- Pregnancy
- Baby & Toddler
- Parents
- Getting Pregnant
- Baby Names
- Product Reviews
-
Registry
- Community
-
More
Want a personalized experience?
Download the free app
Attachment Parenting
Question from a lurker.. (kind of long)
I am completely prepared for the possibility of getting flamed for this, but regardless...
I have been lurking on this board and feel like there are many components of attachment parenting that describe the type of parent I want to be perfectly. Such as, we are going to cloth diaper, baby wear, exclusively breast feed, we don't feel comfortable with spanking in the majority of circumstances, and I want very badly to have a completely natural birth. I also agree with not letting an infant CIO.
So here's the part that I am conflicted with... I have A LOT of friends that used *gasp!* Babywise principles and have had tons of success. (I know I'm getting tons of eye rolls right now as I know this is very much looked down upon on this board). According to them, they never let their LOs CIO and they seem to be happy, healthy, well adjusted babies/toddlers. They basically just kept spacing out feedings a little bit longer over time and eventually their LOs just began to sleep for longer periods on their own with no CIO involved. I'm having a hard time seeing the harm in this, but I realize I need to do more research and am planning to read the book to learn more details. I know many of you are very much anti-babywise, and I am honestly very curious as to what specifically you don't like about it? I feel like many of my beliefs are consistent with this board, so I am feeling a little conflicted and I value your opinions on this subject. Thank you!
This discussion has been closed.
Re: Question from a lurker.. (kind of long)
Honestly, I haven't read Babywise. I do know that the AAP recommends against using it as some of the recommendations can cause failure to thrive. It sounds like your friends are using some of the principles in Babywise in a responsible manner, but not everybody is as reasonable. My biggest conflicts with it are in imposing a strict feeding schedule on a newborn and extinction CIO.
I say if you're interested in Babywise then read it. Though if you do find that many of the AP principles resonate with you, you'll probably be turned off of the book pretty quickly.
Thank you, I really appreciate your answer. I just downloaded Babywise and The no-cry sleep solution to my Kindle. After you mentioned that about the AAP I looked it up and from what I read, I have a feeling if I do use some babywise principles, I probably won't be following them very strictly. Thanks again!
Someone gave me Babywise when I was pregnant, and I read it because I read every baby book I could get my hands on. I found the routine very helpful as a first time parent. It's just Eat-Activity-Sleep. At first my DD had to be woken up every three hours to eat. I made sure that she had a full feeding at each meal. Like most newborns, she had a dirty diaper immediately after eating. I would change her and interact with her.
After just a few minutes she would start getting fussy so I knew it was time for her to sleep. I would swaddle her, turn on the white noise machine, stick a paci in her mouth, sing a song and rock her to sleep. The whole sleep routine took less than 5 minutes and she was out.
At night we just took out the activity time. I kept the room dark and cuddled her but didn't talk to her or try to stimulate her at all. If her diaper was only wet it wasn't changed (as that can wake them up more). She started sleeping 5 hours a night at 2 weeks old and started STTN 10pm-6am at 5 weeks old-just in time for me to return to work the next week!
Honestly, I highly recommend the routine. I don't recommend letting your newborn cry for any amount of time (extra feedings and cluster feeding was always welcome) and we NEVER had to do CIO. I believe it's because we established healthy sleep habits from the very beginning. I can't say how wonderful it was to be able to function at work and how well-rested I was.
My main beef with Babywise is that I STRONGLY believe feedings should never be scheduled or spaced out - babies have very good instincts about when they need to eat and we should listen to that. If you plan to breastfeed, scheduling feedings, spacing feedings out, trying to force STTN - all of those are recipes for supply issues. Sure, there are some mama/baby pairs who would do just fine supply wise on such a schedule. But there are many more who would have serious supply issues if they didn't feed on demand as nature intended. Night nursing is actually quite important for milk supply.
I also dislike Babywise and other "training" methods because they are so focused on getting baby on mama's schedule - and to me that's anti-AP. No, I don't think mama should give it all up for baby (that's not AP either!) but trying to force a newborn/young baby to adapt to a schedule that is against their biological programing doesn't sit right for me. It's one thing to introduce things like a bedtime routine - that's good! But the expectation that babies should STTN by x # of months is societal - not what's actually "best" for baby.
The new edition of Babywise has undergone changes but the previous editions were linked with failure to thrive and were condemned by the AAP. Even if you don't buy my above arguments, that alone should make you think twice. They are written by a guy with no medical or other child expertise who uses religion to bully people into buying his method. Not the sort of person I'd take parenting advice from!
If you haven't already, do some reading about the natural course of breastfeeding and the importance of on-demand feeding. Kellymom.com is a good place to start.
Breastfeeding Counselor with Breastfeeding USA
Babywearing Guide ** Newborn Carriers
Cloth Diaper Guide
Safe Bed Sharing Info
I am a lurker too but really like this board and feel like many of the things I do as a mom are AP. I just wanted to say that my daughter naturally fell into the eat-awake-sleep repeat schedule probably when she was around 2-3 months old. She continues to be on that schedule and now only eats about every 3 hours a day and doesn't eat at night (at least not past 11pm). She did this completely on her own, and so I've never felt the need to put her on a schedule. You never really know how your baby is going to be, and they are constantly changing.
I also wanted to say that in the book Baby 411, the author recommends CIO, but is strongly against babywise because they have been linked with failure to thrive and because they have advocated CIO for newborns. I just wanted to throw that out there, even though it sounds like that isn't the part of babywise that you are considering using.
I also mostly lurk on this board. I am against Babywise for the same reasons the previous posters have listed. Our routine is entirely baby led, when he is hungry, he eats until he is full. When he is tired, he goes down for a nap and sleeps until he wakes up. For us, success was achieved by watching his cues and really learning what each cue meant. I had to spend a lot of time watching him and he naturally fell into eat, play sleep. Sometimes he plays for 5 min and starts yawning others he plays for an hour.
He is 10 weeks old and will go down between 9-10 most nights. Sometimes he wants a snack around 2:30 - 3 and others he sleeps until 5 am. Every once in a while, we are still up at midnight, 3 and 6, but it not the norm now. We have a bedtime routine that we start around 8 pm most nights. Bath, massage, play, white noise, nurse. We swaddled when he was younger, but it is counter productive now - we sleeps with us and likes to suck his hand.
What ncbelle said. Also, as a mom of a spirited, high needs child who had wicked reflux & allergies from birth that were undiagnosed until 4 months old (the 1st 2 allergies, not the whole list, that took almost a year), I grew to hate parenting books that recommend schedules or routines or whatever mold your LO is "supposed" to fit into. I tried to get Ari into a routine (not a strict schedule, a routine) early on, & he just wouldn't fit the feeding routines. Turned out his GI issues were causing him to not be able to nurse a lot @ one time & he also comfort nursed to soothe his tummy, & he's just a crappy sleeper, & I LIKE bed sharing & stopped feeling guilty about it. Reading that he should be doing this or that made me feel like a bad mom or just frustrated in general. I drove myself nuts with all of that. My advice? Listen to your baby. I love parenting books, don't get me wrong, but one size all type advice doesn't work for all (most) babies.
Your baby will start spacing out feedings on his/her own & fall into a routine with some gentle guidance from you, taking his cues into account. You don't need a book to tell you that, kwim?
When I was first pregnant a good friend's sister emailed me about the wonders of Babywise. I responded something along the lines of, "Wow! that sounds great and makes perfect sense. Why wouldn't you put a baby on a schedule, right? I'll have to look into it!" Go-with-the-flow type that I am, I read no baby books ahead of time and had no real plan. Baby came and it wasn't as formulaic as I though it would be. How was I supposed to nurse her every few hours when it seemed like that's what she wanted ALL the time??? Hard-core emotion and instinct hit me HARD. I had "The Baby Book" lying around and it fortunately validated what I was doing and felt the need to do with my baby: settle on the couch and nurse endlessly with her, hold her as much as I could (and wanted!), sleep next to her.
As simple as scheduling sounds pre-baby, they don't necessarily have that in mind, and that's okay. They are biologically pre-programmed for attachment in those first vital months.
I am all-for researching and figuring out what works best for your family, but Babywise just seems to be all about convenience parenting at a minimum. Worse are the Babywise-ers who seem to adhere to the Ezzo mantra that if you DO give in to those cries, if you DO nurse your baby on demand, if you DO coddle your baby too much, you will be setting yourself up for a spoiled brat, which is beyond absurd. In addition to the fact that humanity seems to have survived okay prior to scheduled feedings, I'm happy to have a 2 and 4 year old that are evidence to the contrary.