Not for me (Controlled Crying)

Member Name: starfish2000

Product:	Controlled Crying
Date:	09/11/00 (2441 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Baby will fall asleep alone

Disadvantages: Stressful for both parent and child

I have already written a bit about controlled crying in my opinion on the book ' Solve your child's sleep problem', I hope noone minds me expressing my opinion here too!

Controlled crying is a popular method for training your baby to fall asleep alone and stay asleep all night by leaving them to cry.

It works like this:

1. Put baby to bed awake.
2. Say goodnight and leave the room.
3. If baby cries, wait five minutes before entering the room.
4. 'Reassure' your baby by talking to her but don't pick her up.
5. Say goodnight and leave the room.
6. I baby cries, wait ten minutes before entering the room....

and so on, increasing the times between going in to your baby until the baby eventually falls asleep.

If you have a baby you have probably heard of this method and how successful it is from the many parents who have used it and health visitors who recommend it, and you may be wondering if you should try it with your child.
I would never use this method and here are my reasons why...

1. IT'S UNKIND

Babies are helpless, dependant and very vulnerable, but they are people. They count on you to be cared for and when a baby cries she is trying to tell you, in the only way she can, that something is wrong and she needs you.
I have an 18 year old sister with Downs Syndrome who cannot speak. She often uses crying to express herself during the night if something is wrong. If we were to ignore her and let her cry herself back to sleep instead of giving her the drink, snack or cuddle she wants, we would be accused of being cruel and probably have social services investigating us.
I see no difference between that and doing it to a baby.

2. YOU'RE GIVING YOUR BABY A NEGATIVE MESSAGE.

Babies can't speak, but they are intelligent people who can communicate through sounds, gestures and crying. When you ignore your baby's attempts to
communicate as well as teaching your child to sleep you are teaching her that communication is a waste of time. This method works because your baby thinks 'when I cry, noone listens to me' and gives up trying to communicate. A baby who is picked up and shown affection when she cries learns to trust and feels secure, a baby who is ignored feels abandoned and powerless.

3. IT COULD BE DANGEROUS.

During sleep, babies, like adults go through several sleep states, from light REM sleep to deep sleep, back and forth throughout the night.
According to some studies, cot death is most likely to occur while babies are in the deepest state of sleep.
Babies who are forced to sleep for long periods, therefore spending more time in very deep sleep before they are naturally ready, could be more vulnerable to cot death.
Countries such as the UK and USA where contolled crying is widely used have much higher rates of cot death than countries where babies sleep with their parents and controlled crying is rarely practised, such as Japan.

4. IT COULD MAKE YOU LESS RESPONSIVE TO YOUR CHILD.

A baby's cry is almost impossible to ignore. When my baby cries I want to make her stop. I believe nature designed it this way, if crying was a pleasant sound it would be easy to ignore, but it isn't because it isn't meant to be ignored.
By forcing yourself to ignore your baby's cry you may eventually lose the natural sensitivity to the crying and become less responsive to your baby.
It is possible that you might lose the ability to sense when something is really wrong with your baby at night.

5. CRYING IS BAD FOR BABIES.

Remember the last time you cried for a long time, out of fear or distress, eventually srying yourself to sleep?
How did it feel?
Probably horrible, and it is no different for your baby.
Babies who cry for long periods suffer physical stress - high blood pressure, tense body,
increased temperature.
Eventually they fall into a deep sleep, just as you or I might fall into a deep sleep afer experiencing trauma.
Of course crying isn't always bad for your baby, sometimes babies need to release emotions or pain by crying, but at those times I would rather be with my baby comforting her than be the cause of the crying in the first place by placing her in a frightening or stressful situation.



Having a baby is exhausting and it is very tempting to try controlled crying, especially when everyone is telling me 'it works!'. I would argue that's not the point, cutting someone's hands off to stop them stealing 'works' but is it the right thing to do?
Being a parent is a 24 hour job and I'll be there for my baby 24 hours a day for as long as it takes her to naturally start sleeping through the night.
My baby will only fall asleep at my breast or in my arms and many people tell me I should let her 'cry it out' and that she should learn to comfort herself with a dummy. Personally I see nothing wrong with her behaviour, sometimes it's inconvenient but I'd rather bring up a child who turns to to people for comfort and love rather than inanimate objects.

I want to add that I'm in no way suggesting that anyone who has used controlled crying is a bad parent. There is a lot of pressure from experts and other parents to have a 'good' baby that sleeps through the night. I don't think there's any such thing as 'good' or 'bad' babies. All babies and parents are different and many people are perfectly happy to use this method, afterall it 'works', however, it's not for me.

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