To think controlled crying is cruel

[KazMa]

DH would like to try controlled crying/sleep training but I am totally against any sort of crying/leaving DS on his own upset. Any advice?

Here is current scenario:

DS just turned 7 months old and we have been co sleeping since the dreaded 4 month sleep regression, he also breastfeeds to sleep - will go to sleep without it but needs a lot of patting, rocking and walking around so it’s easier just to BF.

For a month now I am able to BF to sleep and then leave him in his cot in his own room for nap times and he will sleep 45mins to an hour per nap (3x per day).

At night however he will wake up and only go back to sleep if he is laying & feeding next to me in my bed. (Eg, bedtime at 8pm but he’ll wake at 8:45 and won’t go back to sleep.

And as many others have said on this thread (which I've given up reading - too many sanctimonious mothers of easy babies who have no openmindedness/empathy for others' experiences) it was not 'crying it out', which every single mother on here (as far as I've read) has been at pains to point out. My son cried for no longer than if I'd been caught in the loo, which also happened!

I wouldn't do it, I do think it's cruel.
BIL kept suggesting it to us and got very defensive when DH told him that it was not for us and would do no harm. Maybe not lasting harm but being distressed in the moment is more than I personally wanted to tolerate. As some posters say you would hopefully not leave anyone to cry.

That's what I don't understand. Such as the poster whose husband comforted her while she cried about leaving the baby to cry - surely he should have reassured her for a few minutes then left the room so she could eventually soothe herself. 🤷‍♀️ I think it's odd when people leave their babies to learn to soothe themselves, but would expect their partners to comfort them when upset.

My eldest was far from an easy baby. In fact he didn't sleep for more than 2-3 hours at a time until he was over two. DP used to walk him up and down for hours, so that I could get some sleep. He seemed to need perpetual motion! But there was no way I could have left him to cry. His younger brother, thankfully, slept a bit better, but we were still up with him a couple of times a night. I certainly don't think I'm any better than anyone else, but, personally, controlled crying just felt all shades of wrong to me.

My son got into a habit of waking up at half one every night (could set your clock by him he was that regular) just before he turned 4. I dealt with it (once I realised it was a habit) by doing a reward system for nights he didn't get up, that's a pretty common method of changing behaviours in children this age.

That's a false dichotomy. My daughter has always been an edge case, I've never met anybody in person whose baby woke up as often as she did when she was a baby. Most people who don't sleep train still end up with a toddler/child who sleeps well. Though I do know people who did sleep train who seemed to have more stress at bedtime than we ever had. Listening to your baby cry themselves to sleep over a monitor for 45 minutes every night as a necessary part of the routine versus a peaceful feed or rock to sleep I know what I'd pick.
Let's say that I had sleep trained her though and she had '"learned how to sleep" that way. She still would have gone through this phase one we'd moved house (since she did know how to sleep through before we moved) and we would have had to repeat the sleep training process. Only harder this time because she's not physically contained in her cot and can voice exactly how she's feeling. I think one reason some people are able to go through with sleep training is that a baby can't speak so you can fool yourself that they aren't genuinely distressed. If my child is sobbing out "Mummy I need you, please come to me, I'm scared" (which is what I hear these days when she wakes up) that's what she would have been feeling when waking up in the night as a baby, only not being able to put it into words. It would be terribly heartless to ignore that.

@Loics Except adults do self-soothe all the time.

Good if that works for you. I don't really like the idea of it for myself because if there was a reward for not getting up in the night I'd worry she wouldn't get me up if she needed the toilet or something.

Listening to your baby cry themselves to sleep over a monitor for 45 minutes every night as a necessary part of the routine versus a peaceful feed or rock to sleep I know what I'd pick

Where has anyone suggested that they or you do this?

I thinking you are exaggerating/ creating hyperbole because your child would do this.
Ive never had a crying child for 45 minutes let alone left them to cry for 45 minutes and its offensive that you keep saying this.

Tbf he takes himself to the toilet in the night so I didn't have that concern but I did worry about him thinking that also meant not getting up if he's ill and made sure he understood it only applied to waking up for no reason, and that if he woke up because he was ill or had a nightmare or something like that then it didn't count (he always wakes me up if he has a nightmare and gets a cuddle and tucked back in)

That's what it was like for people I know who sleep trained and that's what I was comparing it to. Is 45 minutes really unusual? Controlled crying involves going back in the room every five minutes or so, so I assume the expectation is several rounds of five minutes and not just one.

Lol if I said to her 'you can wake me up if you have a nightmare' she would just tell me she'd had a nightmare every time!

I really can’t understand this attitude. You’d rather your child woke every 2-3 hours through the night, every night until he was 2, rather than have a few nights of crying? Baffling, he (and you) must have been exhausted. Not to mention that he must have done a lot more crying during that time overall than if you’d just sleep trained.

Not according to MN... There is the previously mentioned poster whose husband had to hold her while she cried herself to sleep, and numerous threads of people upset that their partners didn't ask what was wrong when they were crying. I don't recall any replies saying the partner should have left them to cry until they stopped of their own accord.

Ah yes, some children are chancers and will do that!

It starts at 1/ 2/3 minutes and usually by a few returns and settles mine went off.
A few nights in and they got tucked in and went straight to sleep.
You implied parents are sitting there while their baby screams for 45 minutes.
That's not CC that's neglect.

@Loics Of course an adult wants a partner to ask them what is wrong if they are crying. I would do the same if my children were crying. But if I wake up in the night a bit upset, I do not wake up my husband.

I predict the singing could go on for years.

You didn't do that, but lots of people do that. People often describe the first few nights of sleep training as heartbreaking, even if they're glad they did it in the end. If it's only a few minutes it's unlikely to be heartbreaking so I'm guessing for a lot of people it takes a long time.

It might do. And there will be songs she will hear as an adult and think ah, I remember when my mum used to sing this to me in the middle of the night. I felt so loved and cherished.

Isn't she four? Surely she can get up and go to the toilet if she needs to.

I'm not sure where you get the impression that sleep trained children don't have times they call out to parents in the night and the parents come to comfort them - nightmares, unwell, new environment, stormy night etc.

I really can’t understand this attitude. You’d rather your child woke every 2-3 hours through the night, every night until he was 2, rather than have a few nights of crying? Baffling, he (and you) must have been exhausted. Not to mention that he must have done a lot more crying during that time overall than if you’d just sleep trained.

Baffling? Baffling that someone does something differently to you? I wasn't prepared to leave my baby to cry. How is that baffling?

The rise in mental health problems is more likely due to the internet than sleep training. If the first 1001 days are important and you sleep train for part of 3 of those, will the child be damaged? What about if child and mother are separated because of illness ? Are those children damaged too? What about nursery? Many children are very upset about that, for much longer than 3 days.
There are plenty of research papers on sleep training and none have found any adverse effect either long or short term

Ah these threads just keep giving!

I 'sleep trained' all 3 of mine - at no point did they cry for 45 mins - not even for 3

I started by settling them in the room with me there gently patting - then I'd leave - returning if they cried to pat them and say calm soothing things - repeated over 3 nights - they began to sleep through

I was returning to work so needed to sleep!

Sorry to ask a personal question but did you have some sort of traumatic event as a child?
You seem to be projecting an awful lot of your own emotions onto these broken nights which isn't really fair on your child.