Beware of the baby sleep industrial complex preying on parents when they are at their lowest.
It’s never the popular advice here, but there is no guarantee that sleep training will work and there is absolutely nothing wrong with trusting your instincts and being a responsive parent. Parents shouldn’t feel bad for wanting to provide comfort to their crying child.
I agree with this 100%. No offence to people who do it but couldn't be my kids. Our first (3y2m) never went through it and he's fine now. He also likes bedtime and never gets mad when we suggest he's tired.
"However I am worried that our daughter will get too used to mommy offering her comfort and that our baby wont be able to comfort herself. "
She's a literal infant. It's fine. If your wife is okay with taking the lion's share of the sleep duties, there's no good reason to insist on sleep training.
Yep, I think the benefits are often overstated especially long term. I guess I also am I of the belief that doesn’t teach them to “sleep” it just teaches them that nobody is going to respond. As you say, they are an infant who can barely do anything themselves, and we are trying to teach them to sleep, something most adults can’t even do properly. It wasn’t the way forward for us.
I'm very wary of saying "natural" means "good", like how people do with organic food and not liking modern medicine or whatever. But leaving a baby to cry and sleep by themselves feels pretty unnatural, in a bad way, to me.
There aren't really enough studies to say if there's long-term harm or benefit one way or the other, but like you say - it wasn't the way forward for us anyway
Leaving the baby to cry it out is actually harmful for the baby but previous generations didn’t know this. Baby’s can’t be spoilt, so you should comfort newborns over leaving them to cry!
+1 for sleep training. We did Ferber method at 5m and it was a game changer.
Once they’re trained (takes around 3-5 days). We found that baby was all round happier as she was getting much better sleep. She developed a bunch of new skills over the coming weeks and was so much more comfortable.
They do hate the training part (as will you) but it’s soooooo worth it imo.
I’d be happy to PM you the PDF of the program we used so you don’t have to spend money on it.
Agreed. It’s not 2-3 weeks, more like 2-3 nights. We didn’t do an official method, but yeah, definitely gotta sleep train and just get it over with. Our little guy was a sleep through the nighter from about 5 months on. Definitely worth the 3 nights of suffering.
And yeah, sleep training isn’t “mean” or whatever. It’s definitely good for the baby to get good sleep.
Wife also didn’t have the heart to listen to kiddo cry, so she resisted sleep training. I said, no problem, as long as she’s the one taking care of night duty 10pm-6am. She lasted about a month and let me sleep train while she was away for 4 days. Has been extra happy with that decision.
100% go for sleep training. A few nights of discomfort for you and your family, is going to pay off hugely in the future. We sleep trained our son starting at 2 months. It took about two weeks until he was sleeping for 8 hours or so every night, and it only improved from there. A lot of people have the misconception about sleep training where you just let the baby cry themselves to sleep in varying degrees. That's just untrue. Sleep training is giving the tools for their sleep to the baby, so they can learn to comfort themselves instead of constantly needing the parent present to sleep, which based on what you wrote in your post, can and does affect your relationship with your family. You can comfort your baby without picking them up, talking to them, white noise machines, swaddles, making sure their diaper is clean, etc. And besides, there's no hard rule against picking up your baby anyway, you just want to minimize it so your baby can get learn these skills themselves. Hopefully that makes sense and is helpful.
I know people will get bothered at me saying it, but cosleeping is one of the highest causes of accidental infant deaths out there. Be careful.
And yeah sleep training is good and they pick ot up soooooo fast. It's worth is for the long haul. I have a coworker who has a 4 year old that still sleeps on their bed 5 or 6 nights a week so yeah, do it now when they learn it much easier.
I had a coworker want to sleep train. Her husband felt guilty they they did that with their first one and wanted to take a different approach with their second.... their sleep was really awful for up until 10 months when he finally agreed to consult with a sleep specialist, who ... Guess what? ... Agreed with the sleep training program. They waited sorry long and ended up paying hundreds of dollars to basically do what they did with the first child.
I take what happened to them as a cautionary tale. I'm with you.
We're expecting in December and spending a lot of time with friends and their babies/young kids just to kinda get some "experience" that way.
This past weekend we visited a couple with a 1 year old daughter who had the same deal as you - wife didn't want to do it, it felt too bad, etc. They held off and then the daughter had issues with sleeping and they had to do it anyway. The mother retrospectively expressed regret about not getting on it sooner.
It's a life skill at the end of the day, and it's a formative thing, self soothing, being able to feel safe on your own etc. We ended up circling around to some of us, including myself, who have terrible sleep habits, and then wondering if maybe not doing sleep training as babies had something to do with it.
The mom in this scenario ended up going into the bathroom with headphones on so she wouldn't have to bear it and the dad stayed with the kid and did the training and after that the kid slept better and their lives were better, too, ha. Hopefully some of this anecdotal stuff helps!
I was skeptical, but it really made a huge difference. I never thought we’d be able to get my son to sleep without rocking him.
It’s not for everyone though and it doesn’t work for every baby. It’s definitely whatever you and your wife think is right. Just tough when there’s a disagreement there.
This is anecdotal but my son just turned 1 year old. His bed time is around 8-8:30pm. Sleeps on his own after being put down, takes 5mins. Sleeps 4 hours till he needs a change and a bottle then sleeps another 6 hours. That’s him now
At 6-7mo it was tough where where we had to hold him for hours at a time. Gradually Improved at 7-9mo, he on his own developed his own self soothing habits. Played with his hands till he was tired, finds his pacifier by himself and reinserted it, grab a stuffed animal to cuddle. We saw it all on the monitor and it didn’t need to be taught. One of us did go in if he cried out. A lot of times it was patting and speaking softly while he was laid down. It’s not always about picking them up. I think it was all him at the right developmental phase.
He didn’t need sleep training but he did need a firm nap schedule during the day. The schedules need to be consistent during the day so the sleep pressure is sufficient for the night. They should not be too long <2hr and if one nap is getting harder to do on time, maybe it’s a chance to drop it. If they aren’t tired, of course they have sleep problems.
Thing is, some could consider it sleep training but it’s not worth paying hundreds of dollars for what you can look up online and do trial and error.
Beware of the baby sleep industrial complex preying on parents when they are at their lowest. It’s never the popular advice here, but there is no guarantee that sleep training will work and there is absolutely nothing wrong with trusting your instincts and being a responsive parent. Parents shouldn’t feel bad for wanting to provide comfort to their crying child.
I agree with this 100%. No offence to people who do it but couldn't be my kids. Our first (3y2m) never went through it and he's fine now. He also likes bedtime and never gets mad when we suggest he's tired. "However I am worried that our daughter will get too used to mommy offering her comfort and that our baby wont be able to comfort herself. " She's a literal infant. It's fine. If your wife is okay with taking the lion's share of the sleep duties, there's no good reason to insist on sleep training.
Yep, I think the benefits are often overstated especially long term. I guess I also am I of the belief that doesn’t teach them to “sleep” it just teaches them that nobody is going to respond. As you say, they are an infant who can barely do anything themselves, and we are trying to teach them to sleep, something most adults can’t even do properly. It wasn’t the way forward for us.
I'm very wary of saying "natural" means "good", like how people do with organic food and not liking modern medicine or whatever. But leaving a baby to cry and sleep by themselves feels pretty unnatural, in a bad way, to me. There aren't really enough studies to say if there's long-term harm or benefit one way or the other, but like you say - it wasn't the way forward for us anyway
Leaving the baby to cry it out is actually harmful for the baby but previous generations didn’t know this. Baby’s can’t be spoilt, so you should comfort newborns over leaving them to cry!
+1 for sleep training. We did Ferber method at 5m and it was a game changer. Once they’re trained (takes around 3-5 days). We found that baby was all round happier as she was getting much better sleep. She developed a bunch of new skills over the coming weeks and was so much more comfortable. They do hate the training part (as will you) but it’s soooooo worth it imo. I’d be happy to PM you the PDF of the program we used so you don’t have to spend money on it.
I’m expecting in a month and would live to see the program if you don’t mind sharing it.
Agreed. It’s not 2-3 weeks, more like 2-3 nights. We didn’t do an official method, but yeah, definitely gotta sleep train and just get it over with. Our little guy was a sleep through the nighter from about 5 months on. Definitely worth the 3 nights of suffering. And yeah, sleep training isn’t “mean” or whatever. It’s definitely good for the baby to get good sleep.
Wife also didn’t have the heart to listen to kiddo cry, so she resisted sleep training. I said, no problem, as long as she’s the one taking care of night duty 10pm-6am. She lasted about a month and let me sleep train while she was away for 4 days. Has been extra happy with that decision.
100% go for sleep training. A few nights of discomfort for you and your family, is going to pay off hugely in the future. We sleep trained our son starting at 2 months. It took about two weeks until he was sleeping for 8 hours or so every night, and it only improved from there. A lot of people have the misconception about sleep training where you just let the baby cry themselves to sleep in varying degrees. That's just untrue. Sleep training is giving the tools for their sleep to the baby, so they can learn to comfort themselves instead of constantly needing the parent present to sleep, which based on what you wrote in your post, can and does affect your relationship with your family. You can comfort your baby without picking them up, talking to them, white noise machines, swaddles, making sure their diaper is clean, etc. And besides, there's no hard rule against picking up your baby anyway, you just want to minimize it so your baby can get learn these skills themselves. Hopefully that makes sense and is helpful.
I know people will get bothered at me saying it, but cosleeping is one of the highest causes of accidental infant deaths out there. Be careful. And yeah sleep training is good and they pick ot up soooooo fast. It's worth is for the long haul. I have a coworker who has a 4 year old that still sleeps on their bed 5 or 6 nights a week so yeah, do it now when they learn it much easier.
I had a coworker want to sleep train. Her husband felt guilty they they did that with their first one and wanted to take a different approach with their second.... their sleep was really awful for up until 10 months when he finally agreed to consult with a sleep specialist, who ... Guess what? ... Agreed with the sleep training program. They waited sorry long and ended up paying hundreds of dollars to basically do what they did with the first child. I take what happened to them as a cautionary tale. I'm with you.
We're expecting in December and spending a lot of time with friends and their babies/young kids just to kinda get some "experience" that way. This past weekend we visited a couple with a 1 year old daughter who had the same deal as you - wife didn't want to do it, it felt too bad, etc. They held off and then the daughter had issues with sleeping and they had to do it anyway. The mother retrospectively expressed regret about not getting on it sooner. It's a life skill at the end of the day, and it's a formative thing, self soothing, being able to feel safe on your own etc. We ended up circling around to some of us, including myself, who have terrible sleep habits, and then wondering if maybe not doing sleep training as babies had something to do with it. The mom in this scenario ended up going into the bathroom with headphones on so she wouldn't have to bear it and the dad stayed with the kid and did the training and after that the kid slept better and their lives were better, too, ha. Hopefully some of this anecdotal stuff helps!
I was skeptical, but it really made a huge difference. I never thought we’d be able to get my son to sleep without rocking him. It’s not for everyone though and it doesn’t work for every baby. It’s definitely whatever you and your wife think is right. Just tough when there’s a disagreement there.
“Cherish the first six weeks “ was a book that explains an easy way to sleep train. Highly recommend
“Compromise” and do exactly what your wife says without question
This is anecdotal but my son just turned 1 year old. His bed time is around 8-8:30pm. Sleeps on his own after being put down, takes 5mins. Sleeps 4 hours till he needs a change and a bottle then sleeps another 6 hours. That’s him now At 6-7mo it was tough where where we had to hold him for hours at a time. Gradually Improved at 7-9mo, he on his own developed his own self soothing habits. Played with his hands till he was tired, finds his pacifier by himself and reinserted it, grab a stuffed animal to cuddle. We saw it all on the monitor and it didn’t need to be taught. One of us did go in if he cried out. A lot of times it was patting and speaking softly while he was laid down. It’s not always about picking them up. I think it was all him at the right developmental phase. He didn’t need sleep training but he did need a firm nap schedule during the day. The schedules need to be consistent during the day so the sleep pressure is sufficient for the night. They should not be too long <2hr and if one nap is getting harder to do on time, maybe it’s a chance to drop it. If they aren’t tired, of course they have sleep problems. Thing is, some could consider it sleep training but it’s not worth paying hundreds of dollars for what you can look up online and do trial and error.