MCHN to get training in controlled crying

[bon]

I find it interesting that they say babies over 6 months that do not sleep for long periods have a "sleep problem" or "sleep disorder". I thought that was pretty normal!

To be told your baby has a sleep disorder sounds so ominous - and just adds to the pile of guilt that is already felt my mothers over every little thing. Plus it sounds like they are trying to medicalise something that really is just par for the course for many parents.

Parents need to be told that waking during the night is normal - my almost-4-year-old still does it and most nights ends up sleeping in our bed or on the floor in our room. Obviously he didn't get the memo that tells him he should be sleeping soundly for 12 hours in his own bed!

How can leaving a baby or child to cry themselves to sleep be right? I did try CC when Harry was 10 months old but, while it seemed to work at first in the long term it had no effect at all, and I think ended up just making him more insecure at night. Plus the heart-renching feeling of leaving your baby to cry...It just felt wrong to me.

[Liz]

OMG - did anyone see the episode on Neighbours where they did controlled crying on Charlie, and lo and behold, it worked in one night! grrrrrr at them for promoting CC in the first place, and then to have everybody so happy the next day coz it worked so quickly!

I actually have no expectations of my baby to sleep right through. Imagine feeling disappointed in yourself or your baby everytime he woke up? Admittedly it's very trying when you have those few nights where it's every 40 minutes or so, but usually it's just a phase, and they sleep a bit better again in a few days. By better I mean for at least a FEW hours. LOL.

I thought chemical/hormonal imbalances were a major cause for PND? I think we've been designed quite cleverly to deal with sleep deprivation.. especially through the night. Breastfeeding induces sleep in both mum and bub, and I think we interrupt that natural process by not having the baby with us in our beds. I personally couldn't co-sleep with such a littlie, but you'd often find me on the rocking chair asleep with baby on boob.

I think we create our own sleep deprivation by trying to maintain our old lifestyle/jobs etc and not cruising along giving our babies all the time they need. Tallon woke every 2-3 hours every night for 3 months.. and even now it can be every 3-4 hours. We didn't suffer too much sleep deprivation, and I didn't really sleep much through the day, coz I was washing nappies, and pottering about at home.

And OMG at all you drugged babies! I'll have to ask mum if I was on anything!

[bon]

Liz I did see that episode of Neighbours and it irritated me to see a tv show promoting something like that.

[Ambah]

I'm really disspointed to read that article.
I feel sorry for the Mums out there that will now have MCHN's pushing controlled comforting techniques on them, and even if it goes against what the mum wants, they are vulnerable and tired, so no doubt will be swayed.

I thought chemical/hormonal imbalances were a major cause for PND?

I'm not sure - that could be the case, but I can also safely say in my personal experience that sleep deprivation is what broke me in the first 3-6 months or so. Although I didn't have PND, I was absolutely 'out of it' and on the nights with barely any sleep, it would magnify my emotions/stress levels/anxiety the next day about 100 fold, so I was an irritable mess. So I can certainly see how it could lead to PND if these women are barely getting more than a couple of hours a night. I certainly know my body and mind do not cope with sleep deprivation at all.

GRRR @ the Neighbours episode as well... that is ridiculous, and very frustrating too...

[Jodie259]

I have just returned from 5 days at the sleep school.
My baby would only have 20 minute naps during the day, would not drink much milk during the day, would be overtired and angry in the evenings, and wake regularly during the night.

The centre that I went to did not advocate CC, but the methods were not a piece of cake either. I know that many of the BB mums would not "approve". But after 5 days, my baby is MUCH HAPPIER. He is having long naps during the day - and has not put up any arguements about going to sleep in the day - which was always a constant battle previously. He had some problems eating, and we were not sure why... but in the last 24 hours he has done some explosive poos and we now think he may have a bit of gastro.

My husband stayed with us in the centre, so we could support each other. The first night was the hardest. It would be obvious that to change a habit (in an adult or child) is going to be met with some reistance). You put your child in the cot, and as they cry. You stay with them, comfort them (without picking them up). You pat, soothe, and rock the child until they relax. The first time that took us an hour. And as always, he woke after 20 minutes. But over the following days, we rarely needed to pat him when going down. We would recognise his tired signs, put him in the cot awake, and he would be happy to drop off to sleep with his blanket & soft toy. He would wake after 30 minutes or so, and we would just pat & soothe and he would be back asleep within minutes, if not seconds! And after 1.5 hours sleep - he would be such a happy baby!!

The staff were very respectful of my ideas and requests. Although they gave me a routine that included a 12 hour sleep from 7pm to 7am, they were happy to help me with my ideas of just "extending" his current sleep blocks of 3 hours. I wasn't looking for a 12 hour miracle in one week. I was just hoping to get 5 hours sleep at some time. And little Shaun did that twice in the 4 nights he was there!

I have come away feeling more confident, more relaxed, and I think that a happy mummy makes a happy baby. (Just as a sleep deprived mummy could result in a sleep deprived baby!).

These schools are not for everyone... but I have absolutely no regrets about doing it.

[bon]

Jodie that's great the sleep school worked for you, I don't think that anyone on here would disapprove of something that has helped you to be a happier, more confident mum.

[sherrie]

You know my daughter is 18 months old and still wakes 2 hourly for a feed and even more when something is wrong, I don't have family etc close by as I moved to the country just before she was born, but you know I think CC is much more cruel then my sleep deprivation.

My daughter is a real handful since day one but I just think of it as her being assertive and good at communicating her needs which I think is an important trait. With all this CC and worrying about spoiling babies etc I wonder how responsible these things are for our lack of self-esteem when we grow up. I don't want to teach my baby that her feelings and needs don't count, she has no-way of understanding my needs yet so why impose them on her before she can understand?

That quote about the advice regarding vomiting is absolutely abhorrent, it really is. I tried sshing and patting my daughter in her cot, within a minute or two of putting her down and patting/shhing her she had worked herself into such a state she vomited her entire feed. Thats not attention seeking that is pure stress, you bet I'm not going to teach her that vomiting will get my attention because there is no way in hell I am going to let her get in such a state again. She simply wants to be with me, pure and simple she doesn't understand why I want time for myself, how can she?

I totally agree with the comment about putting much better use of funding towards more nurses. I tried once to make an appointment for my daughters 6 month check and I had to book 2 months ahead, I told them to forget it... I have seen a MCHN once when they came here when she was a couple of weeks old and thats it. From all the stories I have heard here I am glad!!!

When I had my son over a decade a go whilst I liked my mchn and saw her for anything and everything I also did everything she said despite how it felt to me. By 3 months my son was weaned on to formula and rice cereal (in night time bottle) then solids by 4 month, phenergren etc all in the desperate bid to stop my son waking 2 hourly because it is not normal(yeah right!). Sure he was sleeping better by 6 months but at what cost. He was always constipated and the nurse had me put him on prune juice... the poor kid was just dehydrated. When he was older say 3 yrs old I finally succumbered to everyones comments on my co-sleeping and did CC. Yeah it worked but it killed me inside and I am sure it did the same thing to him too.

If I could only turn back time!

[Jodie259]

There are many methods to get a child to sleep... and I don't like the idea of CC. But putting into perspective... CC is a very short term method to solve a long term problem. I would find it more cruel to have a sleep deprived child; or a mother that has PND or is too tired to be productive. There are other methods like co-sleeping... but at what cost sometimes? A child dependant an having someone sleep beside them, and possibly a breakdown of the relationship between parents? NOT that I am saying this has happened to anybody here... it is just a possibility.

I am an insomniac myself, and I have managed to go 5 months will no more than 3-4 hours at a time. But I could not see myself doing this for years! And my child would not eat well, and was tired. In a matter of a few days, I have seen an improvement in him getting those few extra hours sleep. He doesn't cry at all when I put him down. Both times I have posted today, my child has been placed in his cot, and gone to sleep within a minute without one whimper, let alone cry.

It was my MCHN that originally put me onto this sleep school, and I will be giving her a big thank you! There is help for people who want it. Whether it be sleeping, feeding or whatever issues are affecting one's child. I didn't want my child to suffer any longer.

Sherrie, this post is not in response to yours, and I fully respect and understand your decisions; and those of the many other women on this forum. My comments are to try and express another view and to let people know of the results I have had within a few days... without any vomiting or excessive crying from my child. But I don't think I could have done this bymyself or totally grasped the information from a book. The support and advice from the sleep school was invaluable - to me and my child.

[BellyBelly]

A reminder this forum is for those who do practice infant-led/attachment/gentle methods; please read the forum guidelines. People who do CC dont like it when we try to say that we have a way that works for us and defend what we do, hence I created this place for infant-led parenters to do their thing. I dont think CC is needed to teach a baby how to sleep, its just as easy to learn sleep cues and follow them. Controlled Crying rarely works long term if you do your research into it.

The Con of Controlled Crying

[Liz]

The thing I don't like about CC is that it has to be done over and over again. At the next developmental stage, bub becomes unsettled, and the parents resort to leaving to cry again. It's very sad. Just when bub needs the reassurance, with teething, or just an unsettling week.. he/she is labelled as being difficult, and the whole CC process has to be done again. I've experience loads of unsettled periods with Tallon, and they do pass. Of course in the middle of them it gets difficult, but once it's passed I'm usually able to look back and understand what was wrong.. be it teeth, or he's learnt some new things (I found he was quite unsettled about the time he was learning to sit!! hehe) He still wakes through the night.. altho it's slowly improving again, but if he needs me, I'll be there for him.

I totally agree with "I don't want to teach my baby that her feelings and needs don't count, she has no-way of understanding my needs yet so why impose them on her before she can understand?"

[Astrid]

I also wonder about the support that will go with the CC lessons. Are they just going to spend 10 minutes telling a mother about what to and leave her to it, or are they going to be their for her in the middle of the night when she has question and doubts. In my experience with the MCHN they just don't have the time to give more than the basic advice.

When Maggie was about 7 weeks old I received my last home visit from the council MCHN. A different one turned up that who had been visiting me (for feeding problems), she treated me like I was a waste of time, as the feeding issues had resolved since the last visit and then told me off for feeding her to sleep. She went on about rocking to sleep as well and do I want to be doing it when she is 7 kg (I was doing it at 7kg and she felt no heavier than at 4 as my muscles built up, they fail to take that into consideration with their scare tactics). She then proceeded to show me the 5s method (Happiest Baby on the Block?), but did not explain it, both DH and I thought she was assaulting our child as the "shaking" was quite severe. Poor Maggie was distressed but she continued to assault our child with the shaking and we thought her hearing would be damaged by the very loud shushing (louder than what I have ever used with her). Finally Maggie went to sleep, I think mostly in the hope that the awful woman would just go away. The MCHN finally left the house, she left me with no info on what to do, how I was to continue etc. We tried the method a couple more times, it only worked once, but we doubted it the whole time as we did not know the theory behind it. Finally I got to see the video on the method, so I then understood it, but I also realised that the MCHN was overly aggressive with it and was no doing it correctly herself. The sad thing is she really gave me no choice in the mather or even explained that there are different parenting methods, there was one method and it was hers.

So if that happened to me with the gentler method of 5s, what is going to happen with CC? It really saddens me to think about it.

[Jodie259]

A reminder this forum is for those who do practice infant-led/attachment/gentle methods; please read the forum guidelines.

kelly... can I clarify something... is the entire forum as per those methods... or the 'gentle parenting' part of the forum?

After your comment I wondered why you had made that statement.. and checked the forum guidelines and didn't see anything specifically about those methods...(the guidelines that are under the 'announcements' header). I'm not sure if there are more guidelines???

Then later it dawned on me...

I hit the "new posts" tab at the top, and read the headings of topics. If it is of interest to me, I read and add a comment. So I saw the heading (MCHN to get training...) and thought it was of interest as I was going to sleep school this week. At no point did I even notice it was within the sub-group of "comforted sleeping". After my initial post, I would hit the user profile tab and read the latest comments.

So... I always thought this post was a general topic...
To make it a general topic - open for general discussion I would have had to repeat the original post (made by kelly) - and post into the general parenting section, I guess (? )

There are 20,431 threads... and I don't go into each section to read each thread. That is why I like the "new posts" tab ... but in this instance, I would have thought that this topic was of 'general interest' as it is not advocating gentle parenting.

So... having said all that...
I appologise if I have offended anyone as I did not realise this thread was within the 'gentle parenting' section. As I have said before; I respect all methods of peoples parenting. It is their child, it is their choice. Each to their own. If this post had of been put into the 'general' section, it would have been good to get everyone's experiences. In future I will have to be more careful to see what section the posts are in, now that this has come to light...

[sherrie]

Jodie that is great it worked so easily for you but it doesn't for a lot of babies but if thats all MCHNs focus on then what good is it for babies like mine and their mothers.

But you know it doesn't last forever, I think coping with this is all about your perspective. Once you stop fighting it and start seeing things through the child's eyes it gets a lot easier. I no longer fall asleep standing up, I just go to bed earlier. My daughter certainly isn't sufferring sleep deprivation as she is ahead of her milestones and at a very healthy weight with only two colds and baby measles and thats it (which all came at the start of teething a molar), pretty good for 18 months. My son who slept through had numerous colds, gastro etc... by that time.

To me my daughter has good survival instincts, she is teaching me what is normal not the other way around. Well thats how I look at it.

Astrid with the shaking etc... you know those merry go round things you used to see in playgrounds where people would spin it really fast? thats what it reminds me of hehe