Photo credit: “At the end of a very long day” by KitLKat on flickr
There was some banter the other day on twitter comparing sleep with sex. I’m not sure if it originated with or ended with Ann Douglas, but the conversation at some point came around to the intro to her book Sleep Solutions for Your Baby, Toddler and Preschooler: The Ultimate No-Worry Approach for Each Age and Stage (Mother of All Solutions)
Sleep is a lot like sex. If you’re not getting it as much as you’d like, it can become a bit of an obsession. Suddenly, all you can think about is when you last had it, how great it felt when you had it, and what you can do to get some again.
Sounds logical. Maybe sleep is like sex in the way that Ann described. In terms of our obsession with it. And maybe that is where the discussion ends. But as someone that uses analogies a lot and that once wrote an hour long presentation comparing web content with food, I tend to follow the analogy down a path and see if it continues to work.
Let me explain.
Sex makes us happy. Sleep makes us happy. Lack of sex makes us cranky. Lack of sleep makes us cranky.
If you have a newborn baby in your house, you may be starved for sleep. If you are the spouse of a woman who recently pushed a baby out of her vagina you may be starved for sex. If you are starved for sleep or starved for sex, then you might, as Ann explained, be obsessed with it, be thinking about when you last had it, how great it felt when you had it, and what you can do to get some again.
So what can you do to get some again?
First of all, it is important to recognize that it is normal for newborns to not sleep through the night and it is normal for women to not be interested in sex right after having a baby. It is also a reality that some babies are ready to sleep through the night earlier than others are, just as some women are interested in sex earlier than others are. And we like to compare. Why does her baby sleep through the night and mine doesn’t? Why is his wife dragging him into bed every night and mine has no interest in sex?
If you are on the losing end of that equation, you are probably trying to figure out what you can do to get some more. There are appropriate and inappropriate ways to deal with that. If someone is obsessed with sex, it is appropriate for them to use gentle, loving, techniques to try to convince a partner to have sex. It is not appropriate to use force to get someone to have sex with you. It is also not particularly respectful to complain and push, complain and push, complain and push with intermittent reminders that you love the person until that person finally gives in. Same with sleep. If someone is obsessed with sleep, it is appropriate to use gentle, loving techniques to try to get your baby to sleep so that you can get more sleep too. It is not appropriate to force a baby to sleep using methods like the extinction method of cry it out. It also isn’t particularly respectful to say you have to sleep now and I’m going to let you cry for a bit, remind you that I love you, let you cry for a bit more, remind you that I love you, and then let you cry some more again until you finally go to sleep (otherwise known as graduated extinction).
But it is different too. Sleep is a necessity. We need sleep to live. Sure, many of us can get by with less than desirable amounts of sleep, with constant interruptions to our sleep, but we do need it. We don’t need sex in the same way. We desire it, it is healthy, sometimes we want more of it and sometimes we want less of it. We may be obsessed with it, but we can survive without it. Does that make it okay to use force or disrespectful techniques to get sleep? I’ll let you decide for yourself. But for me the answer is a very clear and unequivocal no.
There are countries where it is appropriate, accepted, and normal for a husband to force his wife to have sex. They would call it normal, a wife’s duty. We don’t think that is acceptable. There are also countries where it is appropriate, accepted, and normal for parents to use cry it out to force their children to sleep. They call it normal, a parenting choice. I don’t buy it. Just as we need to challenge cultures, religions, regimes that allow women to be disrespected in that way, I believe that we need to challenge cultures, religions and regimes that allow babies to be disrespected in that way. (note: this paragraph was rephrased to remove a word that some found offensive and clarify that I was referring specifically to cry it out).
Whether we are talking about sleep or sex, I conclude that a gentle, loving approach the best way to get it. It is the humane way to get it. It is the respectful way to get it.
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Oh Annie, leave it to you to compare sleep training with rape.
You kill me.
@TheFeministBreeder: Actually, I’m comparing disrespecting a human being with disrespecting a human being.
I love this post. Giving our children the respect due any human being is imperative in my mind, and I just don’t understand people who don’t “get” that. Of course some people are going to see the rape comparison as extreme, but it’s the basic concept of unnecessarily causing trauma for the someone you “love”.
I REALLY love this post. I think you have carefully worded your post so as to ensure you are **not** suggesting that a parent who lets her child CIO is raping the child but rather that they are disrespecting the child.
That’s totally different and, in my not-so-humble opinion, absolutely
correct. Parents who don’t respect the developmental stage of their
baby by letting him/her CIO are forcing their choices on their child,
often at the detriment of the well-being of the child – be it
physiologic or psychologic.
Thank you, once again, for giving words to the thoughts that roll around in my head. And for offering voice to those too small to tell parents they are being disrespected!!
What I find especially hilarious is that I’d bet my 401k that no one would tell me to my face that I’m “disrespecting my child” by helping them learn how to sleep, but somehow it’s okay on the internets.
My child has never been disrespected. Isn’t happening. No matter what you type in your computer box.
@TheFeministBreeder: I wouldn’t and couldn’t tell you that because I don’t think I’ve ever heard you specify what methods you use for sleep. I know you told me “no Ferber in my house”, but beyond that I don’t really know what you do and I don’t know that I need to know either. I’ll advocate on the Internet about what I think is ideal for society. It doesn’t mean I need to peer into and critique exactly what goes on in each person’s bedroom, with regards to sleep or sex.
@TheFeministBreeder:
I don’t think anyone would say that you disrespected your child. I think the idea is that leaving a baby to CIO when they have no concept of time or permanence or why they are alone and vulnerable in the dark *is* disrespectful. If you are helping your child learn to sleep by supporting them, being with them and not trying to “train” them until they are old enough to understand what is happening then it isn’t considered disrespect. Of course I speak of my own opinions only. In my experience babies who are left to CIO when they are quite young have a greater likelihood of having long-term issues surrounding sleep and/or dark.
It is certainly a topic that has the opportunity to be either contentious or thought-provoking. I see it as one to inspire thoughtfulness and reflection about how we raise our children.
There’s a very interesting tone by many mothers today that the way they parent is the *right* way, and different way of parenting is nothing short of flagrant disregard for human life (i.e. rape.) I’d honestly find it insulting if it weren’t so silly.
There are bloggers on the internets who believe that any mom who works outside the home is neglecting her child, and causing them to develop a deviant lifestyle – a ticking time bomb for drug addiction and delinquency.
Does that make their statements true? Nope.
Is it there right to post it? Yep.
But it certainly damages their credibility with me, because I don’t buy this “my way or the highway” parenting judgment.
@TheFeministBreeder: If you are going to take this post as “my way or the highway” parenting judgment, then you can probably write off my whole blog as that. This blog is about sharing ideas and research on better ways of parenting. I have started to feel lately that I have been bowing to much too the “don’t judge me” cries out there when I write and that it isn’t allowing me to share my ideas the way that I want to, the way that I started out. I don’t syndicate my blog to my facebook page anymore for a very specific reason. I don’t want to push my parenting ideas and choices on people that are not interested in reading them and I use facebook as a way of keeping in touch with friends that may not be interested in my views on parenting. My blog, however and my twitter account, are there as a venue for me to share my ideas on better ways of parenting. To be very frank, if you feel judged by it, perhaps it is best not to read it. I am quite happy to read a lot of things, even strong opinions, that are contrary to my own and take what works for me and leave the rest or debate it. I’m happy to debate the issues with you, with anyone, but I’m not going to stop sharing my ideas because some people may not like them.
I have to wonder if you really believe that you’re simply “sharing ideas” by calling someone else’s style “disrespectful of their child” to the point of comparing it to rape. Those are some very harsh words for simply “sharing” an idea or research, and I didn’t see any research at all in this “sleep training is rape” post.
I’m willing to bet if I posted a blog saying that WOHMs are “disrespecting” thier children, and compared it to rape, you’d have something to say about it, no? There’s a big ‘ol difference between sharing research and passing judgment in the form of “you will ruin your child’s life if you do this.” It’s just mean. I don’t need to hear that I’m “raping” my child.
BTW, Pantley, Sears, and Dr. Jay Gordon all advocate various methods of sleep training (or sleep guidance, as you know I like to call it). You think they consider it akin to rape?
@TheFeministBreeder: I said:
I never said that anything Pantley, Sears or Dr. Jay Gordon recommends is akin to rape. Never.
Some posts are based on ideas. Some posts are based on research. Parenting is an art and a science, as my byline says.
I am enjoying your blog even though I disagree with some of your approaches. It seems that for you nothing but co-sleeping will be good enough. Yes, there are some gentle ways to convince your baby to sleep, and, no, it doesn’t necessarily mean co-sleeping. I have never had to sleep-train my child who slept in her own crib from the day we brought her home. I taught her early to fall asleep by herself using gentle and reasonable approach that I got from Secrets of Baby Whisperer. And, by the way, I had to get up every night to her to nurse her for 15 months straight (she wasn’t a STTN baby). However, I didn’t mind. For me it was the right thing to do, while co-sleeping wasn’t. Oh, and by the way, I know a lot of hard-core co-sleepers that eventually went through CIO or other forms of sleep training, because they needed you know what? Their bed and their sleep back!
@Natalie: Co-sleeping is right for my family. It is, for us, the easiest way to meet our children’s nighttime needs. I think that parents can meet their baby’s nighttime needs if the baby is in a crib, but I am too lazy to get out of bed at night and I also miss my kids while at work during the day, so I love being able to cuddle at night. That said, I would never ever recommend Secrets of the Baby Whisperer due to the dismal and dangerous breastfeeding advice in that book.
I always miss the good discussions on Twitter. Sigh.
Anyways, I can see where you’re going with the analogy. We want to be as respectful as possible. I wouldn’t leave my children alone to cry. That’s the choice that I’ve made. It’s the choice I’m comfortable with. I wouldn’t judge others for the choices that they make, and I hope that they would extend the same courtesy to me.
“The dismal and dangerous advice” of Baby Whisperer worked perfectly well for me. I listened to my daughter needs, but I didn’t use my breast as a human pacifier. Of course, I was also lucky – my daughter was a healthy child and a barracuda nurser. I knew that she is getting enough and that she doesn’t need to nurse every 20 min. She was on the reasonable schedule, and I also nursed her more often when she had growth spurts.
Sleep is the new breastfeeding. The hot button issue that seems to put Moms in two camps. More cannon fodder for the Mommy Wars – the family bed or else you are abusing your baby.
Here’s my experience.
I gave birth to twin girls in December. I dutifully signed up for the natural childbirth class, where I was admittedly the most questioning of the dogma. Probably more “mainstream” whatever that means – I didn’t eat my placenta. But I buy organic at the farmer’s market, have an Ergo carrier which I love, belong to Greenpeace, breastfeed (but had to supplement with formula for the first 8 weeks, god forbid, until my milk supply was enough to support two hungry babes ), and we co-slept with twins for 6 months!!! So I must get at least a few brownie points from whoever is keeping score.
Co-sleeping with twins is no easy feat in a queen size bed. The first three months were good, we all slept quite well – considering – and the babies were well-rested and well-fed on demand. The last two months were hell for everyone. Babies kicking and screaming at all hours, impossible to get them down for naps without huge Herculean efforts which could all be for naught if they woke upon transfer to bed/crib/couch. Remember I have TWO babies. So I’d have to do this twice at various times throughout the day. The end result was overtired babies all the time. I was basically the nap manager during the day. That’s all I did. Forget getting down on the floor and engaging in some fun times – I was usually rocking/wearing or nursing a baby down for a nap while the other waited for me to come for them.
Something had to give.
We took what we think is a reasonable approach to get them to sleep better. We moved them out of our bed and into their cribs. We sit by their cribs and soothe them down until they are asleep. When they wake in the middle of the night, I nurse them, and change them and take care of their need, and we are all sleeping better. There’s a remarkable change in my energy, in my babies dispositions and general joie de vivre in my house. And it is definitely sleep training. Yes, they cried, but they in fact CRIED LESS than when we rocked/nursed/jiggled/pleaded to deity to let them sleep.
I seriously doubt anyone puts their baby in a cold dark room, shuts the door at 7 and doesn’t go back in for 12 hours – even Ferber himself doesn’t advocate this, but it sounds nasty to do that, so let’s just keep repeating it until everyone believes that that’s what us “mainstream” moms do.
My point after this long-winded response is that it isn’t as black and white as you portray it. Babies can sleep peacefully and happily on their own, without tears, and it isn’t coercive to help them get there.
@Olivegirl: You’re putting words into my mouth. I didn’t say “the family bed or else you are abusing your baby“. Or maybe you weren’t referring to me specifically, but just to the supposed “wars” in general. As I said in response to Natalie, the family bed is the best way for us to meet our children’s needs. If other people are able to respond to their children’s needs without co-sleeping, then all the power to them. There are lots of ways that parents can respectfully respond to their children’s needs and each family needs to figure out what works best for them. It sounds like you have found something that works for your family while respecting your children’s needs. There are, unfortunately, people that do put their baby in a room, shut the door, and not go back until the morning.
Ha, I’m loving that quote!
all I know is that there’s nothing like a little sex to make you less cranky about not getting enough sleep!
@Barbara: I love it!
I wish I could articulate how I feel about this better than I actually can. My Nana said the other day that she figured out the reason our daughter is such a happy baby – it’s because we never give her a reason to cry. If she has a need, we meet it, as soon as we can. That applies to everything, from a dirty diaper, to being hungry, to her sleep patterns. I completely agree that it disrespects our children to not give them what they need, when they need it. Even the thought of making them cry themselves to sleep breaks my heart.
I do have to point out though, not once in the entire article is co-sleeping mentioned. Not co-sleeping does not disrespect your children, and it isn’t related in any way to crying it out.
As always Annie, I think you’ve written this very concisely, and used a great analogy. Thanks for a wonderful and ‘provoking’ post!
oh i love it
so many people would totally disagree with you – be offended…but its just brilliant I must link to you.
It just goes to show what forcing means and loving means…and how we have mixed it all up.
It also goes to show how little not only do we read our children but some times our partners.
love m
I always enjoy reading your blog, but really loved this particular post. I can’t imagine doing anything other than co-sleeping and nursing at night. It makes life ever so much easier, is how nature intended it both biologically and anthropologically speaking, and doesn’t involve any kind of nasty, pointless “training.” I signed up to have a baby knowing it was going to take work, but, fortunately for me, it’s work that I enjoy.
@Frost at Midnight – that’s interesting because our first son would not sleep in our bed. Would. NOT. Sleep. He never slept well when we tried and tried and tried for him to sleep with us. What would you do then? Would you force your child to sleep with you and keep him up all night? Is that what nature intended? Talk about disrespectful to a child…
I love how some people think that there child is exactly like every other child in the world. It’s hilarious.
Feminist Breeder,
It’s interesting that you feel the need to make repeated comments about how you’re feeling judged and yet you turn around and do the same thing to every other poster on here. If you want other people to respect your opinions then perhaps you should learn to respect the opinions of others yourself.
I respectfully suggest that if the comments in this blog bother you so much then perhaps you shouldn’t read them. When I see something I disagree with it, I move on. I don’t stick around to argue about it. If you feel you’re doing the right thing with your kid, then what are you getting so worked up about?
@FeministBreeder “I love how some people think that there child is exactly like every other child in the world. ” This sentiment is currently driving me bonkers IRL! Just because your toddler asks for a nap at 1:00 every day and goes down with no help at all, doesn’t mean that you’re a better parent than me, and that I should just do the exact same thing you did and I’ll be fine. Argh!
Sorry, Annie, that was OT… Enjoyed this post – made me really think. Analogies can be so tricky, especially when such touchy subjects are involved. I love how you aren’t afraid to dive right into stuff like this.
@Lindsay: Thank you. Re: “Analogies can be so tricky, especially when such touchy subjects are involved. I love how you aren’t afraid to dive right into stuff like this.” I agree. I don’t think that cry it out is like rape any more than web content is like food. But analogies can be useful in explaining a concept. Some people don’t understand the difference between using an analogy and making a direct comparison though.
For those that do not understand what an analogy is:
When I gave my presentation on how web content is like food, none of the executives got up at the end and said, “that’s preposterous, you can’t eat a Web page“. Instead they thanked me for using a concept that they did understand (food) to help them understand something they didn’t (how users consume Web content).
An analogy is not a direct comparison.
I am not saying that sleep training is rape.
The definition of analogy is: “Similarity in some respects between things that are otherwise dissimilar.” OTHERWISE DISSIMILAR. Rape and cry it out are dissimilar. Sex and sleep are dissimilar. They are not the same. I am not making a direct comparison. I am using the analogy to illustrate concepts and NONE OF THOSE CONCEPTS IS THAT SLEEP TRAINING IS LIKE RAPE.
To be fair to FB, in your post you write:
“There are countries where it is appropriate, accepted, and normal for a husband to force his wife to have sex…There are also countries where it is appropriate, accepted, and normal for parents to force their children to sleep on their own”
which is a direct comparison between forcing sex (rape) and forcing sleep (CIO). Now, I see the point you are trying to make in this post, so I’m not all bothered about it.
As for my opinion, sleep IS a necessity, and even moreso for babies than for us. Babies need sleep to be healthy and grow. And sometimes, babies don’t want to go to sleep. Bed time is one of those perennial battlegrounds where parents insist that children do what they don’t want to “for their own good.” Now that doesn’t mean I advocate CIO or other harsh methods of sleep training. However, I also know from experience that babies aren’t always interested to go down without a fight.
If just forcing a child to do something they don’t want to do is disrespectful to their person, then half your life as a parent could be interpreted as coercive, mean, or abusive. Of course kids don’t want to go to bed! That is the nature of life. But as parents, we must sometimes insist that they do what they do not want to do, because we know it is most important for their overall well-being.
Once again, I’m not talking about CIO or other harsh or abusive measures. And of course all decisions should be made with age-appropriateness in mind. But if a parent decides that their child needs more sleep, and would better achieve that in their own space, and the child is old enough to soothe themselves, and the parent achieves that through a method which, while not abusive, could be considered “coercive,” in that it is subjecting the child’s will to the parent’s, then that is just the prerogative of the parent, not some nefarious plot to remove the bodily rights or integrity of the child.
@Emily Jones: The comparison that I was making there is that just because a society is accepting of one person forcing their will on another, doesn’t mean that we have to accept that. In some societies, women are considered lesser human beings than men. In our society, I think often we treat children like lesser human beings. Again, I wasn’t saying that cry it out = rape. I was using an analogy.
@Trish: I love that. I try to use that screening process too.
I think it DOES go back to respect…and expectations. We run into trouble when we expect someone to be something they aren’t, or do something they don’t want to do. We get frustrated because we think they should be doing it our way…and in our frustration we sometimes try to force the issue. Instead we should learn to accept people (adults AND babies) for where they are. If a baby is crying and needs comfort, comfort that baby. Accept that they aren’t miniature adults and give them the care and compassion they need. Don’t try to force them into adult sleep habits when they just aren’t there yet!!! Excellent post.
There are ways you can help your baby sleep alone. I totally agree. The reasons me and my husband, co-sleeping parents, choose to do this is that the baby’s needs ar at least as important as ours.
If my baby feels security and serenity by sharing the bed with us, but, on the other side, we would prefer sleeping without him, have all the bed for us and have sex in the bedroom
), we choose to make ourselves the compromise, not the baby. I never felt it as a compromise, my husband did it a couple of times at the very begging. Still, his decision was the same: for him, we shall do this. Our nights in two will be in the livingroom, his sweet sleep in our bed, with 1-2h hours stayng there alone 
There is no argument in this world that could pursuade me that my baby is feeling better sleeping alone. He is the only one who can tell me this and he is not (telling that). I might be feeling better without him? For the sake of the argument let’s say yes (it’s a no:) ). Then my choice is clear: my baby’s needs are the most important. Period.
Nice post, and very logical analogy!
I tend to use this screening process for how I treat my children: would I treat my husband/best friend that way? For instance, if my husband were scared at night, or upset and crying in bed, would I leave him alone in the room? Absolutely not! Would I put my husband in a time-out chair if he did something that I viewed as unacceptable? No. We’d talk about it. Would I use methods that were originally developed for the training of animals with my husband? No.
Trish: Sleep training isn’t meant for use in a situation where a child is actually scared or has some other problem that needs sorting out. It’s meant for a situation where they just plain can’t figure out how to get to sleep without being cuddled, rocked, or whatever, and, as a result, need you to do this several times a night (as that’s how often all children wake up and need to get back to sleep). If one of my children is scared or upset, I do indeed go to them, just as I would go to my husband in that situation. But if my husband was waking me up several times a night, every night, solely because he wanted me to cuddle him back to sleep – not because he was undergoing any sort of trauma, but just because he preferred it that way – then, yes, I certainly would expect him to learn how to go back to sleep on his own rather than expecting me to put up with that for years on end.
PhD: I understand what you were trying to say, I’m just saying I can see where FB got her conclusion. Also, as I was saying, sometimes we DO have to impose our will on our children, that is the nature of parenting. Yes they ARE lesser human beings, they are not-yet-fully-developed humans, and are given to our care to make them into fully-developed humans. Granted, we can still do that and respect their person, and respect their personalities, but parenting always comes down to deciding when and how to something is important enough to teach your children that you must force them to do something they don’t want to do. (i.e. not play in the street, go to bed at a reasonable hour, brush their teeth, etc.)
@Emily Jones: I agree. And I think that means it is even more important that we consider how to do that in a respectful way. If I disrespect my husband or a friend, they can choose to leave me. My kids, however, are stuck with me (unless the authorities decide to take them away). So I think that means I have an even greater responsibility to ensure that I am treating my children with respect. It does mean that sometimes they have to do things they don’t want to do. It also means that I will go out of my way to give them input into how those things happen.
” sometimes we DO have to impose our will on our children, that is the nature of parenting.”
I’m not sure that’s true, though. Don’t get me wrong, I do “impose my will” on a regular basis, sometimes because I don’t see any other way for it to work (for instance, the Boychick is hypothyroid and needs regular blood draws, which he simply Does Not Want), but usually because I am overwhelmed and unable to be as creative as I’d like. But regardless, I know enough parents who live consentually (or strive to) that I don’t think it’s necessarily or universally true that parenting REQUIRES imposing one’s will.
It’s just one of those fundamental philosophical differences, like whether kids are fully persons (with as-yet limited capabilities), or works-in-progress (who are still fully fabulous); those different starting points, whether recognized or not, will lead us to very different conclusions about right actions in parenting.
(Annie, I’m not really replying to your post ’cause I don’t have much to say about it other than I loved it, and you’re sure earning that most provocative blog award!)
Thanks @Arwyn.
Since Arwyn mentioned it, in case you are not familiar with consensual parenting is, I wrote about that too: Consensual Living
Not sure what an analogy is? Try Analogy of the Day. Today’s is: Delicatessen is to cheese as newsstand is to magazine. Please note: DO NOT TRY TO EAT THE MAGAZINE. IT IS NOT LIKE CHEESE.
Seriously! Your blog makes me think, laugh and then say “Amen to that” when I’m done reading.
Oh and don’t censor yourself. I love reading your thoughts as is.
This are two different things. If you force the baby to sleep, it would not sleep. It would only close its eyes and pretend to sleep. You didn’t achieve your goal. But if you force yourself on your wife, it can be called rape, but you achieved your goal.
http://www.getbettersleeptips.com/
@Anjia: Have you ever dealt with babies? Babies do not close their eyes and pretend to sleep. Either they do sleep. Or they cry and cry and cry until they fall asleep from exhaustion and despair.
Maybe if we all had a nap, we could have a discussion where people don’t get offended by literary devices! I get what your point was, and I think that you were following an analogy another person had made! Also, Trish was spot on in her test for behavior.
I find that mothers (all people, really) sometimes have to take a moment and realize that whatever particular argument is being made is not usually a personal condemnation of them. There are people who have used Ferber’s books, *incorrectly*. It’s been years, but I *think* even he said not to use his methods under a certain age. There are also people who read Dr. Sears and never get to the part where he talks about loving guidance. The point is, do what is right for your family. The entire family. If you and hubby didn’t want to be interrupted at night or ever have people touching you, may I suggest an outdoor cat?
My fave analogy (but I’ve never taken to the end, so bear with me) is that I imagine my baby as a guest from a foreign land who I have invited to spend the year. They don’t speak the language, know the customs or how to drive, and it would be incumbent on me to make them comfortable.
That said, there are often nights when 3 of my 4 kids are in the best with us. It helps that we’re short, and we’ve assigned people to their own squares!
“…But that is the unfortunate conclusion some people are drawing from PhDinParenting’s new post about how sleep is like sex. In her post, PhDinParenting says this…”
do not try to eat the magazine. annie, you crack me up! by being a provocative blogger i think it goes without saying that sometimes you will have to face some less than thrilled commenters. i think you handle it beautifully, you write well, and i also think it wouldn’t hurt us all to remember that being nice is a good thing to strive for (with out kids, in the blogosphere, and so on). wrote about that today on my blog in reaction to how i was feeling reading all these comments on your blog.
not that i imagine you being the type to get discouraged by “negative press” but still i am passing on a little “hold your head up” vibes.
robin
Arwen, PhD – I disagree with the consensual parenting philosophy. While I believe my children are individuals in the sense that they have their own tastes and preferences, and different ways of approaching problem solving, they are not developmentally capable of being full partners in decision-making (that’s not opinion, that’s scientific fact – that we only gain certain emotional and intellectual skills over time).
Yes, children should be respected, in that their personalities and helpless position should be taken into account, but the inherent nature of parent-child relationship is that one has executive privileges while the other does not. And it has to be that way, since children necessarily lack certain fundamental emotional and intellectual skills. In fact, that is how they gain them: by us teaching it to them. Children may be born with individual personalities, but they do not automatically come with experience or judgment. That is the function of parents.
And when one person has more power than another, power struggles will naturally develop occasionally, so yes, sometimes parenting does require imposing your will. But imposing your will is not inherently bad or evil – it just comes with the territory. The trouble comes with doing it in a cruel or disrespectful manner. It is possible for parents to be assertive and in control while allowing children their own integrity and individuality.
Emily -
If you disagree, then you disagree.
And I wouldn’t even say we “do” consensual living either. I just know enough people who DO that I don’t think it’s accurate or fair to say that it “can’t” or “doesn’t” work. I /choose/ to accept that I impose my will — respectfully, as much as possible — on my child at times, but I don’t pretend that it simply MUST happen, because I know families where it simply /doesn’t/.
Which I think does relate to this post: some husbands say they simply “must” use force to achieve copulation with their wives; some parents say they simply “must” use CIO or “graduated extinction” to get their children to sleep. But my partner knows force isn’t required for sex with me, and I as a parent know crying out of arms isn’t required for my child to sleep.
Now, if a parent still /chooses/ to use extinguishment, well, that’s their choice, just as it’s my choice to impose my will on issues like food and time pressures (although if a husband rapes his wife, he bloody well ought to go to jail, because this is an analogy and thus has limitations and dissimilarities). I’m just going to disagree about whether it’s *necessary*, and yes, whether it’s *good*.
Arwyn – I never said it can’t or doesn’t work. I just said I disagree with the philosophy. Whether it “works” or not depends on your definition of “work.”
And yes, you’re right, no one HAS to do anything. Everything is a choice, no one can MAKE anyone do anything, etc etc. One does not have to accept the authority that comes with their role; that doesn’t mean the authority does not exist, however. Okay, if you REALLY want to get esoteric, authority itself doesn’t technically exist, as all people are constrained ultimately by their own conscience. But we are getting really far afield and silly here.
The point is that parents are inherently in a position of power, whether they choose to use it or not. And as I said above, imposing your will is not inherently bad or evil – it just comes with the territory. It is possible for parents to be assertive and in control while allowing children their own integrity and individuality.
Also, it’s not a matter of opinion whether children are fully emotionally or intellectually capable of being partners in decision-making. It’s been proven by child development studies that some skills just don’t come until certain ages. So the question is not whether children are fully developed (they’re not), but whether you are willing to allow them a say in the decision process, and how much of a say, knowing they do not have the full capabilities of an adult yet. That, of course, is obviously a matter of opinion.
I wanted to share with you all the way I rape my children.
Today I raped my son numerous times. He hates getting his diaper changed. Sure, I cheered him up by blowing raspberries and kissing on him, but initially, I forced him on the changing table against his will.
I also raped my older son by laying him down for a nap. He wasn’t tired, or so he said in a whining voice right before I soothed him. But I raped him nonetheless.
I raped my stepdaughter a few months ago. I simply don’t believe 12-year-olds should wear cleavage-baring shirts, so I asked her to change.
And by all of these comparisons, I of course mean, “I disrespected them by going against their will and making a parental choice for their own good.” You see the logic there, naturally.
One of my Facebook friends saw the Twitter conversation about this blog post and mused, “What’s odd to me is that the blog doesn’t read as thought the author was intentionally trying to be inflammatory by making such a comparison. Could she just be that dense and insensitive?”
Rape is nothing to use as a light analogy. I’m actually glad for you that you don’t know how serious it is. May no one you love ever have to join the ranks of the 1 in 3 college women and 1 in 4 American women overall who do know the horrors of this crime.
Now, I have to go rape my chickens. By that, of course, I mean, “Close the coop for the night because they haven’t developed fully enough to be able to do it for themselves or see why it might be good for them.”
@Cate: If you are going to complain or object to me using rape at all in an analogy, then I can accept that criticism. But your comment demonstrates that you didn’t understand what I meant with the analogy at all. I wasn’t trying to say anywhere at all that disagreeing with your child or setting limits is inappropriate. I can make parental choices for my child’s own good, but in my books letting your child cry to sleep alone is not for the child’s own good.
@phdinparenting
Though I don’t agree with CIO, I do agree with bedtimes and routines and even training to get to this point. And for some children (and all are different, as we all know), sleeping alone is the better place for them. My 3-year-old included. (My 15-m-o sleeps in our room in his own bed.)
You equated a parenting decision–getting a child into normal sleep patterns–with rape.
Most people would call that not only an illogical analogy, but a careless one.
Other feminists have called you on that here. We don’t think the word “rape” should be taken so lightly, even if it for a parenting choice that we don’t agree with.
You also seem to draw a thin line between “training” a child to sleep with CIO. They’re absolutely not the same thing, as both sons would tell you if they weren’t going to be asleep in their own beds for the next 10 hours.
Go ahead and be a provocateur! I am! But understand that if you have to edit your post after the fact to specify just what kind of parents are the *real* rapists, you might be using a term carelessly and not considering its weight and history to some readers.
@Cate: If I drew a thin line, let me clarify. I do not think it is appropriate to leave a child alone to cry to sleep in the dark. Not using full extinction. Not using graduated extinction. I do think it is appropriate to create conditions that help the child to sleep. I know that some children sleep better alone and if that is the case, then great. I don’t have anything against that. I would never ever call cry it out “getting a child into normal sleep patterns”. The end does not justify the means.
Woah..now I see why you made another post. I once used a literary device on a forum comparing reactions to a woman’s situation with a card playing analogy. (her child had a stong bee allergy and she wanted the entire school to have indoor recess so he would not be singled out. She also wanted them to ‘spray for bees” totally unrealistic idea…but anyway) I suggested to her that she used her son’s possible death by bees to refuse any other ideas that were suggested by the MANY other people. I can’t remember how I used the playing card analogy now…sorry..that would be a better story…..but she got really mad accusing me of comparing her son’s death to a game….which was nowhere where I was going with it. Anyway…..I love you Femmistbreeder! but I would like to agree to disagree. I love you PHD in parenting. Don’t make me pick between you!
I choose not to respond to many of your posts because honestly I find your tone judgmental and I really don’t like “this is the best way (of course supported by a lot of scientific studies)…but of course do whatever works for you” which of course leaves every parent who chooses the “whatever works for you” feeling like their option is 2nd rate (even when it makes everyone happier). Of course that is your choice which I respect and if other parents feel threatened, guilty, or otherwise, it’s really their problem. We are all responsible to learn our children, learn ourselves as parents and find the balance to make the best decisions we can to raise them healthy. Doing everything I could to ignore the twitter chatter going on about this, I finally came over the read it and do feel I have something to share.
I think as the writer you need to accept that when a reader or readers are so fixated on an idea or word that they are losing the point of your post that perhaps you just need to consider changing it and/or make a formal apology. Most of the discussion is around the word you used, not the point of the post…yet you continue to try and bring it back to the post – obviously not the problem. I’m not talking about changing the idea of a post to suit everyone, what would be the point? But I’m sure from what I have read you are creative enough to find another analogy that would be less offensive to parents especially mothers.
Rape is a very emotional word and especially for women who have experienced it.
You mentioned something about other cultures not regarding women as equal humans – that might have been a better choice – still emotional, but not quite the same intensity, as most of us are regarded as equals in our culture (notice I did not say treated).
When I read it, I understood it, I didn’t like it being a survivor of this type of abuse…but I didn’t think you were saying I was in turn raping my children – it just leaves for a very insensitive feeling from you.
If you don’t care that you come off as insensitive to women who have experienced a life changing event like rape, than that IS your prerogative…hopefully most of your readers are not those women.
@Natural Mom Loves Prada: I apologize if it came off as insensitive. The post came about because people were having the discussion of sleep being like sex. In reality that obviously isn’t true. Sleep isn’t anything like sex and the full on extinction method of cry it out is nothing like rape. But there are lots of analogous concepts. To remove the sex/sleep analogy, I would have to scrap the post altogether. However, I did edit the offending paragraph to the extent that I could without scrapping it altogether.
I didn’t have any issue with the subject of the post or the analogy of it – my husband said when we had our last babe “yes, having a baby in this house means no sex for a year…” and there was nothing in the post that I objected to as far as your opinion except the last paragraph.
I appreciate that you are trying to say that just because something, especially something unspoken is accepted, doesn’t make it right…and that we need to expect more from ourselves.
I think the way the post WAS worded was cause for emotional flare ups and took away from your point.
Thanks for changing it, it holds a different energy for me now and I appreciate that you cared for my comment and feelings!
parents who use Cry it Out are like the Nazis.
@Backpacking Dad: Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew you would say that.
Annie, there are two flaws in your analogy. The first is that sleep is necessary not only for the person doing the forcing (if that’s the word you want to use for setting limits on your child), but for the person being forced. Children need sleep. If they don’t get enough sleep, they will be cranky, miserable wrecks, and are likely to end up suffering more, not less, in the long term. The second is that tiny children, unlike adults, don’t have the mental capability to make informed choices about what’s best for them, and it’s therefore part of the parents’ job to do just that. Putting those two together – yes, I do think it completely appropriate for parents to make informed decisions about the amount of sleep their children need and to put them down for that amount of sleep even if the children would rather be up playing. If I had let my children stay awake and play for all the time they wanted to, in the knowledge that this was going to make them hopelessly tired and cranky and ultimately more unhappy, then I think that would have been far more disrespectful to them than leaving them on their own crying for a few minutes.
Now, if you can find a third way that involves getting them to sleep without any crying, then more power to you. But what no-one (as far as I can see on a quick skim through) seems to be taking into account is that, for some children, that third way just doesn’t exist. Both of my children were like that. I tried and tried and tried gentle methods, but that just kept them awake for longer. With my son, the problem wasn’t that he was afraid of the dark or of being left alone – it was that he wanted to stay up and play instead of going to sleep, and staying with him trying to put him to sleep was just giving him a mixed message (well, Mummy *says* it’s bedtime, but she’s still here, so maybe it’s not bedtime after all and I can still play!). I *had* to walk out of the room and leave him alone to get the message through to him. I went back every few minutes to make sure he knew that I hadn’t just abandoned him, but there *had* to be some leaving him alone crying involved, because he wasn’t going to go to sleep any other way.
In my daughter’s case, she just plain needs a few minutes of being left completely alone to go to sleep, and she often needs to cry for those few minutes before she can get off to sleep. Any kind of stepping in to try to calm her, no matter how low-key, will just keep her awake. I couldn’t even do the go-in-every-few-minutes technique, because it would only wake her up and upset her more. She HAS to be left completely alone while she drops off, even when she’s crying, because it is the *only* thing that will work for her.
So, for both my children, it *was* a straight choice between leaving them alone and crying for short periods of time, and letting them stay up until all hours to the point where they’d be miserable with tiredness. Oh – or spending hours trying gentle techniques which weren’t going to work and were only, if anything, going to make them cry more.
I’m really curious to know what you’d do in that situation, but, either way, it doesn’t change my decision. For my children, leaving them to cry *was* what met their needs – my son’s need to have a firm limit set about bedtime, my daughter’s need simply to be on her own for a few minutes in order to get to sleep. I was willing to look at my children, not at somebody else’s pet dogma, and do what was best for them. That *was* the respectful way to do things.
I also believe that it’s much better to try gentle methods wherever you can. I don’t believe in leaving children alone if they’re frightened after a nightmare, or hungry, or just need a cuddle and a quick bit of reassurance. But the problem is that ‘gentle, loving methods’ of getting children to sleep are talked about as though they were an option that works for every single child, and the plain fact is, sometimes they’re not.
@Sarah V.: We do have a third way. That ways is parenting our kids to sleep. It doesn’t mean that there is no crying ever. It does mean that they are never left alone crying out for us.
You’ve mentioned that that didn’t work for your kids because they wouldn’t go to sleep with you there and thought it was time to play or time to be awake because you were there. In our case, we created a strong sleep association right from birth. That sleep association was to us. So for our kids it is normal to go to sleep with us in the room. In fact, lying down with us on the bed is a sleep cue. That was done on purpose. It doesn’t mean that it is always easy. There are evenings where I would prefer to just be able to plop them down and walk out and go and do something else. There are evenings where it takes a long time for them to go to sleep. But it is a choice we made and that I feel was right for our family.
You asked what I would do in your situation. To be honest, I don’t know. I’d like to think I’d find a way to do it without leaving them to cry. But asking me that is like asking me if I would steal if I was broke and my family was starving. I’d like to think I’ve done the right things in life to ensure that we won’t ever be starving. But there are no guarantees of that. I think stealing is wrong. But would I let my family starve before I would steal, no way. But believe me I would try everything else possible before stealing. And perhaps there are some creative ways I would think of to keep my family from starving that others wouldn’t think of or some things I would be willing to do to keep us from starving that others wouldn’t be willing to do, so maybe other people would resort to stealing earlier than I would. (yes, here I go with analogies again….).
Both of my children were also used to falling asleep with me there… up until the time when they stopped doing that and just wouldn’t do it again. So, no, the situation wasn’t something I could have avoided just by doing something differently from the start.
Your comment did remind me of something, though – when my son went through the stage I’ve described above, he *would* settle if I lay right down on the bed with him and fell asleep with him. There was no middle ground where I could sit next to the cot and aim to edge further away each night – that made him cry for a lot longer than simply leaving him be, because, as I said, it gave him mixed messages and left him with the hope that I’d pick him up for more playtime, and I think that *that* would have been the cruel way to do things. But, if I’d been prepared to spend all evening every evening just lying next to him while he slept, I could have got him to sleep without crying. That would have meant leaving my husband without his chance for a bit of time getting child-free adult-conversation, company, and support, for years on end. I think that that would have been far more harmful than leaving my son crying for five-minute intervals for a twenty-minute time period (which is what it took), and I don’t see why my husband’s need for company and support should be so completely ignored just because he’s old enough to talk about what he wants instead of crying about it. On that point I guess you and I will just have to agree to differ.
But with my daughter, there just weren’t other options. She would not go to sleep without me leaving her in her cot to cry. End of story. And I don’t think your analogy in the comment really covers the situation, because you’re talking about a situation where meeting the needs of a second party hurts (unarguably, indisputably hurts) a third party. What I’m talking about is a situation where it turns out that what you think would be best for that second party actually turns out not to be the right thing for them. The closest analogy I can think of is that of a Jehovah’s Witness who believes blood transfusions are just plain wrong, who can back that up by telling you all the associated risks (which, unlike your claimed risks of sleep training, actually are proved risks)… and who then has a child with haemophilia who needs regular injections of blood product. Sure, in that situation the Jehovah’s Witness could try everything possible to avoid giving her son blood product (which is no bad thing, because it does carry some risks and it’s worth minimising the amount that you have to give). And maybe she could think of creative ways to stop her son from getting hurt or to minimise the bleeding if he did. But, ultimately, she’s going to come down to the choice between sticking to her dogma or accepting that her dogma doesn’t cover her child’s case and is, in this case, doing more harm than good.
@Sarah V. : Also, you said: “Annie, there are two flaws in your analogy. The first is that sleep is necessary not only for the person doing the forcing (if that’s the word you want to use for setting limits on your child), but for the person being forced. Children need sleep. If they don’t get enough sleep, they will be cranky, miserable wrecks, and are likely to end up suffering more, not less, in the long term.”
If my analogy is flawed, then that means men need sex and women don’t. I don’t think that is true. I think both men and women desire sex. Perhaps one desires it more than the other at certain points in time, but I do think both desire it. Same with sleep, the parent and child may not have the same ideas about how much sleep and when sleep should happen, but they both need it.
I’ be the feminist to say I absolutely got what you were saying and in no way read this as comparing CIO with rape. I’m actually offended for you be reading some of these comments, sadly from bloggers I tend to agree with. In some countries it’s OK to rape, but being cuturally OK does not mean we should shrug and say “sure, that’s great!” In some cultures it’s OK to plop the baby in the bed and ignore it for the next 8 hours. But, again, that does not mean we should shrug and say “OK, that’s great. This doesn’t mean that rape is the same as CIO, it means that just because something is “normal” or culturally accepted, or even endorsed by some people, does not mean that is is actually OK.
Why is it a feminist ideal to respect other’s bodies and wants and needs, unless that person is only a few months old?
Keep rocking the posts and ignore the people who get offended by a flay fart. Honestly, this seems more like a common sense post than controversial. Eh.
I, too, believe strongly about this issue. And I commented on your other post about the issue itself.
In the (perhaps beaten-to-death) issue of the analogy. I do think it was perhaps not the best one to use. And, yes, I do know what an analogy is
While no analogy is perfect, some are more explosive than others. And there are certain comparisons I just don’t make unless they rise to that level–rape and genocide chief among them.
I get that you are asking people to examine accepted norms. In this case, CIO. You are asking people to consider that CIO is a solution we all have agreed upon without considering the effects on a child. I think that is a good thing.
I feel that your analogy is inappropriate for one main reason: now people are talking about your analogy and not questioning CIO. If you want to get people thinking about the topic, don’t throw them something else to fight about as a distraction. You might have been better off using a social norm from the past that we now know is bad for kids. I think you would have proven your point much better.
My reveal is: I used CIO after 7 months of very serious suffering. My child was awake every 1 to 1.5 hours. I never slept. I read the No Cry Sleep Solution, tabbed pages, underlined sections. I even had email conversations with the author. But I didn’t know where to begin: my daughter used every sleep crutch in the book. My girlfriend warned me about the damage I would do to my child if I used CIO. I cried about it, worried about it. My doctor at the time, Dr. Harvey Karp, supported CIO over the “pick up/put down” repetition in the No Cry book. I was very confused, and still not sleeping.
Eventually, I hurt my back so badly from carrying her 19 hours a day that I was unable to walk. That was the final straw. My child was completely unable to fall asleep on her own and there was no way to inch our way into that. We did it cold turkey. It was tough, and certainly not preferred, but we had to come up with a solution and the “gentle” ways were not working.
You are right. All I thought about at that time was sleep. I hated my child, I hated myself and I hated parenting. However and disrespectful CIO seems to you, resenting every breath my daughter took, seething with anger when she wouldn’t nap quickly so I could finally sit down and screaming at my husband at 4 in the morning isn’t the way to live.
I believe I did the work you are asking people to do. I questions, I considered, I mulled. And I still picked the choice you would have rather I hadn’t picked.
From “The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog” by Bruce Perry, M.D., Ph.D. (I think you would find this book fascinating):
“… when humans evolved, infants didn’t have their own room – they didn’t even have their own bed. They were usually never more than a few feet away from an adult or sibling at any time and most often were being held. Many of the sleeping and crying problems seen in infancy today are likely caused by the fact that a human infant left alone and out of sight distance of adults for almost the entire evolutionary history of humankind would have been facing near-certain death. It’s hardly surprising that babies find being left alone to sleep distressing. In fact, what’s startling (and what reflects the adaptability of the human brain) is how quickly so many get used to it. Infants might ultimately evolve such that being left alone doesn’t’ so easily set off their stress systems, but evolution works over eons, not the timeline preferred by most parents.”
Perry is one of the most respected and highly sought-after professionals dealing with childhood trauma. This recent book of his is a major eye-opener. I have children with attachment disorder, but I think every human should read this book – our whole society can learn from the children this man has encountered.
Christine – while true, it is impractical in our culture. Humans are also designed to work outside, sleep when it is dark, wake when it is light, wear their baby most waking moments for the first year, breastfeed on demand, and live and raise their young in a tribal community. But we don’t live like that:
We stay up past dark, get up sometimes before it’s light, we work in structured environments where many of us can’t bring our babies with us, we have several kids and no other adults around for most of the time to spread out the work, and even the most ardent babywearer does not wear their baby every waking moment. We can’t even go around topless in our culture to facilitate true nursing-on-demand. The point I’m trying to make is, yes, humans are designed to do a lot of things a certain way, and our modern culture makes some of those things either not possible or not practical. So the point is to find a way to incorporate those things as much as possible, while still finding a way to function in society.
I agree with Emily this argument that “that’s how the cavemen or cavewomen in this case, did it” is old. Sure we need to realize what has kept us alive and understand the benefits of those things but there is a reason they call it evolving…as society changes so does our species. Whether that is a good thing or not is not really the issue, thats a personal point of view, fact is it’s a reality.
And another thought is that co-sleeping, breastfeeding on demand and these prehistoric ways that have kept us alive are on the table, but why not working mothers and how that affects children as young as six weeks, schooling which puts who is essentially a stranger as the main caregiver for your child 6 or more hours a day…was this what our ancestors did? Are we not concerned about children’s emotional health and security after 2, 3, 4 years??? I don’t think you can argue for one issue and not look at all the issues, which is my point.
Getting back to the thoughts of the post…when did cavemen find time to have sex?
(I’m joking…but I don’t think joking happens around here…)
I realize the quote I used was easily questioned in isolation. Another quote from the same book:
“Further, we need to call an immediate cease-fire in the ‘Mommy wars’ and recognize that everyone benefits when new parents have the choice to spend more time with their children and when they have community support and access to quality childcare. As Hrdy says: ‘We evolved in a context where mothers had much more social support. Infants need this social engagement to develop their full human potential.’”
“It’s time for leaders to step up and ask: ‘How do we build community in a modern world? How do you explore relationships in a world that is going to have television, that will include email, artificially extended days because of electric lights, and automobiles, airplanes, psychoactive drugs, plastic surgery and everything else that goes along with advancing technologies? How do we deal with the presence of all of those things and create a world that respects our biological needs, one that enhances our connections to others rather than ignores or disrupts them?”
We have to focus on babies. By the age of five, all of our neurological “ruts” are developed. I am currently parenting children who did not receive the touch, nurturing, stimulation and heart-beat regulation they needed in the first three years of life. There is hope that some of that can change, but it will take years of therapeutic parenting.
I don’t think we should be arguing with each other about this. We have mothers who are doing their absolute best, but our society is constantly working against what their children need, and what they need to continue to be in tune with their child. I think we should be standing together and saying, YES, we should build our nation in a way where every single mother has a community around her in those early years, where she can have her baby close, where she can have a host of others – just as loving and just as passionate friends/family – at the ready to share in the nurturing so she can find peace and rest and rejuvenation and support. Our youngest are the ones who desperately need consistency and lots and lots and lots of touch. Their brains actually learn to regulate their hearts based on the consistent sound of their main caregivers hearts. They need to be close, and I think every mother and every single child needs it. I think we should be demanding it. It’s not being selfish. It’s vital.
So instead of, “Well, that’s not practical. I can’t do that.” Let’s work together to change it. I have had to work unbelievably hard to create a home environment where I can give my children some of these things. It’s crazy. Why should I have been working against the “norm?” Let’s change the norm … for every child.
Natural Mom – I like you. You’re cheeky!
FYI: while cosleeping with our first, we conceived our second one night in the backyard. Will leave you with that lovely visual for the day! (can you say “chiggers”??)
Christine, after that very balanced comment I like you too and also agree with this last comment. We do need to be creating a supportive community…but that’s not my experience. When I had dd#4 I had one friend come and visit her on day 2 and then no other visitors for weeks (well except my mom for a quick visit in the evenings). I don’t hear women talking about creating supportive circles that support new moms (or in my case old moms with multiple children) IN THEIR HOMES, WITH THEIR BABIES. I hear assumptions, criticism, judgment and expectations that are unrealistic for some and their life experience.
I experienced a child in my home for a time with what we diagnosed with RAD – it was horrible and difficult both for him and us. I understand your point of view and why this would be such an important issue… but I don’t think RAD happens because a baby sleeps in a crib or cries for literally a few minutes once they are over a certain age (which of course I won’t decide for any other parent). I don’t even think children have to cry to go to sleep and can sleep before they are a year old.. I wrote a post on it. I do have concerns about babies not sleeping in their parents room but I also see sleep as one part of parenting, that baby may well be attached to the parent every other minute of the day, so who am I to say that it’s a “bad” choice…
So, the question becomes…who is going to lead the revolution of mothers supporting mothers?
I got what you were saying. Not sure why people are flipping out over a blog based on your own opinion & experiences. Here’s an analogy (sorta): It’s like a formula mom visiting a breastfeeding blog & then bashing the blogger for advocating breastfeeding. If you don’t agree don’t read it! Go find a blog for like-minded people.
Some people take the opinions of others way too personally. No one is being forced to read your words and then follow through.
Thanks for this Annie; I guess you edited some of the initial wording that people were getting excited about. Perhaps justifiably on substance, but very unjustifiably in terms of their inability to appreciate your good faith and the point you were really trying to make.
I agree with you on sleep, but if I may, I would like to say something about sex.
First of all, I am not quite sure from where you got the idea that “sex makes us happy”. For sleep I can almost accept it as a somewhat careless formulation of a valid point. For sex, I think it is a lot more complicated than that.
I don’t think this is merely nitpicking, because the implication that follows rather unfortunately from your analogy is that there may be at least some level of egoistic consideration which is justified in obtaining that happiness. Wherever it lies, there is some tradeoff as regards sleep, because if you don’t sleep at all, your baby will also suffer from your crankiness. In relation to sex, however, this does not apply. The problem with the spectrum of aggressive sexual couplings at some point of which we call it “rape” is that at ALL points on that spectrum (including consensual, mutually aggressive sexual couplings) it is an antithesis of what sexuality is about. Behaving like this sexually amounts to dissipating ones vital energy in a neurotic manner because ones body is unable to bear the sexual charge. When in pursuit of sexual release you objectify the other, you cut sexuality from your heart and in my opinion it doesn’t make you happy. I also don’t think, to put it mildly, that it contributes to making you a better parent. It’s, you see, merely another manifestation of the narcissism which is the problem in the first place.
Unlike one or two others on this thread, I do of course appreciate that yours was an innocent analogy which made a valid point, which I have merely taken as a pretext to make what I believe is an equally valid point. I hope this is pardoned in advance! Your calm responses to the aggression you encountered show me that you yourself are well anchored in your heart, and this is not only useful for parenting but, as we see here, also for life.
LoriNKY – The main objectors to this post ARE like-minded individuals. We all co-sleep or co-slept at some point, breastfeed, and avoid CIO. We just dislike 1) CIO being defined as any crying of any kind for any length of time from a baby not personally attended by his mother, and 2) that allowing that crying to occur is comparable to coercion and abuse.
Ok, so I am behind on my blog reading. Now I guess I missed out on the comparison. Could you please change it back to your original post…lol? I want to see what the rape comparison was that I am reading about in the comments.
@stwberryjoy
(And all who’d like to see the bit removed when she edited)
Annie commented on my blog response to this. There, she showed what she changed in this blog post.
http://blog.thenatureschild.com/2009/06/lets-talk-about-natural-parenting.html
Interesting topic.
Some thoughts I had:
Not every child needs the same amount of sleep.
Not every child has the same needs for attachment (some need a little, some need a medium amount, and some need A LOT).
My 2 older children needed considerably less as infants than I would have ever guessed or would have ever liked.
We had to pace dd1 in the wee hours of the morning for 3 months straight because we didn’t know about co-sleeping. But somehow, miraculously, without CIO methods, she tolerated sleeping in her crib by 4 months and soon after slept through the night. But she hardly napped during the day because she was active and alert. She probably slept 2-4 hours less than other children her age.
She had huge separation anxiety from 3 months on and no one else could hold her for about a year. Then she turned into a shy but happy toddler and a very shy but happy preschooler and eventually grew into a very confident little first grader.
Dd2 was co-slept with from day 1, she slept better with me from day 1 and into her crib without CIO, but then about 10 months, she started crying when I put her to bed and would get so upset about it I just stopped and pulled her into bed with me and she quieted down to sleep. She also had separation anxiety from a few months on…but grew ever more anxious into her toddler and preschool years. By the time she was in preschool, I found out she had selective mutism (a severe social anxiety that caused her to shut down her speech in social settings like preschool). Through trial and error, I found that the only emotional self-regulation she could do was through me.
The more I pushed her away to try to get her to stop needing me so much, the more severe behavioral problems became. People tried to tell me it was because I wasn’t firm enough in pushing her to be independent from an early age.
No, the only thing that pushing her to be independent did was scare the poop out of her and made her distrust me and make her escalate. I would have created a RAD situation if I stuck to what mainstream advice would have told me to do (CIO, TO and the like).
Pushing a child before they are ready to be independent can have a deep effect on them. I’m not going to accuse anyone who uses CIO will have what happened to my daughter happen to them (because obviously it didn’t cause it in our situation), but with HIGHLY SENSITIVE children like my dd2, it may very well affect them in some profound way.
Children with symptoms of SPD (sensory processing disorder) also may be more dependent on their parents for longer periods. They are developmentally delayed (sometimes only temporarily that SPD therapy activities can help with ). For those highly sensitive/SPD children, emotional regulation can’t be achieved on their own so they need longer time to develop those skills.
The upside to having a child like her? She’s highly gifted and highly creative. And at 5.5 years of age, STILL needs me to lay down with her at night to help her sleep. She just has a huge imagination and is afraid of the dark. Only now, it takes about 5 minutes for her to fall asleep and then I put her into her own bed.
It reminds me of my own childhood, when I was about 10 years old and begging my sister to let me sleep with her in her bed because I had lots of nightmares due to the fact I was highly sensitive/highly imaginative too.
To this day, I STILL sleep better having my dh in bed with me. I can’t stand sleeping alone.
Oh…and for what it’s worth, sex is awesome and very restorative for me! The only thing that ever really prohibited it after childbirth was my episotomy. It delayed enjoyment of if for me for about 4 months, but other than that, I was always raring to go about the 6 week mark in my 2 subsequent deliveries. But hey, that’s just me.
Anyway. Thanks for the interesting discussions as usual
The extreme CIO approach is what I believe you are talking about. Closing the door and ignoring the screaming until it goes away, no matter what. Thank you for addressing it. It needs to be addressed. The rationale goes that the baby has started to sleep through when there is no more screaming at night. Has anyone considered that such babies might be lying awake at times, for whatever reason, and do not bother to call on their parents anymore?
I am grateful God is available 24 hours a day.