You know, all this talk about CV and avoiding eye contact is bothering me, because I did that.

[welliemum]

Have 2 dds who were extremely active, responsive, "wired" babies who found it difficult to wind down and go to sleep.

Both of them they were very responsive to eye contact almost from birth: if they were sleepy and you looked into their eyes, they immediately became wide awake.

At times they were feeding every hour during the day and every 2 hours during the night. I quickly learned that when settling them to sleep after night feeds my options were:

Holding them close with head on my shoulder, rubbing their backs, stroking their hair, rocking, saying "shhhhh" = reasonable chance of getting them back to sleep.

Holding them in my arms, doing all the above and looking into their eyes = reasonable chance of spending the next 2 hours pacing the floor with screaming overwrought baby, whilst almost hallucinating with exhaustion myself.

Am quite lentil-weavery and basically wore them for the first 10 months of their lives, demand breastfeeding, etc. If anyone tells me I emotionally damaged them by not making eye contact at night I'll be a bit

Has anyone else found similar with their DCs or is it just mine that were eye contact freaks?

Really tired is right. Problem with CV is she objects to, it seems, all ruddy eye contact. 'Allows' ten minutes of cuddles a day. Even when she's feeding the poor bairns she's holding them at arms length, as if she finds them repellent (no eye contact allowed during feeds).

It's so interesting to hear other people's experiences, thanks for all the comments.

This has really made me stop and think. If eye contact is such a powerful stimulant for so many babies - what is the effect going to be, of denying a baby eye contact at all times....

I'm imagining a little baby desperately trying to engage with the people around, and being constantly stonewalled - not hard to imagine that this is going to do bad things to their brain.

these eye contact discussions make me feel a bit uncomfortable, as I have very bad eye contact myself. Doesn't mean DS wasn't/isn't cuddled/indulged etc but DS would tbh not have had vast amounts of eye contact from me.

I think it's all about context, TC.

After all, there are people with eye problems who can't make eye contact with their child at all and they're fine.

thanks Welliemum

Hallgerda...fair enough ...
I don't think the CV bashing threads are necessary about information about parenting method generally they are simply there to bash a complete insane so called Baby Guru and her extreme measures...and extreme they are [shudder emoticon]

Daddy J....well....the way I interepreted the programme...indeed you are not meant to have eyecontact during feeding...I think you are just about allowed to have eyecontact with your Baby whilst changing them, but other then that you only have another 10 minutes a day for that, as that is the scheduled cuddling time that is allocated. The rest of the time your Baby is meant to be shut away asleep in it's room or shut outside ...with crying being ignored...tehrefore...well, all in all, there isn't much touch or eyecontact ...I think they worked out that a new parent will only have contact with their Baby for 4 hours a day....the rest of the time, the child is "put into the cupboard" so to say...

DD is now 13 months old and at around 8.00 pm she walks to stairs and starts shaking the gate to go to bed, also after tea goes and stands by the bathroom door getting more and more vocal till I give her a bath.

I must admit I made night feeds as dull as possible but it wasnt difficult as I was so tired. I do think that this is a really effective way of getting babies to know the difference between night and day quite quickly and not at all cruel. My DC are the centre of everything during the day.

Maybe I have been lucky but I did not really have to "work" at a routine for either of my DC. Certainly had no routine on feeding both were BF fed on demand, though I must admit I was very happy when they went on solids at 6 months in order to stretch feeds out a bit. I have a theory that with a little common sense from parents children will get themselves in to their own routines when THEY are ready to. I sometimes wish that I had not listened to so much advice. There were times when I went against what I felt so as not to develop "bad habits" eg feeding to sleep and with hindsight we would both have been happier if I had followed my instincts.

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