effects of CC

[papillon]

i just found this review in amazon.. does anyone agree ... disagree? I have heard of Gina Ford but not Elizabeth Pantley

...Australia the Association of Infant Mental Health have issued a warning against the method of "controlled crying" which she advocates as it can lead to psychological problems!! Gina's job is to train babies, she has no interest in the child's mental or physical (scheduled feeds can lead to dehydration and failure to thrive) well being for the future. She just wants her money for her quick fix methods! She's not even a mother herself, just a baby trainer. Babies aren't meant to be trained, they need to be nurtured and loved and leaving a baby to cry until it believes it has been abandoned and then shuts up to conserve energy is not my idea of caring for a loved one! Dissociation and learned helplessness are not pyschological problems i wish to instill in my baby for the sake of a full nights sleep! This woman makes me so cross! I second the reader (dated the 7th of november) who suggests a far kinder book to look at - "The no-cry sleep solution" by Elizabeth Pantley. At least she has had children so has some idea what she is talking about!

Two, did you read any of my posts about what my baby's sleeping habits (or rather, non-sleeping habits) did to me? It does make me laugh (in a rather hollow, hysterical way) when someone whose baby slept all night at four months and just needed some cuddling, says that we should all respond to our babies etc etc. I didn't use GF except for some tips about naptimes etc, but I did do cc eventually. I just think you have literally no idea of what the torture of prolonged sleep deprivation can do to a person. Without my dh's support and sleeping in shifts, I honestly think I would have become ill or depressed. I have such vivid memories of sitting in bed breastfeeding my ds while actually sobbing. This is NOT giving up a 'little sleep for extra cuddles' - this is physically and emotionally and psychologically draining. I have never heard anyone ever criticise mothers who don't mind being woken at night. Ever. why would anyone do that? I have heard plenty of criticism though of mothers who use cc or follow a GF routine (barbaric is one that turns up quite often, though not here, I'm glad to say). As it happens my baby was very happy and is still very happy, but I was a wreck for a while and, actually, still feel scarred by it a bit, like people who had terrible birth experiences feel a bit scarred by that.

Sorry everyone, I just haven't made my point clearly, although I thought I had already said that I have no argument with parents who use her routines, it's just - to reiterate - I think those routines are translated into the 'best' approach to childcare, and that if children are picked up / cuddled/ fed during the night, that this is somehow over-indulgent and slack. Honestly, I do think this subtext exists because there is a good deal of comeptition amongst mothers as to whose baby is 'sleeping through the night'. Come on admit it people!! It's true. And I am presenting the case for those mothers who feel they can take the sleeplessness for a fraction longer! I didn't say that Gina Ford advocates babies lying in their cots all day, nor did I say that mother's who follow GF are looking to neglect their babies. all I am saying - and really this is partly addressed to mothers who are made to feel failures becuase their babies don't fit into early routines - is that it is perfectly natural for babies to crave attention and that crying is simply the natural method they have of acquiring it, not some refelction of poor parenting!
Tee hee - always such a heated debate this one!
Jxx

See what you mean two. I agree that babies at first are not designed to sleep through the night and lots of people (not here) see a good baby as being one who sleeps through the night. CC is about older children or certainly should be.

Hello aloha (your post overlapped mine)

when did I say there was something 'wrong' with GF? I am defending people who don't want to follow her route. my sister is having a tough time with sleepless nights, it's just that she wants to sort it out her way (it's also - dare I say - a little patronising to anyone who ahs a baby to suggest they don't know what exhaustion is! It might not be just sleepless nights that you have to contend with)and yet she has gf devotees breathing down her neck to leave her baby to cry it out. I just think people who follow a different route to GF should be given some badk up (to repeat myslef again)

From what I know of GF she doesnt advice to leave them to cry it out. I am not a follower of her either.

Look, I really don't want a row, honestly, but if we are bandying words like 'patronising' around, I happen to think that it's a bit patronising to dismiss the kind of sleep deprivation that I endured as "giving up sleep for extra cuddles which is nature's way". If you can describe persistent night wakefulness for month after month after month in that way, then, no, you didn't experience what I experienced. I was actually trying to explain how painful, upsetting and distressing that kind of persistent, prolonged night waking was for me, and I don't see what's patronising about that. Sleep deprivation isn't used as torture for nothing. I also felt, and I may be wrong here, but there is an implication that cuddles solve everything. No baby was cuddled more than my ds but it didn't mean everything was rosy for the rest of the family. I am amazed that your sister is feeling criticised. If that is the case then I suggest she just tells those critical people that her baby sleeps all night which will shut them up. I happen to think that the criticism goes both ways. I don't think anyone has called your sis barbaric, have they?
I didn't go GF and I didn't even try to do cc for six months and it didn't work until 8. I'm not proselytising for either, but I think unless you've been driven to the brink by lack of sleep you may well not understand why people do cc.

Hi Hercules

Perhaps the problem with GF ishow she is implemented/ interpreted. One woman I know had a GF nanny (for reasons of her own) and she was always being told to be 'firm' and learn to leave her baby, because that is what was made them happy. In fact she was told that strict routines made babies happy - and Gina Ford does prescribe this too. However, lots of things make babies happy, most important being loved. So if a woman follows her own instincts/ temperament and varies her routine from day to day, the implication is that the baby will not be as ghappy as some of GF's 15 minute routines!!! My sister who knows this girl and her nanny felt very embarrassed when she took her baby to the girl's house and was not able to just put him down and leave him to nap at a set time, because her baby needs a cuddle to get him off to sleep. She then feels that somewhere she is FAILING!

I also often hear GF followers saying they wished they had done GF from birth because maybe their babies whould have slept through the night. SO yet again they have failed!

I think you and I are rather like baby and mother in the early months of life Aloha - we just don't seem to quite understand each other, so let's forget it.

And Hercules is right. GF is primarily about routines, not controlled crying. It's a tool you can use if you want.

The problem as you say then is the interpretation of gf as I'mn sure GF doesnt advocate leaving them and not cuddling them, more about routine.
I have to agree with aloha asprolonged sleep deprivation to which she is refering to has far worse effects on the family rather than cc.

I hope i dont come across as inconsistent on this thread as cc seems to mean different things to different people.

Hi again Hercules

I am a co-sleeping fan myself, although I never knew I would be! But it has garunteed me good night's sleep. However, my major feeling is that mother's should go with what is right for their context and what they feel is appropriate for their child.

Jxxxxx

Have you added your name to the cosleeping thread?

Certainly didnt plan cosleeping either.

Hi again

I haven't embarked on the co-sleeping thread! Just couldn't resist this one. Slow afternoon at work, I admit!

Jxx

I have some sympathy with two here. I have had 2 children. DS1 was always excellent at night- if GF had been around in 1999 (we just missed TCLB) and had I wanted to follow her routine I;m sure he would have fitted into it very well. DS2 on the other hand. Well at 2 he does now sleep though the night in his own bed, but we took a long time getting there. He spent a lot of time in bed with me- which was fine it worked for us. I don't do sleep deprivation very well so we snuggled up together, he was happy and so was I. Ironically- now we've got him in his own bed, ds1 has suddenly taken a dislike to his bed (we think he's scared of the dark) so he's in with me- for the first time ever really at the age of 4 and a half.

I think its important to find what is right for each child. And their needs may be very different. I don't think any childcare guru can really get it right for everyone.

I have warned my SIL (currently pregnant) not to get GF as I have a feeling that if her baby isn't easy to get in routine then GF would make her end up feeling like she was failing. (she's very self critical and tends to be underconfident- of course she may not be when she has her baby but I would worry about her trying such a rigid routine). I'm sure for some people that GF is a godsend, but I'm not sure she suits every baby.

Jimjams

Couldn't agre more about books which advocate strong lines. People (some with no children) advocated GF to my sister before her baby was born, so she got it and I think that although as it happens she is a confident person normally, she has been left rather uncertain. I prefer to recommend 'what to expect..' which is much better cos it is a group os peadeatricians giving a spectrum of approaches which can be followed (including CC) But I think when pregnant women hear the phrase 'no sleepless nights', they obv think that they are being given the golden solution, and I do also happen to think that these techniques should be under constant re-examination.

Jxx

As I said, I would definitely have co-slept if it had meant I got some sleep. I would have slept stark naked in the street if it meant I got some sleep! But it sadly didn't work like that for me, and it wasn't for lack of trying. As for mothers with sick or special needs children who stay awake all night with them regularly, I think they all deserve canonisation immediately.
Actually I agree that reading GF can make you feel a failure if your child doesn't fall into the routines. Felt a bit like that myself. But the same goes for all parenting books. Penelope Leach made me feel a complete hopeless freak because my ds wasn't thrilled to watch me peel potatoes, as she promised!

In fact, ds spent most of those 8months in bed with me or dh - just not asleep!

exactly two- without children the books make it all sound very simple. I always imagined that I would have perfectly well behaved children who did exactly what I said and would sit colouring in nicely whilst we had bonding mother child discussions (actually mother dd as I never imagined having son's). and then reality strikes. I mentioned that I'd imagined having 2 well behaved children to my son's LSA this morning as I was trying to extract ds2 (age 2) from dancing round the reception classroom. She laughed. Maybe I should write a book Parenthood-the reality!

I do worry about my SIL. She's the most anxious pregnant woman I've ever seen- and everything has to be perfect or she gets very strssed. (you know tidy house, lots odf money in the bank, etc etc). That's why I told her to avoid GF. I could see it causing real feelings of inadequacy if her baby didn't perform. Of course she'll probably have a wonderfully behaved baby from birth and we'll remain the ones in the family with the nightmare children

Aloha- if we're up for more than so many times a night (but you have to be up for 20 minutes before it counts) then we get higher rate DLA That's what I chant to myself when I reach the 3rd hour with ds1 (55 quid a week, 55 quid a week ). Doesn't help though. Have to say that ds1 is sleeping very well in our bed. its weird as he's never wanted to be in bed with us before. DH is on the futon.

Hi to both Aloha and Jimjams

Now I've got no 1 having the odd toddler tantrum and it's almost fun to be the person I used to look at with horror in my twenties in the supermarket!

Jx

Even found myself reading Christopher Green but then decided that since the phrase terrible twos does exist, it isn't just me, so better to spend free time sipping vino! Esp since 6 month year old just getting more active!

J

So far (touching wood frantically) ds is 2 1/2 and has not yet had anything like a tantrum. He's sooo easy and nice and sweet. I gave him his supper last night and he said "Oh, you are a kind mummy' I think this is my payback for the horror times earlier. But then I may well be posting about my horror 3 year old in a few months so am trying to enjoy it without being smug iyswim.

Aloha, my lovely DS2 (also aged two and a half) has just started doing tantrums!

Interestingly, a little boy I know who cried day and night for 6 months (parents the most gentle, quiet, stable couple) turned into fab toddler too (now 3.5), so think it might work that way!!!