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AIBU?

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Original poster

WIBU to ask why people are so weird about cry it out?

408 replies

Worried675 · 24/05/2022 06:34

OK, I know already how this is going to go and what views about this are on Mumsnet, but my question I guess is why people are so against cry it out methods? Recent research showed no differences in babies' behaviour/happiness/attachment etc. between cry it out and other sleep training methods. I'm always surprised by how strongly people are against it, especially as anyone born in the 80s or before probably were trained that way.

Enlighten me! Is using cry it out unreasonable? Why/why not?

OP posts:
Topgub · 25/05/2022 10:35

@Bambi7

And you've done the exact same to anyone disagreeing with you.

Pot kettle

Anyone?

Bambi7 · 25/05/2022 10:36

HelenHywater · 25/05/2022 08:55

I didn't do any sleep training with mine. I was in that rare case you mention below - a single parent with a non-sleeping baby (my youngest didn't sleep through until 18 months), a senior job and older children to parent. It was exhausting. We got through it by co-sleeping. And it's a time that passes.

I grew up in the 70s. I wasn't sleep trained.

Actually I do remember briefly trying shush-pat (I can't remember which book that's from) . That was so stressful! It confused the baby and uspet me.

While I think that everyone makes their own choices, and it's up to them how they parent, my personal view is that sleep training is cruel and too hard on the baby and the parent. Babies don't sleep and our expectations that they do are unrealistic. Most people are lucky enough to have a partner who can and should help them, regardless of their working situation. I also accept that modern day expectations re work, and the lack of family support, don't help with dealing with sleepless nights.

Agreed.

TheLadyofShalott1 · 25/05/2022 19:16

I have baby sat for a young baby twice, once at 5 weeks old, once at about 8 weeks old. I refused to do so after that even though it caused 'big problems'.

I refused because it was the most horrendous few hours I have ever spent (and like most older people I have had a few of those). I literally could not have done it a third time, it was like being tortured.

The mother of the couple told me that the baby had to be put to bed by such and such a time, and then I was not to go into see the baby after that, that "they" left it to cry. The father didn't say anything. I was told that the baby would cry for about an hour before it fell asleep, and it did. My every instinct told me to go to the baby, pick it up, cuddle it, check if it needed a nappy change etc and that it hadn't been sick, or have a temperature etc. But I was pretty sure that it only needed comforting.

By the way, it was in it's own room by then, the mother tried having it in the same room as her for a few weeks, but couldn't hack it any longer - I suppose it was more difficult to ignore the crying if the baby was in the same room.

I actually wanted to report them to the SS, what stopped me was that the mother appeared to have PND, but she wouldn't tell anyone else about her difficulties. But apart from fact that I never saw the mum ever cuddling her baby, and we were only allowed very short cuddles while we gave the baby it's bottle, then it either went in it's cot or one of those bouncy chairs, the baby was putting on an adequate amount of weight, it was bathed, it did wear mainly clean clothes. Dad appeared to not be allowed to do much for the baby except change it's nappies, and the mum moaned at him if he took too long, ie gave it a good clean and applied nappy cream.

Reading this back now, and seeing the child as they are now - nearly into double figures - but completely besotted with it's mother more than any other child I have ever known - they only want to be with their mum, they always behave for their mum, but they play up a lot when their mum isn't there. The mum still palms the child off as much as possible, but there are still very strict rules for anyone looking after the child.

I am very concerned that I made the wrong decision when the child was a baby, but I have heard such awful things about the SS, and about children who go into the care system that I was scared that that would be the wrong decision too. Also I knew the father was there and would stop the mother if she ever got violent with the child - having said that, he did work, and she didn't.

Anyway, that is what being left to "cry it out" means to me, and I could never condone that.

loislovesstewie · 26/05/2022 07:33

Ignoring a baby who is only a few weeks old is child abuse; using the 'pat thing' as I called it when they are much older isn't IMHO. In the latter case, it is enabling a baby to settle,self soothe and get a decent night's sleep. FWIW , I think purely from his behaviour ,that when my 18-month-old started to sleep through the night he became much happier. He was never a grizzly baby, but he became calmer but also more lively during the day. I think the quality of his sleep improved . Clearly, you might disagree , he might well have been on the verge of learning anyway ,I shall never know , I do know that less than 5 minutes of hollering worked.

RidingMyBike · 26/05/2022 08:30

@TheLadyofShalott1 SS don't just take a child into care on the basis of one report though. It would have been logged for that child and someone (eg a HV) would probably have followed up, got in touch and offered support eg for PND. The Mum could have turned that down, but it means it's flagged up, and that report might then be added to by others with concerns eg nursery staff, children's centre, teachers later on.

Ahurricaneofjacarandas · 26/05/2022 08:33

TheLadyofShalott1 · 25/05/2022 19:16

I have baby sat for a young baby twice, once at 5 weeks old, once at about 8 weeks old. I refused to do so after that even though it caused 'big problems'.

I refused because it was the most horrendous few hours I have ever spent (and like most older people I have had a few of those). I literally could not have done it a third time, it was like being tortured.

The mother of the couple told me that the baby had to be put to bed by such and such a time, and then I was not to go into see the baby after that, that "they" left it to cry. The father didn't say anything. I was told that the baby would cry for about an hour before it fell asleep, and it did. My every instinct told me to go to the baby, pick it up, cuddle it, check if it needed a nappy change etc and that it hadn't been sick, or have a temperature etc. But I was pretty sure that it only needed comforting.

By the way, it was in it's own room by then, the mother tried having it in the same room as her for a few weeks, but couldn't hack it any longer - I suppose it was more difficult to ignore the crying if the baby was in the same room.

I actually wanted to report them to the SS, what stopped me was that the mother appeared to have PND, but she wouldn't tell anyone else about her difficulties. But apart from fact that I never saw the mum ever cuddling her baby, and we were only allowed very short cuddles while we gave the baby it's bottle, then it either went in it's cot or one of those bouncy chairs, the baby was putting on an adequate amount of weight, it was bathed, it did wear mainly clean clothes. Dad appeared to not be allowed to do much for the baby except change it's nappies, and the mum moaned at him if he took too long, ie gave it a good clean and applied nappy cream.

Reading this back now, and seeing the child as they are now - nearly into double figures - but completely besotted with it's mother more than any other child I have ever known - they only want to be with their mum, they always behave for their mum, but they play up a lot when their mum isn't there. The mum still palms the child off as much as possible, but there are still very strict rules for anyone looking after the child.

I am very concerned that I made the wrong decision when the child was a baby, but I have heard such awful things about the SS, and about children who go into the care system that I was scared that that would be the wrong decision too. Also I knew the father was there and would stop the mother if she ever got violent with the child - having said that, he did work, and she didn't.

Anyway, that is what being left to "cry it out" means to me, and I could never condone that.

I do often wonder why so many people think that a child who's parent(s) have a mental illness are less deserving of child protection. Just because someone has PND or any other mental illness and even just because they aren't actively setting out to harm their child doesn't mean the child isn't being abused. I sortof understand the misstrust of ss but they never just remove a child callously. They first and foremost support that family as much as possible and the threshold for actually removing a child is really high. I adopted a LG and if you saw some of the background these children came from you'd know what they have to go through before they're removed. There may be horror stories out there but these stories come from the birth parents with no space for ss to respond. Is a parent who's had their child forcibly removed going to tell the daily mail that they were constantly high on drugs? Or that their child's nappy wasn't changed for so long that it had maggots in it? Or that they bought a different man home to sexually abuse their child every week? Or that they were given months om end of intensive intervention and clear guidelines on what was expected before their child was taken into care? Of course not! So much easier to play the victim card especially if there is an underlying mental illness. If we suspect abusive parenting we should ALWAYS report it. It's irrelevant what the circumstances are. Every child deserves a happy, safe childhood

Palease · 26/05/2022 11:26

@Ahurricaneofjacarandas maybe you should have put trigger warning before your post. That was horrible to read. Please consider other people before posting such traumatic stories.

Ahurricaneofjacarandas · 26/05/2022 12:29

@Palease I apologise for any distress I caused and yeh maybe I should've put a trigger warning sorry. However the examples I gave are not isolated incidents or aimed at any individual case in particular. They are all too common reasons for ss involvment. I didn't deliberately set out to upset anyone but when people demonise ss they need to realise that they're damned if they do and damned of they don't and the enormity of the work they do x

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