The premise behind extinction sleep training is that infants (and toddlers) are being taught to "self-soothe"; however, this ignores key points of what self-soothing abilities can be expected from children and how distressed they are at the time of separation. Instead of focusing on these extinction methods, gentler methods that respect where the child is developmentally should be considered.
New research suggests that extremely unsettled babies have a much higher risk of mental health problems in childhood. The question is now what we do with this, and I have a few ideas.
When you talk about stress and sleep training, you often get two polarized views: Either the stress is so great it has to cause irreparable harm or it's fine or even beneficial. Yet neither really captures the whole story.
To the man on the beach who smacked his child - this is what I wanted to say to you and all those who feel that is the only option they have.
I had a choice in a moment: To focus on the "misbehaviour" or focus instead on making sure my daughter understood one critical thing. I chose that critical thing - knowing that she is always loved by us.
"He would wake after two hours of being in the crib, though he had been sleeping longer stretches while in our bed. I attributed it to him realizing it was a different sleeping environment. Once he would cry, I would put him back in our bed for the rest of the night. I tried it again the next night and the same thing happened. So, we gave up the crib for a while."
The idea of an "elimination diet" scares many women and prevents them from making changes that can make their and their baby's lives much easier. However, it doesn't have to be forever or all bad and here is some advice on how to approach it and what you may get out of it.
The topic of stress-release crying is a tricky one because people's understanding of it is lacking. The fact remains that even infants who experience this type of crying need to be responded to and supported during this time.
I hear people argue all the time that we don't need to be as responsive to our children because there aren't wild animals anymore. We couldn't be looking at the issue any more wrong if we tried.
Recent research has identified "fake crying" in late infancy. What does this mean? How should parents respond? Here's a look at the research and what it means.
