If I can’t leave my baby to cry then what am I supposed to do here???!

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Everything I read online says you cannot leave your baby to cry. I obviously have always tried to avoid this. He’s now 10 months and goes absolutely crazy if I am not with him. He does sleep at night but in the day it is non stop. I can’t cook or eat or shower. My partner works away in the week and this can’t be changed. No family nearby and nobody local to help unless we paid.

What am I supposed to do? Even if he’s in his high chair and I start cooking he will lose it, wants to get out, then I take him to the playpen and go back to cook and again he’s screaming, howling. I just want to disappear.

This "rule" will have been made up by someone whose baby never cried. Dd1 screamed every time she was put down until she was about five months old. Obviously she had to be left to cry so I could shower/use the loo/keep the house vaguely clean.

I had a carrier that I wore much of the time.

I had a crier. I used to put him in a baby bouncer (allegedly terrible too but almost everything a mother can use to gain 5 minutes space to do something else is decreed damaging in some way) and he would bounce while i peeled carrots.

Try sticking him in his high chair at the kitchen table as you prep food, chatting to him a bit and letting him 'help' by thumping a potato up and down or something.

With a shower, can you put him in a rocking chair or similar, while you shower. Or in his playpen with TV on to distract him for 10 mins.

I sometimes had to leave DDs to cry while I went and had a good cry myself in another room. It's very hard, do give yourself time to make food, eat, drink, shower etc. Self-care is so important.

It's not the done thing to use the tv as a babysitter but I found CBeebies did it brilliantly while I was cooking dinner for my two and they are both now successful adults so it never did them any harm.

I think wearing the baby is ok if you can manage it but don't do it for too long, you can hurt yourself particularly your back, quite easily post partum, and some people will be recovering from difficult birth and SPD. Also my DDs were 8lbs and 9lbs 2oz, it wasn't long before they felt too heavy for me to manage carrying them for long. Muscle tone takes about two years to come back after giving birth/pregnancy. I used to get DH to carry them when we went for walks- I've carried them for 9 months - your turn! And I just about have enough balance to get myself over a stile - we nearly went for a burton when I tried it carrying DD1.

Get a baby sling so you can pop him on your back :)

You know when you’re on a plane and they say if the masks drop down that you should put yours on first even before you help your kids? Your baby relies on you for its survival and if you are not surviving the baby won’t either. There is a vast gulf between being neglectful and being realistic. It is much better for a baby to cry for ten minutes in a safe location than it is for you to be so frazzled that you accidentally do something dangerous. Don’t let other people’s criticisms guide you.

Plus when I had DD1 it was a summer when it was 30 odd degrees and we'd both get hot if she was next to me for long. After a few minutes she'd literally be prising herself away and seemed to prefer a little wriggle about on the baby gym or blanket. DD2 was a winter baby and liked a lot of cuddles!

You can do whatever you want. You are the adult and are in charge. I know that sounds flippant but it took quite a long time for this to dawn on me when my son was little!

It does not hurt a baby to cry for 5 mins whilst you are in the shower provided they are left in a safe place eg their cot in your bedroom whilst you're in the ensuite or in the dining room in playpen whilst you are in the kitchen. You can pop your head around the door and talk to the baby so they know you are close. I used to talk to mine through the baby monitor if they cried when I popped into another room. Not leaving them to cry means not leaving them 30 mins to scream themselves into a state.

Having twins, one would commonly cry while tending to the other. Pretty sure it's fine.

Oh sweetheart, I remember this phase well. My eldest was so easy, I could leave him in his little bouncy chair or jumperoo or playpen and he was fine.

My second came along and I thought the same would happen. Not a flipping chance. I had to take him to the toilet with me. It's exhausting but it's normal. Sometimes, you just need to let him cry for a bit. I wore mine in a carrier around the house quite a lot so my hands were free to clean/cook. When I showered I took his bouncer into the bathroom and sat him where he could see me.

It does pass, I promise.

They should tattoo this on every woman's forearm at the 12 week scan.

There is a huge leap around 9/10 months and separation anxiety is huge at this point.

As others have said, leaving a baby to cry in order to ‘teach’ them to sleep is cruel. Leaving a baby to cry because you have to take care of a basic need is often unavoidable.

My daughter was and still is at 7, extremely clingy to me. I’d bring her with me whatever I was doing and baby wearing saved my life. But I understand that’s not always possible. As long as you’re doing your absolute best most of the time, you’re doing amazing.

Of course you can leave your baby to cry - he needs to learn that yes, you have gone, but you will ALWAYS come back. Otherwise believe me, you will have the kid that clings to you howling when you drop off at daycare/school.

That sounds difficult, I really feel for you. Of course you can leave him for a while. Will he tolerate being free to crawl around near you whilst you’re busy? Or maybe a baby bouncer on the doorframe or a walker? Good luck, this phase will pass x

Let him cry. During the day on maternity leave I wouldn't have eaten a single meal, or gone to the loo, or left the house, if I hadn't put my eldest down and let her cry while I made food/went for a wee/got dressed etc.
I didn't leave her crying for ages, and I was always there. I just wasn't physically holding her all the time. I used to think, well if she was a twin, or had an older sibling, sometimes she would have to be left while I dealt with the other child, and no one would say that was wrong.

My youngest was a lot more chilled, but she also had to be left crying sometimes while I was dealing with DD1. You can't leave a 3 year old to fend for themselves because a baby is crying.

It's not come from Attachment Parenting, I did AP, there was no golden rule about avoiding all crying EVER. Yes there was some judgement about sleep training or ideas about "not holding the baby too much" etc but in general, no, this isn't what AP is about.

It's come from the weird polarisation of social media/internet parenting advice, making everything into an extreme "us vs them" issue, backed up with dubious "science" so that you end up with ridiculous, black-and-white, overly-detailed standards which nobody could possibly fit into, and the threat of dire consequences to your baby if you don't, which only seems to serve to fuel new parents' anxiety and sense of isolation.

It's absolute madness - I thought it was bad when my eldest was tiny (2008) but then it seemed to calm down a bit - then over the last 10 years or so it's been ramping up and up and up until people feel like (whichever side they've fallen on) is somehow "the official advice".

It's not. It's never been! If you look at advice from sources like NHS, lullaby trust etc it's much more balanced and really not very prescriptive at all. This is because if you're writing official advice in a professional capacity, there are guidelines and training to do this, you have to consider not only what exactly are you saying and how it might be interpreted directly, but also consider what people are going to read between the lines, what unintended consequences will there be from this advice? And realistically there is a HUGE gulf between "ideal" parenting and "harm". Randoms on FB on a power trip don't have any of that in mind and seem to revel in creating ever more extreme or ever more complicated rules and then berating anyone who expresses any kind of dissent.

What's the cure for it? Get off the internet, make mum contacts IRL. Such a sanity saver to see that people can exist quite happily and safely in that gap between ideal and harm. Good enough parenting is good enough. And social support is probably what you're looking for by searching all the groups/pages/forums anyway.

They cry because they haven’t learned that you’re coming back when you walk away. You need to do some gradual withdrawal over time. Leave them to cry for a minute then go back. Then try 2 minutes and go back. And so on until you’ve got enough time for a shower or to make some food. Sometimes being able to hear you when they can’t see you can help as well.

when they say never leave a child to cry they’re talking about children who have been abused. Those orphanages abroad have silent babies in them because they know no one comes back. This isn’t healthy for the child and causes a form of attachment disorder which actually re programmes their brain and ability to form attachments later in life. Parents who neglect their children for hours on end and leave them to cry when they’re starving or dirty for hours. Same thing. But totally fine to build up the trust so that they can cope with you being in another room for 10 minutes. It helps with bedtimes too.

I think at that age he can be left

I had 3 dc under 4 and sometimes you have to get on with stuff and they grizzle

You put them somewhere safe like the cot and you go and shower. Don't feel bad it's a basic necessity. Baby will be fine.

Twins here and they cried plenty. They were put in the playpen , were safe and had toys/tv to entertain them. We all survived!

I used to cook with a baby in a carrier or on my hip, or get stuff done while they slept but if DH was away I wouldn't miss out on a shower, I would just put them where they could see me e.g. in the bathroom with some toys and then on my bed while I got dressed.

I’m totally with you on this.