Any child psychologists out there? What do you think (professionally) about controlled crying?

[Neenztwinz]

I have used CC, I think it is a very quick and effective way of dealing with sleep problems, but I was wondering if there was any research done into its long-term effects. My SIL is a child psychologist and she is dead against CC, so I wonder whether it is because of research she may have seen. I don't want to ask her about it because our babies are only 7 weeks different in age and discussions such as these are just not worth the hassle IYKWIM.

I like the AIMH. I buy into their mission and having spent months reading
through AP literature I do share their beliefs.

However, I humbly acknowledge that this is merely a belief, a hugely useful belief
as it has encouraged me to spend as much time as possible with my baby girl
to bond with her, make her feel loved, stimulate her senses.
She is 2 and a half years old now, there is the most immense love between us
and she is just an astonishing ray of sunshine - which of course reinforces my belief
that emotional early years investment is very important!

Hard science this it not, though! The nebulous references to 'evidence-based practices' and 'neuroscientific evidence' should be taken with a massive pinch of salt.

There is now a backlash against the whole infant mental health movement (including Sue Gerhardt's 'Why love matters')
which is being derided (somewhat correctly) as 'infant determinism'.
Read this if you have a spare 20 minutes.

Haven't read the entire thread but just wanted to add to Starlight/DaddyJ's interesting comments about whether AP and CC are always mutually exclusive.

I co-slept with DS til he was 9mo, wore him constantly until he got too big and wriggly, and breastfed til he was 20mo. I also did CC when I was absolutely at breaking point having not had more than two hours' straight sleep in 9 months. (Though co-sleeping made nighttime feeding easier, I don't think it helped either myself or DS sleep much better.)

CC worked very quickly for us -- two nights. He was much happier afterwards and I felt like a different person. He was and remains a very secure, loving and affectionate little boy and nobody could ever persuade me that I have emotionally damaged him. In fact I look back slightly wryly at all the fussing round him I used to do to try to get him to sleep, which just made him cry and scream for longer.

Now, he does sometimes cry out at night but not because he can't sleep without me. He will cry out if he is in an uncomfortable position, if his toy has dropped out of the cot or sometimes because he stands up in his sleep and can't get back down. I go to him immediately, sort out the problem and he goes straight back to sleep. Doesn't exactly sound like a child who has 'given up hope' that his needs will be responded to, does it?

RE: set bedtimes. Elizabeth Pantley says in the NCSS how important it is to have a set bedtime and getting up time because this helps to set the body clock and thus helps to get a good night's sleep. This makes perfect sense to me so that's why DS goes to bed at 8 every night.

MegBussett - I don't actually disagree with you... BUT if school starts at a different time every day, what can you do?

anna - fair enough - had never heard of that before - how do working parents cope with that?

blueshoes - yes, I was very ill after the birth of my dd and so my dp coming home early evolved out of that - it will probably change when she is older.

My ds also needs to be up at 7am to get out of the house at 8am for school - this is why he goes to bed between 7.30 and 8.00, if I let him choose it would be 8.30-9 as it is on holiday and I think he would be tired in the morning.

Anna: you're in France, I think? Here afaik school starts at the same time every day.

Even if school started a bit later some days I would still get them up at the same time, and spend the extra time in the morning doing something else.

Disclaimer: I don't yet have school-age children, perhaps by the time I get that far I will be begging to leave them in bed as long as possible in the morning!

Lots of children get themselves to and from school - the odd hours start at 10/11 (when they enter secondary here in France) and parents are expected to leave children on their own at home the rest of the time. Not great IMVHO but that is how it is.

At primary school hours are fixed BUT if you have secondary age children coming and going at different times, needing breakfast/the bathroom/to be dropped that buggers the whole household around. So even primary children get affected by this.

Honestly Meg you wouldn't get your secondary children up at 6.30 am if they had a 10 am start - they'd murder you

Anna: that's what paper rounds are for, to give teenagers a reason to get out of bed in the morning

LOL no teenage paper rounds here in Paris .

anna - so what is the sleep training vs. no sleep training prevailing wind in france then?

Oops, no link!
I meant this article by Dr Helene Guldberg.

Another interesting critic is John Bruer who has written a book called 'The myth of the first three years'- see here for an introductory article.
How very dare he diss my belief!

Finally, this quote from the neuro-scientist Steven Petersen deserves to be posted here -
I have translated it from this German article:

'Things that negatively affect a child's development - we have to be talking about seriously appalling conditions.
Look, don't bring up your child in a wardrobe, don't let him starve and
don't bash him over the head with a frying pan.'

The article, by the way, deals with German parents who, having heard about the latest neuroscientific insights, are anxious to expose their babies/toddlers to a myriad of activities from babygym to Mandarin classes from an early age.

Interesting, DaddyJ, I will indeed find 20 minutes to read those links. Do those links discuss the effect of nursery attendance below the age of 3?

Babies get stuck in their own rooms from birth mostly here - there is quite a prevalent belief that it is unhealthy for parents and baby to share a room (the word "incest" is bandied about).

French parents all tell you that their children sleep through the night very soon indeed... as they would, I suppose, if you just shut the door on them and left them until morning.

May I carry on ranting? Thanks!
I am off on a business trip tomorrow and need to do some WORK very soon -
but please indulge me for a sec, just need to get this out of my system..

Sadly, the AIMH's Australian sister organisation is still as demented as ever.
Surely some kind soul must have told them by now that their statement is fraudulent.

There certainly are studies that look at the impact of controlled crying on infants..
and what's more even the hardcore Attachment fans have now acknowledged those studies:
They have been presented at the Annual Meeting of the World Association of Infant Mental Health, July 2006, Paris, France.
And this is where it gets interesting:
They have tried their very best to dismiss the research!
They have actually set up a website that's essentially about discrediting the CC-related research.
Crikey moses

Yes, I think Attachment Parenting is quite excellent but as usual with any movement
you have the fanatical fringes taking everything literally - Attachment Fundamentalists
in this case!

Have a read through the CIO Poster..it raises my cortisol levels alright.

Yes, blueshoes but I need to dig it out for you on my home PC.
Maybe a google for 'cortisol nursery' might yield something in the meantime.

Well exactly, Anna!
So there is a whole nation whose parenting practices piss all over any notion of AP.
Forget about CC - what they do is hardcore CIO!

Instead of going into the jungle or to some remote tribe in Kenia
the AP Massive should study French people.

Anna - good grief or even mon dieu, though I suspected that would be the case as a friends dp is french and she's like that. I extrapolated from one person to the entire population right there but am hoping noone will notice.

Is this the reason their bf rates are so bad?or is that a bit chicken and egg.

I do study French people - and I write about it on MN .

And the more I look, the better I understand why any form of authoritarian parenting is so dangerous. Only yesterday afternoon I was watching two little girls (4, 6) from my DD's school who are terrorised by their parents and are always incredibly well-behaved if sullen in their presence, exhibit the most appalling bullying tactics on their nanny. The whole bus was watching as these little girls were really cruel to her. Now where would they have learned to bully someone weaker than themselves, I wonder ?

The French will make an interesting casestudy for the general effects of anti-AP.

giantsanta - BF rates are bad for lots of reasons:

• short maternity leave
• French perception that breasts are primarily sexual ie for DHs not DCs use
• no bed/room sharing
• very longstanding tradition of not feeding own baby (wetnursing was a huge, nationally regulated profession before the Revolution even with town babies sent off to the countryside for months)

I got so slammed by French people for my AP tendencies - the one I particularly got was "your DD will never settle at school because she is too attached to you".

She settled at school brilliantly. In fact, one of her teachers told me she was one of the most well-adjusted children in her class.

Well of course. Because she is secure....

Posting to remind myself to come back and read this thread properly.

I agree with DaddyJ's delight in seeing a proper, spirited debate on this controversial subject that has remained polite and intelligent.

Bravo to the OP and subsequent posters..

When DD was 4 months old and feeding twice in the night, we were told by DD's French paediatrician that it was a good time to cut out night feeds. She said it would take at most a week for her to sleep through.

DD slept through the third night. It was the best advice ever.

Why thanks, taliac .

Thanks so much for those links DaddyJ, will definitely read them when I have the time (ie when DTs are in bed after 7pm tonight )

This thread has been good - I wonder what it would have turned into if I'd posted it in AIBU?

Well, that CIO poster..let me make a list, it helps me put down my pitch fork:

1. These people have written position papers, in fact whole books (Margot Sunderland)

on the dangers of sleep training without knowing (ignorance) or acknowledging (deceitfulness) the body of work that already existed. They have a vested interest in this propaganda exercise.

1. They have now redrawn the battle line. Instead of 'any sleep training

at any age is damaging', they are now arguing that 'sleep training before 1 year is damaging'. That's progress of sorts.

1. As ever, they are exceedingly talented at spin:

'a majority of existing research was conducted on children older than 1 year' Out of the 22 studies, 13 included infants under 1, some as young as 4 months old. So in fact the majority of studies did include infants under 1. Nothing was found at any age to justify focusing further on a particular age group.

1. The elephant in the room: Have you noticed how they haven't done any

studies of their own? It's great, isn't it, when you can just sit there, criticise other people's work, bang on about your fancy theories and, fantasise how one fine day you will be proved right. WELL, GET OFF YOUR DERRIERS AND DO SOME RESEARCH. Instead of even more Interweb fearmongering. Jesus.

1. Can someone find the animal studies on extinction? I didn't realise you could

sleep-train animals.

1. CIO is not CC. Dr. Ferber specifically 'invented' CC because CIO appeared too

harsh on parent and child.

1. The one sentence that should make Dr. Sears and Jean Liedloff spin in their graves

(if they were dead): 'No objective assessments were conducted.' What exactly does that mean in plain English? Well, it means that you and me, i.e. parents, cannot be expected to be able to tell whether our child is damaged or not. Only 'scientific' measures will do! Which is rather rich given that Attachment Parenting is all about trusting parents. In fact, that sentence represents a complete betrayal of everything that AP stands for.

1. What do they mean by prolonged crying?

Prolonged Crying is a medical condition.

I am feeling better now, though I suspect my cortisol levels will remain elevated
for quite some time.
There is more to come..