwise you're not properly dedicated to the breastfeeding cause. Or you have to bottle feed from birth, be fending off the "breastapo" at every moment, only use a Tommee Tippee perfect prep machine and pooh pooh anyone who wonders whether it really meets guidelines. Have the baby on a routine number of ozs every 3-4 hours and wean at 4 months onto a carefully constructed Annabel Karmel rainbow of home made purees.

Co-sleep until they're 11 or have them in their own room sleeping through the night from 6 weeks old.

Practice perfectly positive gentle discipline where you only whisper to your child, any words with a slightly negative connotation are banned and they are total equals with an equal say in everything in the household vs run a tight ship with strictness on the slightest behaviour so the DC know who's boss etc etc etc.

I mean who really parents like this?? Nobody does because you'd go insane. Despite those blogs where somebody seems to, or Facebook groups where you get piled on for vaguely suggesting something slightly angled towards the opposite "camp". It's all bullshit. Balance is what real life is about and how people actually live.

Yup. Balance and a withholding judgment. How about.... that wouldn’t have/doesn’t work for us, but shur different families do different things. It’s like we are all frantically trying to justify our own ‘choices’ which were in fact less choices and more coping mechanisms by frowning upon anyone who does it differently.

This surely has to be the way forward.
Accepting there isn't one correct parenting method.
That different things work for different babies, parents and situations.

@Aria999

About the sids posts; the significant risk factors for sids are smoking, front sleeping and blankets etc in the crib. There's no conclusive evidence that room sharing makes any difference. I think it is weird and unhelpful that the nhs have this in their guidelines alongside stuff that actually matters.

This is helpful. Where did you read this?

@WineInTheWillows

Emily oster's 'crib sheet' most recently (we also did a review of the research a few years before she wrote it, DH is good at that stuff)

@BertieBotts I agree there there is definitely a massive lack of balance. I am in a few Facebook breastfeeding groups (because I am still feeding my 14 month old) and yes anyone who mentions weaning before 26 weeks (even if advised by a paediatrician) gets told that they are irreparably damaging their child. Anyone who wants to give their baby the odd bottle of formula or a bottle once a day so that they can let their husband feed a bottle and get some sleep is pretty much told it will ruin their supply. All of mine have had some formula. I also joined the beyond sleep training group and they seem to be pretty much against any even gentle nudging to better sleep. The respectful sleep training group was the other end of the spectrum where parents were leaving small babies to scream for hours and there was a whole section on cleaning up babies who had cried so hard they were sick, apparently they do so to manipulate!

They vomit to manipulate???!!! I think I ve heard it all now.

@BeardyButton according to the group! I found it such an upsetting group. On some posts mums were almost bragging about how many hours they had left their babies to cry it out for.