Anyone tried attachment parenting and found it DIDN'T calm their baby?

[boo64]

Just curious really after reading so much about attachment parenting....has anyone tried it and found it didn't suit their baby (I imagine there are a few people who found it didn't suit them as parents but I want to know if things like co-sleeping and carrying are 'guaranteed' to make for a happier more settled baby

Any experiences?

OK Liliac, there are guidelines provided to ensure safe co sleeping. Co sleeping itself is thought to actually prevent cot death - as the mother ususally sleeps much more lightly when co sleeping, there is an instinctive process going on - which means she can be more alert to the baby's breathing changes. Obviously, the guidelines include placing your baby on top of the duvet with their own blanket, not co sleeping if you have taken any medication or alcohol
In countries such as japan and china where co sleeping is the norm, the SIDS is virtually unheard of. The research against co sleeping is actually against co sleeping if combined with other factors [drugs, alcohol, cigarettes] If you are breastfeeding and co sleeping the safety factor is even higher. Obviously there may always be exceptions to the rule, but generally co sleeping following the safety guidelines is a good thing.

Good article about co sleeping and guidelines here.

women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/families/article2115373.ece

Co-sleeping didn't work for us long-term. Dd went to her own cot at 4 mo - she doesn't like to be too close when she's asleep and wriggles and plays and pushes us both out of bed so she can be horizontal across it. I would love to co-sleep with dd but every time I bring her to our bed it is a disaster and no-one gets any sleep.

Naps were completely different - she very often napped on my lap or chest up to about 9 mo. I have read that babies regulate night sleeping and napping differently and it certainly has seemed that way with dd.

I held dd as much as possible but couldn't get on with any kind of sling unfortunately. I weaned at 12 mo, and I did, out of desperation, do some controlled crying for night waking (not for going to bed and only 2-3 5-min intervals max) at about 9 mo (which worked well). Otherwise we don't leave her to cry as a rule.

So personally, I took the basics and adapted them to a compromise solution that I felt worked for all of us.

Didn't settle two out of my dcs. They were very cuddly tactile babies, but also liked their own space. DC 2 in particular slept much better - longer, unbroken sleep and was happier on waking - once she went into her own cot. I also found none of mine were keen on being carried in a sling. Facing me or DP, they just didn't get enough stimulation cos they couldnt watch what was going on around them (maybe my 3 are just nosey buggers!) and facing outwards never seemed particulary comfy - they preferred the pram/pushchair.

Worked very well for my two kids.

Ds didn't much like being carried around. I discovered after a few weeks of him yelling his head off at toddler group (we were there for his big sister not him) that what he really wanted was to be parked in his pram in the nice quiet corridor. Which totally threw me cos dd was always happiest with people and noise.

Neither of them are any good at co-sleeping. Getting into bed with us, oh yes. Sleeping once there, oh no.

liliac, you shouldn't feel that you can't post on a thread just because you are presenting an alternative view!

A really interesting thing about MN is how much you can't pigeonhole parents. For example, I see homebirths as being very risky whereas I feel very relaxed and confident about co-sleeping. For other women, their risk assessment would be the other way round.

For what it's worth, I've also read that China and Japan view co-sleeping as completely the norm and have almost non existent rates of SIDS and also that Colic is an almost unheard of concept in third world type socities where babies are kept close the whole time.

My DD2 has just turned a year old, nd I blame attachment parenting for the hell that I'm in at the moment. I've always been a cuddly mother, carrying my children most of the time and we do co-sleeping. But it's meant that she's totally attached to me and I can't leave her with anybody. I returned to work when she was 9mo, and after 2 weeks she was evicted from the creche because she cried non-stop + was v.unsettled. She's been with a childminder since and she's very up and down. She was sick last week, and I suppose I've been holding her a lot. Now she wants to be carried by me the whole time and I know I can't as, if I do, she'll give the childminder hell on Monday and as it is she's on borrowed time with CM.It's resulted in her screaming non-stop and my head feels like it's bursting. She won't even go to her daddy. She was starting to stand but has now regressed. And she's not even sleeping properly at night.
I actually logged on tonight with the intention of starting a thread on this!

Couldn't co-sleep when DS was a baby although DH liked it. We are both heavy sleepers and I just never slept well if DS was in bed with us. He was in moses basket beside bed till he was 3 months and then in cot at end of our bed till he was 9 months. Then he went into his own room.

He is now 6 and we now co-sleep! Happened gradually after a house move and although we have tried various bribery tactics it hasn't worked! He sleeps with me and DH is in spare room. Although last night he wanted to sleep with DH so is still there. And I missed him!

Didn't do co-sleeping at night but did co-napping.
DS loved falling asleep with me. DD was like Colditz's DS. Sometimes what she needed to be calm was to be left alone.

liliac, the article you linked to have a lot of unanswered 'holes' in them.

it does not answer questions like:
was the mothers very tired and/or sleep deprived? under the influence of legal or illegal drugs which will make them harder to rouse? etc. formula or breastfeeders? routine cosleepers?

it says two thirds of all deaths happen while co sleeping. bedsharing and sofasharing are not the same thing. many of these deaths happen on couches or other unsuitable sleep surfaces.

it also says that all new mothers go to bed very tired. maybe, but since most new mums do not cosleep as early as possible, it is normally in they are overtired and sleep deprived that they resort to cosleepng as a way of catching up with rest and sleep - just the sleep profile when they shouldn't cosleep.

cosleeping helps everyone in the house get more sleep so a new mum, had she been given safe cosleepng advice to suit her unique home environment very early on, may find that cosleeping aids early motherhood.

qwertpoiuy, it may be that your DD is just going through the normal "separation anxiety" phase. I tried to dig out my child psychology book (academic textbook), but couldn't find it, however I recall that the classic age for this to happen is between 9 to 13 months. Apparently at this age, it is quite normal for them to suddenly want their mother the whole time even if they had been happy to go to other people before.

Also quert - there is bound to be tension between AP and being a working mom - the two are not entirely compatible almost by definition. That is certainly no criticism as I work myself - but I'm aware that to do so is automatically problematic if you have an AP parenting style in other respects. My dd is also very clingy. I think it's her temperament but also I'm sure that trying to combine an AP approach with work and childcare hasn't helped. OTOH, I wouldn't do things differently - I wouldn't have held her less because she needs to be away from me. I'm just aware of the issues and try to make her as secure about the situation as I can.

It worked well for us - co-sleeping is safe if you follow the guidelines.

I would agree that AP and a return to work are not really factors that are compatible, unless maybe you had a nanny or family member who could continue in the same vein whilst you were away from home, but not many people have that option.

I found co-sleeping really great as it meant that I constantly monitored my daughter in my sleep and used to wake up if she stirred or got hot or cold or whatever, usually before she did so it worked great for us but I can see it wouldn't in some combinations of parents and children and even bedroom set ups. We created a huge sleeping area so there was always plenty of room as my dd likes to wander in her sleep. Also I think if you are confident in your ability to co-sleep then you relax into it and it works whereas if you are worried it just doesn't work and is probably not the choice for you.

I personally love using slings but have come across babies who don't like being so close to others all the time.

What age do you become less 'attached' to each other? I guess it varies?

One of the reasons I'm curious is if I have another baby I might want to go down this route more than I did with ds. Ds was in hospital for a week in intensive and special care and for much of this time I wasn't really able to hold him - I'm wondering how much that shaped who he is too.

There's quite a good article by Eleanor Mills (working mum) in the Review section of the Sunday Times today, basically saying how attachment type style parenting and responding quickly to a baby's needs helps their brains to develop and leads to greater emotional stability and academic success later on.

I think the age of independence does vary, and some kids seem to be independent earlier than others. My dd found being away from me in social situation really easy but she is naturally outgoing and confident, however she still liked to sleep with me full time till about 18 months and still does 2 or 3 days a week now at 3 and a half. She still likes to be carried as much as possible. I kind of like to think of it as having a stable centre close to me and then she launches off into her own world and comes back when she needs to.

I noticed she was a very early talker and is very socially adept and I have a feeling some of that may be because being up in a sling she was up in peoples conversations rather than being in a pram to one side so sort of picked it up but that is just my theory and may just be her and nothing to do with my parenting style.

Bedside cots worked for us. Takes away the fear yet you're still next to your baby.

As for colic (and my first suffered terribly) attachment parenting made no difference whatsoever, which is why I turned to a routine in utter desperation.

I believe colic doesn't exist in countries where babies are strapped to their mothers who are working in fields etc. (continuous, hard movement) A very colicky baby strapped into a sling whilst you potter around the house is just not the same. DD just cried even more. I think the idea that slings somehow 'cure' colic is one of the great myths of attachment parenting. (not that I'm saying it doesn't help in some cases)

qwertpoiuy- that's an interesting point. If AP really isnt compatible with returning to work, then I think that's a pretty strong reason not to go with it, as many mothers are likely to want/need to return to work.However, there does seem to be evidence that it's quite possible to do both. Personally I would feel very uncomfortable with a child being so attached to me that even the father was excluded though. Some mothers might be ok with that, but personally I would find it too 'possessive' and unfair on the father, who is a co-parent after all.
Rosetip - really good point about the separation anxiety thing, and you know, this is one of the downsides, I believe, of th the longer maternity leave these days. (I'll probably be shot down in flames for saying that. But I'm NOT saying new maternity legislation is bad, just pointing out that there IS a downside). When i went back to work after my DCs, the maximum leave was 6 months, which meant that most people were returning when their LO was about 4/5 months old. A lot of my colleagues now take a whole year off work, and consequently are returning when their LO is about 10/11 months old. On the whole,They DEFINITELY have more problems with leaving their children. A lot of them report difficulties with their kids crying at nursery/CM, so i think the age factor is important. A few months younger or older than this, and children seem to have fewer problems.

I think I did/do attachment parenting. Certainly all the literature I have read since I agree much more with a 'baby needs to be attached and close and bonded' than 'baby needs to learn to be independent'.

My little one is now naturally very secure, happy and independent (she is 19mths). I go to work, daddy goes to work (nanna looks after for the two days i work). She is totally comfortable saying 'bye' knowing we will come back. She goes through wobbly patches of clinginess, illness etc, and yes, the first 6 mths I probably did more for dd than dh (he looked after me - just like in the 9mths of pregnancy ) but she is happy with either of us. Last night she didn't miss me at all while I went off to the Xmas do

I think it's less about techniques (co-sleeping, sling, never putting down) and more about the principle - they are your lovely babies and need to be responded to instinctively rather than put into somebody's schedule.

its really hard to compare one family to another as people adopt different elements of AP and the babies are different. I guess probably if you had one approach at home and then your nursery had another it could be a bit confusing for a child but say you had a well loved child minder on the same wavelength it would be do-able i suppose. I don't think that the way I employed AP could have been done if I worked there just isn't the space in my life for both but maybe the basic principles could be applied. I found AP was a more than full time job (but obviously what we wanted). I think maybe that if a parent was working full time then maybe they wouldn't be employing AP methods all the time anyway as they wouldn't be there to do it so probably would have their own methods to meet their family's needs.

lailasmum - I agree. Each family will have its own approach and also different degrees of what they can cope with. Our babies are all individuals too, and as I discovered, some babies just don't want that intensive 24/7 contact with one individual.
What I find fascinating about this whole debate, is that I guess ultimately we all want the same thing - for our babies to grow into young people/adults who have that balance of knowing that they are secure yet being independent enough to feel they can be their true selves. We also learn from our own childhood experiences don't we - I now realise in retrospect that I was over protected and this didn't help me develop self confidence until relatively late in adulthood.My DCs are now at the teenager stage, and one thing I'm really relieved about is that they are all pretty confident people. My 15 year old actually looked up train timetables and asked me if she could go to London on her own yesterday! I said no, as I wouldn't be happy for her to do that alone, but i WAS happy that she obviously has the confidence to do it! I guess it all starts from birth doesn't it? - this journey of supporting our children to feel safe and grounded yet not afraid of the big wide world.