Controlled crying - moving from attachment parenting to abandonment parenting?

[tinkerbellhadpiles]

I know this is going to get a few people annoyed so I've put my special teflon knickers and fireproof boots on first. This is a genuine question:
I don't get controlled crying. I've spent a long time thinking about this (mostly at 2am when my DD wakes up hungry). If you put yourself in the place of the child, is this not a movement from attachment parenting to abandonment parenting
You spend all day lavishing attention on your child, when the little one cries you comfort him or her, sacrificing your time to do anything else in favour of looking after her.
Then seven a clock rolls round and you suddenly start ignoring her, until she learns that you just abandon her at nights and gives up and goes to sleep through exaustion or frustration.
To my mind controlled crying is an oxymoron, a child cries because they are out of control, frustrated, hungry or frightened. And if you are sitting there on the stairs sobbing because you can hear her (as a lot of my friends do) then you aren't in control either. Is it just a battle of wills or is there a genuine bit of science in here?
Seriously, will someone PLEASE explain how this actually works?
Incidentally, I don't have a much better solution, my DD (five months) sleeps 7-2:30, has a feed and sleeps till about 6ish. We just deal with it now and honestly I don't mind now I'm used to it. She did wake up every hour for a month when she got to three and a half months and I was fairly psychotic after a week of it and did pick up, put down and that worked to get to the above situation.

Oh what a fab night you must have had cruisemum1...

excellent cruisemum and long may your bliss last.

thank you all. am hoping I it works its' magic again tonight. lo has been a beautiful, rested, delight today . Always is but more so today!!!

hey everyone, thinking of starting CC with DD 9months soon. She's not that demanding, just wakes a couple of times a night, and once is in with us fall to sleep. We'll be moving DD to her nursery soon though, so everything must change..... what are the 'nigh terrors'! what other things should I be looking out for?????

I feel so rejected and inadequate now, kiskidee! You are seeing other people behind my back ? and there was me thinking we had something special.
I assumed this was an AP support thread so only just now discovered the sordid truth?boo hoo

Joking aside, I have obviously missed out on the main debate but noticed that your new line on the numerous studies is that you can?t tell the methodology etc from the abstract.
I did make the effort and typed out the main bits from one of those studies on the other thread but, I know, I know, you don?t really read my posts, do you?

I have got quite a few of the studies so what do you want to know?
They were specifically aimed at investigating possible ?damage? caused by Controlled Crying. And there was none. Nada. Rien.
It?s almost embarrassing how one-sided these studies are ? 95 Swedish children and not a single one displayed any sign of ?psychological damage?.

For the first time in weeks I have had a chance to look at other threads and I am really thrilled that for so many people things are finally falling into place, including the NCSS mums whose thread we have been following with crossed fingers for the past six months. Let?s hope there?ll be more success stories aided by much more supporting and maybe, just maybe a little less debating.

I sometimes think that one can do too much reading. You will always be able to find an 'expert' to back up any opinion and a doctor to say that something is wrong.

Speaking from experience, I know full well that excessive screaming in a baby causes damage. My own mother was/is a firm believer in CIO. The damage included burst blood vessels of the eyes, a ruptured diaphragm and damage of the vocal chords. I didn't speak at all until I was five and saw many psychologists. They all agreed that it was because of the damage, both physical and psychological, of my mother's sleep training methods.

Danceswithbaby, I read about your experience on the ncss thread and it did give me food for thought ? thanks but, of course, sorry to hear about that.
I wanted to ask you a couple of things about it but my posting on the ncss support thread probably would not have gone down well.

My main question is: what precisely did your mum do?
CIO ? ?crying it out? ? is very very very different from Controlled Crying.
There is a clear difference: CIO, as I understand it, is about not responding promptly or even not responding at all to your baby?s cries to avoid ?spoiling? him, to teach him to self-soothe at all times, only responding when the parent thinks it appropriate. ?At all times? means for example while the mum is on the phone or if the mum thinks it is not time for feeding baby yet.
And there is no checking involved in CIO, you just leave him to it and let him bawl his eyes out.

CIO as defined above has been pretty much debunked. It has been shown in several studies, for example the Copenhagen one, that ignoring an infant?s cries willy-nilly makes him more clingy and less confident.

This is the sleep section of Mumsnet, though ? all we are talking about is Controlled Crying at sleep times.
In that particular, narrow context ? settling a sleepy child ? there is overwhelming evidence that crying will not do any damage.

For that reason I disagree with your opening statement: it is worth reading as much as you can and reading the material very carefully, particularly because there are lots of definitions bandied about for seemingly the same thing.

CIO is not CC. Did your mum do CC as it has been explained on these forums? If so, please tell us so that we can learn from her mistakes. I personally am always grateful for fresh perspectives.

Danceswithbaby, your post does highlight one major problem in this Controlled Crying debate: Everyone seems to have their own definition.

You are by no means the only person who thinks of CC as essentially the same as CIO. The Copenhagen study was not about CC and yet the Telegraph thought it was and so does ?Medical News Today?.

It gets worse: some people equate CC with the advice from a certain person (also see Telegraph article).
That?s the reason for the fear and loathing on these forums. They can?t talk about that person anymore so they have redirected their venom to what they think are her methods and anyone supporting her methods.

As long as Mumsnet is in conflict with that person they probably think it is their right to police these boards and use anti-CC propaganda as a stick to beat anyone whose advice happens to overlap with hers.

What strongly reinforces this impression is another anti-CC position paper , this time from the UK arm of the World Infant Mental Health Association.
Unlike their Australian co-religionists the wily Brits avoid lying about CC, in fact they avoid talking about Controlled Crying (as we know it) altogether.
Instead, they use the CC angle to attack the advice of you-know-who.

I wonder what morningpaper makes of that? I always wondered which MNer posted the rocket comment.
Trouble is, it?s dangerous when personal vendetta gets mixed up with supposedly sound advice. Because of hatred of one person, lies are being spread and parents wilfully misled.

That can?t be right.

These people are labouring under a misapprehension:
Controlled Crying for sleep-training purposes is recommended by the entire paediatric world (minus Dr. McKenna ? but then again he is an anthropologist!).

"It gets worse: some people equate CC with the advice from a certain person (also see Telegraph article).
That?s the reason for the fear and loathing on these forums."

omg, talk about belittling the intelligence of a multitude of women on 'these forums'. this is your audience, remember.

I wonder who are the 'they' that 'police' this message board.

Controlled Crying for sleep-training purposes is recommended by the entire paediatric world - my now that IS a sweeping claim. Wanna provide the evidence?

(minus Dr. McKenna ? but then again he is an anthropologist!) maybe you would like to look at the CV this anthropologist before you make more silly claims.

I was just trying to be polite but hey! if you want me to spell it out:
of course, by ?some people? I meant my favourite flat-earthers, kiskidee and morningpaper.

Aren?t you the one who does not trust parents? Let me repeat your ?critique? of the Eckerberg study:

Kiskidee:
?daddyj, the swedish study you pointed to in one of your more, shall we say, emotional posts also relied heavily on the subjectivity of parents.
ie, filling in a diary and filling in questionnaires. not very emperical as there is no way to measure the subjectivity of parents on many fronts, as you can appreciate.

empirical, as i remember from doing a bit of chemistry and biology means measuring responses using factors, in this case like blood pressure, heart rate, body temp, neurological activity in certain areas of the brain, hormone levels like cortisol and melatonin, levels of crying intensity (decibels) over an extended period of time, say every hour in the next 12 hrs after say waking?
none of these things are easily measured by the average parent or in an average home which is why a sleep lab is a better place to have cc studied.?

This is Mumsnet, you know ? full of ?subjectivity?

I have provided the evidence on the other thread, Aloha has provided it on this thread ? how about your evidence?
It?s been nearly 2 months since we started our little chat and still nothing, kiskidee? Bit poor, non?

Re ol? McKenna, I looked at his CV and right at the top it says ?Chair, Department of Anthropology?.

Calling the Chair of the Department of Anthropology (who has a degree in Anthropology) an Anthropologist is not obviously silly.

You really struggle with detail, don?t you?

Do you understand what empirical means now?

Will I have to remind you that the AP movement is all about trusting parents and getting science out of the nursery?

Good to have you back, though

thanks daddyj.
say what you mean and mean what you say.

since Ferber has now decided to recommend that cc is not advisable before 1 yr

and that he has also said that:
co-sleeping does not hinder a child's independence like his book claimed earlier

and he also said that:

co-sleeping is fine in many instances.

then surely he is moving closer towards the thinking of people like McKenna.

in addition, slowly, the sleep guidelines in the US and UK are moving towards a child co-sleeping with parents (room sharing is a form of co-sleeping)

as far as your 'flat earther' derision goes, it seems more like the CC believers have got something wrong and are returning to the way things have always been.

while talking of your cute little flat earther phrase, i note that it is recently you picked up this saying from american boards you are reading. does this mean you did not 'completely' research CC as you used to claim you did?

that anthropologist you are trying so are now spending time discrediting - after all, he is 'only' an anthropologist who has made sleep research in infants and parents his life work for over 20 yrs.

oh, in a Sleep Lab working alongside a multi-disciplinary team in a very highly respected university in the US.

If you want to discuss, then treat those who contradict your belief systems fairly otherwise you discredit yourself.

Oh, McKenna does not discuss controlled crying in any of his papers afaik. His work focuses largely on infant and mother sleep in many different sleep arrangements and including solitary sleep.

Come on, you have to believe me - it really is good to hear from you

However - are you at it again?
You have a very unhappy relationship with the truth which seriously undermines all the good contributions you make
(there are some, I should know!) and it reflects badly on the movement you purport to support.

I have posted this before but you really struggle to read anything properly so here it is again (apologies to everyone else for the repetition):
Ferber interview - Ferber demystified
Did you read it? He says babies are ready to sleep through the night from 4/5 months onwards.

What?s your obsession with Ferber anyway?
I didn?t even know he originally advised against co-sleeping and am pleased for him
that he has joined the rest of us in understanding that co-sleeping can be a perfectly excellent solution for many parents.

We co-slept last night from 3:30 am onwards. Dd?s room was just too cold to try and re-settle her so we took her in to our own bed and settled her with boob.

Acceptance of co-sleeping is the major change in Ferber?s thinking since 20 years ago.

He is as clear on CC as ever and, again, you need to read this stuff properly:
he is not advising that CC before a certain age is damaging but merely talking about ?sleeping through?.
The age limit refers to the age at which lo can be expected to sleep through, not the ?CC safe? age.

It is probably not good for your mental health to find out what the ?CC safe? age is, as far as the paediatric world is concerned.

Regarding Dr. McKenna, let me clarify my initial statement:
Controlled Crying for sleep-training purposes is recommended by the entire paediatric world,
including Dr. McKenna who does not have an opinion on the issue according to kiskidee.

Is that better?

oooh i'm not getting sucked into this - i'm too tired!!!! what is attachment parenting, yeah i know i could look up the links but i dont have time just now.

Noo - don't get sucked into this!
It's just me and kiskidee having some fun.

You don't know about attachment parenting?
kiskidee will do the honours, I hope.

Kiskidee, the list of lies just gets longer and longer:

When did I claim that I ?completely researched CC??
I am just a Dad muddling through. When eenybeeny?s thread started
I had no idea these scientific studies proving CC to be safe existed.
And I am still learning ? hence, my delight at your return!
But: Provide us with some evidence for your views - no fibbing, por favor!
I am happy to learn more.

The US/UK guidelines are moving closer to co-sleeping? Proof?
Who sets the US/UK guidelines, btw?

Unfortunately, I don?t know what the American equivalent to Mumsnet is, would be interesting to have a look.
The ?flat earth society? reference is from one of my favourite bands.
Below the chorus of the song, for you only:

The Flat Earth Society is meeting here today,
singing happy little lies
and the bright ship Humana is sailing far away
with grave determination....
and no destination.

You have to stop the lies, kiskidee. You are doing a disservice to the AP movement.

wot i said:
"McKenna does not discuss controlled crying in any of his papers afaik"

how daddyj interpreted it:
"including Dr. McKenna who does not have an opinion on the issue according to kiskidee."

for the first time i am saying it:

the man is an eejit - or deliberately misinterpeting me.

what Ferber also said

"But it says here in your book..." I read him two sentences I had read to my wife during one of our 2 A.M. showdowns: "Although taking your child into bed with you for a night or two may be reasonable if he is ill or very upset about something, for the most part this is not a good idea." And, "Sleeping alone is an important part of his learning to be able to separate from you without anxiety and to see himself as an independent individual."

"I wish I hadn't written those sentences," Ferber replied. "That came out of some of the existing literature. It is a blanket statement that is just not right. There's plenty of examples of co-sleeping where it works out just fine. My feeling now is that children can sleep with or without their parents. What's really important is that the parents work out what they want to do."

found here a fantastic article about sleep and not just infant sleep.

i notice you haven't disputed that CC is no longer advocated by Ferber for a child under a year.

or does that make you wince since you started CC on your dd at was it 3 months initially. yeah, right. you did you homework before CCing your dd.

i could call you a liar here yourself but you have already contradicted yourself here on these messageboards for all to read.

it is articles like this one that daddyj thinks is just not worthy

Sleep safe, sleep sound, share a room with me
"A key message to keep your baby safe and healthy is that the safest place for ababy to sleep for the first six months is in a cot in the parents' bedroom."

I am sure daddyj will still call me a liar though.

Are you arguing with the voices in your head now?

Who is talking about co-sleeping? Who is talking about where the cot should be?

Are you feeling quite well? Should I leave you to resolve your internal dialogue before we get back to what we were discussing?

At least the entertainment factor is back!

You still refuse to read the Ferber links? And you still struggle to read my posts?
And you repeat your lie once more?

You are the one who is obsessed with the poor chap, not me. At least have the courtesy to carefully read what he has got to say.

While we are on the subject of your new lies, how about an apology for the old ones?
The AAIMHI not returning your phone calls?

By the way, note the full address, phone number, email address, list of committee members and the absence of a disclaimer page on the AIMH website .
At last, a victory for the Brits

Right, I am taking the missus for a couple of cheekies by the river tonight
but look forward to your return to the debate later on tonight or this weekend.

Have a mental bank holiday weekend - oops

I was just trying to be polite but hey! if you want me to spell it out:
of course, by ?some people? I meant my favourite flat-earthers, kiskidee and morningpaper.