Attachment parenting and CIO

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm the AP mom who posted above about trying not to judge OP. In response to what would an AP family do in this situation, the most common response i think would be to answer that in this situation you do what the baby needs which is to nurse them, even if it's every 2 hrs. The increase in night waking at 6 mos could be due to teething, illness (ear infections made my DS wake all the time), growth spurt, stressful day, dehydration, etc. So AP'ers would say just trust that the baby is waking for a reason, and in most of our experience, spikes in night wakings always decrease after the needs are met for a specific episode (or an illness or stressful situation subsides). In other words, this 6 mos old will not wake every 45 minutes for the rest of it's first year and there is usually an underlying reason why changes in sleep patterns occur, if you can get to the bottom of it and also meet the infants needs, the phase will likely pass. What i dont like about CIO is that is supposes that the baby's need for food, touch, proximity to parent is insignificant after a certain age and that if the baby is expressing a need for any of those things, the parents must teach the baby that those needs will not be responded to now that they are 6mos old or whatever age people chose to do CIO. IMO most AP mama's have a very different perspective on night nursing than mainstream parents, and they dont fight it or see it as a problem to be solved as they believe children will reach sleep maturity when they are ready, and they always sleep longer once they have solids in their diet which are digested much more slowly than breastmilk and hence babies are less hungry as they age. I imagine that FT working AP parents have a major challenge, however, in functioning the day after night nursings increase, so to them, i tip my cap and then some!!!

I had a baby like the OPs. The only way to ever get her to sleep, and sleep through the night, was to cry it out. This child would have nursed every two hours at 18 months, if allowed to. My other baby, at nine months was ready to sleep in his own bed, in his own room. I just put him in the crib one night, and maybe he cried for three minutes.

As parents, we have a view of what we want to do, and what should be done, but we forget to factor in the temperament of the child. What works for one, doesn't work for another. That doesn't make us failures.

[Anonymous]

just wanted to respond to the question of why we as AP'ers think every time a baby fusses they need to nurse, we dont!!! Sometimes a fussy baby just needs to be rocked, cuddled, or wants to suckle but not extract milk, other times they are truly hungry, most nursing mothers know when their baby is hungry vs tired or overstimulated, etc. It's important to remember every nursing mothers milk supply is different, some babies will nurse more at night to get the mom's supply up b/c thier intake was low during the day, other babies arent as efficient at nursing and need more frequent feedings, day and night, some mothers milk is less dense/caloric, it all depends on the baby, mother, temperment, physical health etc. I just wanted to reiterate you cant apply bottle feeding philosophies (how often a baby should feed, how long, when they should STTN etc) to a BF baby, they are apples and oranges.

[Anonymous]

OP here; Thank you for all of the great posts. Just to clarify a few things about our parenting style. I do not use the term AP when I refer to my parenting style (I know I did in the post but that is because I guess what we fall under). When I was pregnant with my first my DH and I looked into things and made some decisions not because we wanted to be AP parents but because we wanted what we thought would be best for our family. At the time we were living overseas in Africa. We both liked the idea of babywearing. It was a necessity for us as there was no place to use a stroller. We are both still baby wearers today, as we found it just worked for our family. I love to stroll around the store or neighborhood with my little one in his beco or sling, but I still use the stroller as my back can only take so much. We used cloth diapers because I did not like the idea of adding more waste to the environment. We did not set out to co-sleep it just happened as we all needed sleep and it was good situation at the time. We still have the crib in our room for baby 2 and will keep it there until he is at least a year, same thing we did with the first. I am very pro-breastfeeding but for my family. Again living in the developing world there are more diseases and germs and I felt it was very important that my child be given again what I thought would be the best for him. I nursed on demand and still do for my 2nd but that does not mean nursing 24/7.
I think that everyone needs to do what they feel is best for them and their family. For me that is letting my well loved and cared for little one cry a little bit. It has made the whole family happier!

[Anonymous]

ugh- these responses irritate the hell out of me! i would gladly give up my "ap label" to have a child who gets the sleep he/she needs. as a matter of fact i did, and we are all much happier for it - my cosleeping dc was waking up every hour - so in my bed or not, we were ALL miserable. good for you op for finding a solution that works for your family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:With all of the CIO topics I though I would share my experience this week. I have a 2.5 year old and a 6 month old. We are I guess what you would call attached parents. We babywear, co-sleep, cloth diaper, and I breast feed on demand. Our first was a great sleeper and we did not have any issues. Our second has been a terrible sleeper since day 1. Recently he has taken to waking every 45 minutes all night. Well I could not taken it any more. I needed sleep. After two weeks of no sleep we decided to do CIO. We decided we would go in every 5 minutes to reassure. Well we went in 3 times the first night to get him to sleep initially. He woke every two hours that night but I keep up with the 5 minute rule and he went back to sleep each time within 3-7 minutes and I only fed him at midnight and 6 AM(before I would feed him every time he woke up). The second night he went to sleep after going in once and he slept until 2 am at which time I fed him and he was back to sleep until 7. We are on the third night tonight and I hopeful it will continue to go well. Interestingly he has napped great the past two days. He is a very happy baby and this brief crying bit has not seemed to have any negative effects on him. While I know that I can not do a full blown 1-2 hour CIO session I am now convinced that the modified method that we did worked and was very necessary. I am a much better parent today than I was three days ago as now I am not so sleep deprived.

You could be risking being the mom whose child won't stop hugging her leg when you go places, because of lack of independence. There is being attached and there is hovering. Going in every 5 minutes is not the same as cry it out because they still know that your coming in. If you want to try cry it out, don't go in, and you'll see a difference. Cosleeping, most child psycologists will say is never a good idea. I definately don't want to be at all harsh, but stepping away can benefit your child alot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With all of the CIO topics I though I would share my experience this week. I have a 2.5 year old and a 6 month old. We are I guess what you would call attached parents. We babywear, co-sleep, cloth diaper, and I breast feed on demand. Our first was a great sleeper and we did not have any issues. Our second has been a terrible sleeper since day 1. Recently he has taken to waking every 45 minutes all night. Well I could not taken it any more. I needed sleep. After two weeks of no sleep we decided to do CIO. We decided we would go in every 5 minutes to reassure. Well we went in 3 times the first night to get him to sleep initially. He woke every two hours that night but I keep up with the 5 minute rule and he went back to sleep each time within 3-7 minutes and I only fed him at midnight and 6 AM(before I would feed him every time he woke up). The second night he went to sleep after going in once and he slept until 2 am at which time I fed him and he was back to sleep until 7. We are on the third night tonight and I hopeful it will continue to go well. Interestingly he has napped great the past two days. He is a very happy baby and this brief crying bit has not seemed to have any negative effects on him. While I know that I can not do a full blown 1-2 hour CIO session I am now convinced that the modified method that we did worked and was very necessary. I am a much better parent today than I was three days ago as now I am not so sleep deprived.

You could be risking being the mom whose child won't stop hugging her leg when you go places, because of lack of independence. There is being attached and there is hovering. Going in every 5 minutes is not the same as cry it out because they still know that your coming in. If you want to try cry it out, don't go in, and you'll see a difference. Cosleeping, most child psycologists will say is never a good idea. I definately don't want to be at all harsh, but stepping away can benefit your child alot.

Ok, this was the one post too many. (I think given the examples and recent exchanges on other threads, I know who you are. I would like address your opinions in their entirety, but since you have chosen to post anonymously, I won't state my guess. I don't cast any negative aspersions on that, of course. I, too, post anonymously).

Did you actually read OP's post all the way through before posting?

1) She's not asking for opinions on co-sleeping. There is nothing in her post to indicate that she is a mother who "hovers." (and btw, how does one hover over a 6 month old?) Moreover, your notion that co-sleeping is what turns a child into one who hugs her mother's legs is ridiculous. Fwiw, I was a kid who physically hid begind my mom growing. From earlier on, I slept the entire night through in my own crib/bed, in my own room. One is not connected to the other. What I was was painfully shy -- this is different than lack of independence. I can assure you the comments my parents and I heard made it worse, not better. Moreover, plenty of co-sleeping parents will probably tell you that their kids are independent and don't hide behind their legs. (as an aside, I question your markers and value on "independence" in a small child). As for as your assertion that "most" child psychologists say co-sleeping is "never" a good idea, really? never? I would like to see the data to support this. Even the "traditional" doctors such as Brazleton have revised their thinking on co-sleeping. (fwiw, I don't cosleep, but even I can see its benefits).

2) Second, OP said she got her baby to a good sleeping point. That was the point of her post, and that's the purpose of CIO. Parents don't use CIO to make their toddlers/children independent. They let them cry so they can learn to acheive one of the basic needs -- consolidated recuperative sleep. If parents who support CIO could get their kid to sleep with 3 nights of 3-7 minutes of crying (rather than hours on crying over succesive nights), I can assure you that's what they would do.

[Anonymous]

Look, I think the wonderful thing about this site is that people can annonimously state their opinion without getting hammered. Some opinions are going to be black and white meaning everyone has strong views and it's hard to change people's mind if you've been raised a certain way. I personally think that it's hard to give to teach a baby to sleep on it's own if your in the same bed, but it's just an opinion out of many on this site. If I offended you, by going off topic, I apologize.