crying it out method

[guest477337]

What are people's views and experiences on this?

However, I wouldn't do the full thing. I could only stand my child crying five mins max and then I'd go in for one minuet and keep doing that. I couldn't leave her longer!

As you have asked for opinions, I will venture mine. Personally, I think it's cruel and unnecessary, and that there are so many better ways of dealing with sleep problems.

What you describe is controlled crying. "Crying it out" means to leave your baby to cry until they stop, without returning at all.

There's some useful information from the Durham Infant Sleep Info Service about the effectiveness of sleep training here:

www.isisonline.org.uk/how_babies_sleep/sleep_training/research_evidence/

I think most people wouldn't suggest trying to sleep train under 6 months and a lot of people would say under 12 months.

For me, I wouldn't do controlled crying as it's just not something I think is effective or that I would want to do.

Your baby is barely 5 months old.

Any sort of sleep training that involves crying at that age is basically torture.

@TittyGolightly that's why I'm asking. There's so much contradictory information online that I've read.

I don't think it's for me to be honest but was just wondering what other people thought and experiences 😊

Have a read of the actual research done by infant sleep specialists on that link I posted, if you're concerned about contradictory information from other online sources.

Thanks @AssassinatedBeauty I'll have a read through.

I would hate to be left alone in my bedroom crying.
They are babies for such a short time. I just couldn’t leave a baby crying and wouldn’t be able to do it at all.

I did controlled crying with both of mine around the 6/7mo mark first time and 11mo mark second time. Didn’t have to do much as they were pretty decent sleepers anyway (waking only 3/4 times per night).

I would feed, cuddle, settle to sleep and leave. When baby cried I would wait 30 seconds or a minute and go to the cot and put my hand on their belly and pat and shush and soothe and say I love you etc etc. That would take a minute or so and I’d leave. Of course they’d start up again and I’d repeat. It only took 4 or 5 repetitions for them to learn that I was there and they weren’t alone and everything was fine. They’d repeat after another 2 or 3 hours according to their natural sleep cycle, and I’d do the same thing again. All through the night for the first night, half as much the second night, and by the third night they slept through.

They had and continue to have lots of warmth and cuddles and kisses and physical affection from both parents during the day (not as suffocating as it sounds, promise!). In our DCs’ cases, they both just needed to know that they weren’t alone. Incidentally, I co slept with both of them for the first three months or so, bf for the first year. The first one was in her own room around 6mo, the second one I moved into their room and left around 10mo (mild medical issues, plus I was older and tireder).

It’s all a distant memory now. I don’t recall it being terrible for anyone.

I could not have let ours to cry. We co-slept for a couple of years though, which was great for us.

Ours would not have been comforted easily like PlumsofWrath's kids. I don't think many people just get 3 nights of mild grizzling for a couple of minutes, like that.

Cruel and neglectful.

Try reading "the baby whisperer" - we found that method really helpful. It's different and more gentle than cry-it-out/controlled crying, but teaches you to stop and listen carefully when a baby is crying.

What I didn't realise until after many many months of being driven quite crazy from sleep deprivation is that there are some cries that do not mean "I need to be picked up and cuddled" and in those cases picking up and cuddling is the wrong thing to do. Some cries mean eg "I just need to explain in some detail how very tired I am and then I shall sleep" and those cries just need a soothing pat and quiet withdrawal.

It's disgustingly cruel and a form of abuse in my opinion !!

Replace baby with elderly or vulnerable person in a care home - would you still think that was acceptable?

Babies are humans, not robots.

I used control crying.

My husband is self employed an a sound engineer which means he travels away a lot!

My DD went through a phase of just wanting attention and there are time where I just had to let her cry it out otherwise nothing in our house would have been done.

She's fine now (4). People would say to me "she'll resent you", "you'll never be close" and "she'll be distant from people". She is nothing like that.

We have a great relationship as she did with her whole family.

A friend of mine did it from a very early age and honestly, I don't know how she managed it as they always sobbed for 20+ minutes before dropping off. They don't exhibit any apparent emotional scars now that they're older, but they're both terrible at going to bed and often come into their parents' bed at night.

Mine, who were mollycoddled until they learned to go to sleep peacefully by themselves (almost 2 years for my second, which I often found difficult and frustrating) are now absolutely golden sleepers and have literally never gotten out of bed after lights out.

It's anecdata I know, but as previous posters have said, at a basic level it doesn't intuitively feel good for a baby to be left to sob itself to sleep, and there's no guarantee that taking the harsh path early on is going to result in a good long-term sleeper.

I did it and it was less cruel than the alternative which could have been me falling asleep at the wheel or having no energy to function.

I had a newborn, a one year old, a two year old and a husband who i now know was being abusive.

Sometimes you do what you have to do and for me it took one night with eachbof them.

Mine were about 10 months at the time. And i did it properly once. Otherwise you put everyone through the stess of it for no actual reason.

All the judgy pants on this thread. I bet they all do something that is my idea of awful.

This divorce saga has taught me that you can only do your best and your best is much better if you have had sleep.

It all depends on individual circumstances. It's better to do 3 nights of controlled crying than have 2 years of only sleeping for 1 hour chunks at a time. I have a 4mo and haven't done any sleep training yet, but I will do at 6 months. There have been loads of times when I was probably way too tired to drive but had to to get my older soon to school (no family near by to help).

Controlled crying I.e some form of retreat and return or whatever you want to call it isn't remotely akin to abuse but some people will say that it is.

Crying it out is a bit grim and I don't think anyone that starts these threads had intention of doing that

Imo 5 mo is too young for sleep training though

Personally, I think that sleep training is basically bollocks. My DS was a crap sleeper. Up every two hours until he was eleven months old.

What got him sleeping through was learning to walk and being night weaned. I just offered him water when he woke, along with a cuddle until he fell asleep. I still cuddle him to sleep at eighteen months.

By sleeping through I mean seven til seven.

Controlled crying is great!

I used controlled crying after about 9 months. It took a few nights and DS didn’t cry for long - 5 mins or so the first night then just 2 or 3 mins after that. After the 4th or 5th night he didn’t cry. So It worked and he has been a great sleeper ever since (now 23 months).

Definitely not for me and my family. I know it's easy to say but this time is so short.

I felt a lot happier co sleeping after 6 -12 months so I just did that, we all got much more sleep and none of them sleep with us now (littlest is 2.5 years).

It may be judgemental but I do t understand how parents can leave their children alone to cry.

I've known families that have had sleep issues for years - not through the first year as you'd expect to but way beyond this where co sleeping isn't working and it's having a hugely damaging affect on mental health and family life.

So I do think it's kind of judgemental to presume that cosleeping is going to help everyone because it dosent

If some sort of sleep training helps people then that's far far better than the alternative in some cases.

To say that a few nights of letting a child cry whilst going in regularly to comfort them is abusive or totoure is patently ridiculous isn't it? I mean come on.

We did it, it worked wonders. I read quite a few books with different approaches: Gina ford(!), French children don’t throw food and 12 weeks to 12 hours.
Our approach was that we needed to teach our children to self settle when they came out of one sleep cycle and went into another. That takes a couple of minutes and the cry is a bit of a whine.

But while they are learning this they can get very angry, because you are ignoring them!!!

My children are now 2 and 6 and sleep brilliantly. I also know their cries, if it’s stiring in their sleep I leave them, if it’s scared or in pain I leg it through to them.

FWIW the French children book is lovely. It talks about me pause with is basically taking a few seconds before runnning to your child. Either in the night or the day time. Just giving them a moment to gather themselves together before you fix everything. I really like this approach with older children too. I don’t need to helicopter their friendships etc.

Good luck
K

I thought I did it but I don’t think I did, never let it get to a cry as such, but low level whinging was left and every single time he falls asleep within a couple of minutes.
I’m confident that I know if he’s gunna start screaming and wouldn’t ever leave him like that, but a little whinge, yes. At 6 months he has 2, 2 hour naps and 30 minutes sleep at about 4. Bed for 6.30 and sleeps through until 7.20 on the dot