All posts by Bella

Bedtiming will be published in the States: Any changes/additions you’d like to see?

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I seems like my internet access is a lot more sparse than I had planned. So all those posts that I almost finished? They're not getting finshed very quickly. What with 2 three-year olds running rampant and actually requiring parenting (the nerve… on MY vacation) and a husband who seems to believe that computer time isn't all that romantic, I'm less likely to post as frequently as I planned for the next couple of weeks.

But I did want to ask those of you who have read our book, Bedtiming, whether you wish there was something in there that wasn't or if you'd make any changes if you could. We just got word that we've sold the rights to the book in the States. That means we have a shot of changing things somewhat if we want. I'd love to hear from some of you…

1. What do you wish was in there that wasn't?
2. What did you find unclear that we might be able to explain better?
3. What do you wish we had left out of the book?

We'd appreciate any feedback you have!  Thanks!  (And I'll try to post something more substantive ASAP).

Reader’s question: Sleep considerations when travelling

Readers' Questions, Sleep Setbacks

Um, yeah, remember I said that I had a bunch of posts in the hopper waiting to be automatically uploaded at regular intervals? Well that didn't work as well as I had planned, did it? I have no idea what happened, but it seems that nothing has yet been posted. Sorry… and onward.

I am currently travelling with our two lovely but CRAZY three-year olds. Crazy in that they are completely unpredictable. We flew overseas and of course I was sure they'd eventually SLEEP overnight. You know, on that OVERNIGHT flight?! They did not sleep ONE WINK. How does that happen? They were up until 2 am and they seemed permanently set on party mode. I was convinced that the rest of our trip would be fraught with sleep HELL. I certainly was prepared to be up ten bajillion times per night as they adjusted to being jet lagged. And yet, for the first 3 nights of our trip they've slept 14 hours straight through the night, 13 hours and 12 hours, respectively. Go figure… I don't know why any of you listen to me. I have NO IDEA what's up with this sleep stuff. But enough about me let's move on to the reader's question:

I started 'sleep training' over a week ago with a 'gentle'
approach by sitting by his crib and soothing him.  Each night I moved
further away until I was out the door.  When I was out the door, we did
the Ferber method.  Generally speaking, it's worked pretty well.  The
most he ever cried so far was 40 minutes.  He's gone to bed the past
few nights without any crying and when he wakes in the night, he
typically puts himself to sleep in under 5 minutes.  I still feed him
once in the night, but will work on that in a few weeks.  I plan to
work on naps next since he typically nurses through the duration of his
nap and is always held.  So, after all of that long-winded background
information, here are my questions:

  1. Does the timing in your book apply to naps as well?  Do I need to
    be 'all done' with sleep training my son for naps before he is 7.5
    months old?
  2. I've heard and read that it may be necessary to 'sleep train' your
    child multiple times.  For example, after illness or after traveling. 
    If we travel after our son is 7.5 months old, do you recommend we hold
    off on 're-training' him until after 12 months?!  Or, does your timing
    generally only apply to the first time you 'sleep train' your child? 
    We have quite a bit of travel coming up during the 7.5-12 month
    timeframe and I'm concerned about the impact to our son and us.

Great questions. Let's start with question #1: The short answer is, yes. Timing ANY big transition is best done outside of the sensitive developmental windows. As you may have figured out by now, I think that the developmental transition periods are periods of vulnerability during which children are sensitive in general and changing any established habits — including, but not limited to naptimes and bedtimes — are more difficult during these stages. Extending this idea, I actually think that events such as potty-training, entering a new daycare, changing caregivers, and weaning could best be done (IOW, more easily and with less distress) outside of these sensitive developmental stages. But returning to the specific question, being "all done" would be ideal, but of course circumstances in our lives usually don't align themselves perfectly with optimal developmental timing. All we can do is to try to time things as far away from these ongoing sensitive periods; but remember, these ages are approximate and you've got a little leway on both sides of the ages spans we talk about here (and in the book).

In terms of the second question, yes, the dirty little secret that very few people talk about is that MOST of us have to sleep-train our children more than once. Illness, travelling, a new sibling, moving houses, and parents going back to work (or changing hours) may all be reasons why hard-won sleep habits can disintegrate and sleep-training efforts will need to be renewed. From our experience with our own children and hearing many stories from countless parents, I DO believe that the subsequent sleep-training efforts are usually more easily implemented and cause generally less distress for the whole family. BUT THIS IS NOT BASED ON ANY RESEARCH EVIDENCE. I need to be clear about what I have a strong feeling about, based on experience and anecdotal evidence, and what is backed up by empirical evidence. Also, we may have to use different methods at different
developmental stages. For example, I think straightforward Ferberizing
can work quite well for some children around 6 months or so, but 3
year-olds are not going to be easily "Ferberized." So not only do we often have to sleep-train a few times, but we may need to be flexible with the methods that will be most effective over these repeated efforts.

So back to the second part of question #2, I think that sometimes, if kids have already learned to put themselves back to sleep at one time, when those habits get shaken up (by illness or travel, for example), you can "remind" kids how to do it, even during developmental transition periods. This is because these "booster" sleep-training sessions may not trigger the same sorts of fears of loss, anxiety about the "unknown"; basically, they may not be loaded with the same intense emotions the second, third or fourth time. So, if I were you, I would TRY to re-train as soon as you get back from all your travelling. Implement your preferred sleep-training method for a few days and if after 3 days or so things don't start improving, then you may indeed want to wait for a couple more months. But you may be surprised by how easily your baby "remembers" the skills she learned so well a few months ago. 

Enjoy your time away, good luck with the "re-training" and keep us posted with how it goes. Because there are no systematic studies on this exact topic, I am genuinely interested in whether this advice is sound. Anyone else have any datapoints a la Moxie? Any other parents have experience with sleep-training multiple times? Was it easier each consecutive time? Did it depend on what age you were "retraining"? I'd love to conduct a study on this…

Holiday! Celebrate!

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Please, someone tell me how to get this song out of my head now…

I wanted to let you all know that I'll be off for a month (part work, part vacation). I'll still be posting though. I've got some back-logged posts that will be automatically uploaded while I'm gone and I'll be writing a bit while I'm away. I expect that I'll be able to post at least 2 entries per week, maybe 3. But I WON'T be able to get to any emails for a month. So, if you do have questions you want me to address, feel free to send them along, but I won't be replying for about 5 weeks or so.

In the meantime, I'd be thrilled if you used the comments section to support one another through some of the huge transitions you all are going through. I hope the posts I'll be putting up in the next month feel relevant to many of you and that they spark some great discussions.

Also, if you haven't already joined and you'd like a forum that might feel more comfortable for casual discussions, come by our Facebook page and join the group as a "fan." (Either search for Bed Timing — two words — or just click the link). Some discussion boards are already set up and anyone can start new topics. Also, any new ideas about how to structure that space are very welcome.

Hope you all get some well-deserved rest and fun in the next few weeks!

Context Matters Part II: Understanding sleep setbacks

Sleep Setbacks

We've talked a lot about sleep setbacks (or regressions) in terms of sensitive developmental stages and how those stages can throw to high-hell all previously hard-won sleeping skills. But I left off Part I of this series suggesting that another common cause of sleep setbacks can be a change in the context of going to sleep—often a change that we’re unaware of, or that we don’t see as important, and sometimes a change that we can’t control. Changes in context come in all varieties. Some are obvious: like a change in location. Sleep habits have a tendency to go out the window when you’re on vacation (I know a lot of us are anxious about this now), or sleeping in a hotel room or relative’s guest room. Which is one reason why “vacations” may not be so restful during the early years. (Suffice it to say that our last week's family cottage "vacation" could better be described as one large slumber party badly in need of Super Nanny intervention). Other obvious changes in context are alterations in who is taking care of the child and who is putting him or her to sleep. If mom is always present when baby goes to sleep, then her absence can have a formidable impact on sleeping habits, and dad may be at an utter loss while mom is finally out for her first Margarita with her girlfriends since the baby was born. But these changes are usually temporary and/or avoidable (not that I'm saying that the night out with the girlfriends SHOULD be avoided… not at all).

Other changes in context are not so easy to avoid. When winter turns to spring and spring to summer, your baby may have to get used to going to sleep with light pouring through the curtains. And even the smallest sliver of light may be enough to change her fundamental sense that it’s not bedtime yet. When a new baby comes along, a new sibling, this can also cause a major upheaval to your previously perfect sleeper. Now you’re different in so many ways. You don’t read as many books at bedtime. You’re tired, you’re less patient, you smell funny (fresh spit-up on your t-shirt has such a… specific odour) and so forth. And there are different noises in the house. Things aren’t as quiet as they used to be. These sorts of changes in context are rather hard or impossible to avoid or even dampen, but they may have drastic effects on your child’s sleeping habits regardless. Champion sleepers may suddenly lie awake, chanting, or whining, or rattling the bars of their cribs like little criminals. All because the context of going to sleep has changed in some pivotal way.

One way to think of the solution for sleep setbacks caused by changes in context may sound simplistic: change the context back to whatever worked best or whatever context has been in place until now. If you can. Of course, if the change in context is a change in season, from winter to spring, you won’t have much luck changing it back for another half year or so. But you can, instead, install heavy curtains to block out the light coming through the window. And that’s often the best you can do: approximate the context that’s been in place up until now. If the noise level in the house is the problem, put a white noise generator, or simply a fan, next to the baby’s crib. Sometimes a CD of lullabies does the trick. The key to finding the right solution is pin-pointing what’s different. What’s changed? Often some detective work is required. Whatever has changed in the lighting, atmosphere, sound level, or you may not be the least bit obvious, even though that change is sufficiently potent to make a big difference to your child’s sleep. Babies and toddlers are exquisitely sensitive little beings, and their nervous systems are tuned to many perceptual aspects of their environment that completely escape your attention. And they like familiarity. So, if a sleep setback seems to have no other reason behind it, and a change in context is the likely culprit, try to put yourself in that crib, tune your eyes, ears, nose, and skin to the world around you as sensitively as you can, and you’ll probably figure out the problem in no time. Along these same lines, if you're going on vacation, try to mimic the exact sleep context
you have at home: the same dark room, the same teddy, blanket, soother,
the same stories, the same music, and so on.

Finally, some changes in context are unavoidable and no approximation on your part will bring back what the baby was previously used to (for example, babies grow out of swaddles — even the most "miraculous" of them all — and you're not going to be rolling a 12-month old into a tight blanket; toddlers leap out of cribs and the inevitable move to the "big boy/girl bed" can't be put off until adolescence — despite MY best efforts). When these unavoidable changes in sleep contexts occur, the only thing we can do is rest-assured that children are miraculously adaptive little organisms and they DO learn new sleep habits with our help. 

Part III will cover how PHYSICAL milestones can be considered a fundamental change in the child's context and, of course, why this might spell trouble for already-established healthy sleep habits.

Anyone going through one of these unavoidable changes in sleep contexts? How are you coping?

Context Matters Part I: Learning doesn’t happen in a vacuum

Sleep Setbacks

I'm going to try to address several emails at once through a series of posts about what psychologists often call "context" or the "environment." If you've emailed me to ask about swaddling (how long do you do it for? when do we transition babies out of swaddles? will the switch out of swaddling make a difference in the baby's sleep?) or about moving a sibling into another child's room or traveling for a long period of time and coming back home to "old" sleep patterns or differences in sleep patterns at your house versus the grandparents' house… these posts are for you! All those issues and many others concern changes in the child's sleeping environment and those changes, indeed, can make a HUGE difference in how children fall asleep and stay that way. For this post, I'll stick to the more general consideration of learning ANYTHING at all, not just sleep habits. Then we'll generalize in the next post to sleep in particular.

One of the reasons sleep training is usually not a one-shot deal for most families is that as the child develops, the world around him also changes.  So far, we've only touched on one of the most important aspects of sleep training. This issue is actually not specific to learning how to go to sleep on one’s own: it is a fundamental aspect of all kinds of learning, especially in the early years of life but also, to some degree, throughout childhood and adulthood. It’s the role of context. When we learn a new skill, we use all the cognitive resources at our disposal, and it seems as though it is these thinking powers alone that either permit learning to occur or are found insufficient to the task. But learning relies on much more than what’s going on inside our heads. It also relies on what’s going on in the environment.

When a child learns to count, he does indeed require a brain that’s mature enough to grasp the way numbers stand for a sequence of objects. He needs the language skills to utter words that stand for numerical placement. He also needs joint attention and social referencing so that he can pay attention to what is being taught by his parent or teacher. These are all the requirements for counting that rest INSIDE the child's head. But he ALSO needs a great deal from outside his skin. He needs a parent or teacher patient enough to repeat numbers while pointing to objects. He needs a set of objects that are the right size and shape, and are lined up in such a way as to highlight their “countability.” He also needs to be well-fed and well-rested so that he can concentrate on the task at hand. And he needs a well-lit room and a learning space where the objects to be counted stand out from their background and make themselves available to be pointed to or manipulated. In other words, learning depends on context. 

Learning ANYTHING in life is helped along a great deal by contexts that are set up to support that learning. We take all this for granted, and we intuitively prepare contexts to help children learn whatever it is we’re trying to teach them. We don’t try to teach a child the names for colours in a dark room, and we don’t try to teach table manners to a child who has the flu, or who is extremely hungry, or who wants nothing more than to be finished eating and go out to play. We adapt the context to the task and the task to the context. The child’s learning of the task depends on the context in which it’s learned. Finally, skills that are not yet completely formed, or that are still easily lost or forgotten, are best maintained when we reproduce the context in which they’re originally learned. In other words, kids (and adults, BTW) learn particular skills better when these skills are taught in the same (or very similar) environment, over and over again. Table manners take a long time to perfect. But if we want to keep them from vanishing, then we practice them again and again in a context that facilitates impulse control and pulls for social routines.

The role of context in learning and maintaining good sleep habits could not be more critical. We don’t teach children to sleep on their own when they’re over-tired, or going to sleep at grandma’s house, or when their stuffed animal has gone AWOL. And we make sure that the lights are dim, the room warm, the belly full, and so on. We intuitively understand the importance of comfort and consistency, and we carefully prepare the child’s environment to maximize the chances of successful sleep-training. Then, once sleep-training has begun to succeed,  we’re careful to set up bedtime practices that will ensure its continued success. We wait until the child is tired, but not over-tired, we calm her down with stories and other peaceful activities, we sing the familiar songs, the ones that will become bedrock routine before long, we set the lights at just the correct dimness, and we make sure that every nuance of our own behaviour conforms to our child’s expectations.

So one of the most common causes of sleep setbacks is, very simply, a change in the context of going to sleep—often a change that we’re unaware of (slowly it becomes lighter and lighter outside at earlier and earlier times in the morning), or that we don’t see as important (change in diet, learning to walk), and sometimes a change that we can’t control (the child grows out of the swaddle, an overnight disaster trip to grandparents' house).

We'll talk more about how this basic learning principle — context matters — impacts on sleep issues in the next couple of posts. But I think you see where I'm going… What changes in the environment disrupts your child's sleep patterns? How have you adjusted to those changes?

Come join us on Facebook!

Web/Tech

"Real" post up tomorrow morning (sorry for the delay — I have good excuses, but won't bore you with the details).

I wanted to let you all know that I've finally managed to put up a Facebook page for the book/blog. I actually had to JOIN Facebook to put up a page. And then I had to learn that I was far more dense than I ever imagined because although everyone and their kid seems to understand how to post and play and DO THINGS on FB, I suck at it. So, yeah, a bajillion hours later, and I think I finally know how to link blog posts to the page and a few other things. The main reasons I wanted to set up a page were (1) to make it easier for you to share information with your friends, if you're into that sort of thing on FB and (2) to set up a seperate site from this blog for discussion topics to be posted. This second reason is really the most compelling for me. If you go to the page, you'll see I've set up a few Discussion threads/topics. Any "fan" of the page can make up any new topic, on any issue that's relevant to you. Ideally, I want to keep a relatively low profile on these discussion threads because I'd like the discussions to be mostly parents supporting one another through various ages/stages and challenges. Of course I'll be following along and learning with the rest of you, but I most definitely do NOT want to moderate these discussions. I get the feeling (and have received some feedback along these lines) that some people don't feel comfortable posting on the blog because it seems more of a space where my "expert" opinion dominates. I'm okay with that if you are, but I still wish it wasn't so at times. So I thought I'd provide another space that parents can take the info they get here and maybe engage in more in-depth discussion about their own personal challenges, as well as provide fellow parents in the same boat with suggestions that have worked for them.

I'm also very open to any other suggestions about how to use the page. I'm a newbie, like I said, so I suspect there are other ways that connecting in that context could help us all out. Come by and let me know what you think. You can either search for Bed Timing or connect via this link: Bed Timing FB page.

Then just add yourself as a "fan" and away we go!

Now, if you're anything like me, you might have some privacy concerns (which is why it took me so long to join FB in the first place). To become a "fan" of the page, your FB name and whatever picture you have associated with that name will be displayed to other fans. However, NO INFORMATION beyond that will be shared with fellow fans (unless your settings are such that anyone in general can view your information). If you want to remain completely anonymous, I completely understand not wanting to join.

I will still be posting regular blog entries at this site; nothing will change in that respect. Let me know what you think!

Reader’s question: Seperation anxiety and marital conflict

12-17 months, Readers' Questions

Here's a set of intertwined questions and circumstances that many of us can relate to.  B is feeling stressed and confused about this situation. I'm going to take her email in parts. Please feel free to pitch in with your comments and support, as usual:

I'm not sure what to do, and my husband and I are kind of at an impasse
about this.  Our daughter just turned 1, and on occasion has nights where she is wide awake for 2
hrs – nothing seems to be wrong, but nothing seems to solve it. We
usually just rock her and eventually she falls back asleep.

To
help
hasten the sleep process, we've tried giving her pain meds (in
case of teething), a half bottle of milk, a sippy of water, cosleeping,
etc.
Nothing seems to work except time. We keep it quiet so she doesn't
think it's play time. But if we don't go into to get her, she cries
until picked up, so she isn't content to just play on her own in the
crib.

I've
always kind of chalked it up to
teething pains – she is a very slow teether and usually a few weeks
after these  episodes a tooth would appear.  We went through this with
the 9 month sleep regression too though. Right now she just has 2
bottom teeth, and those came in just in late May. I'd expect more are
on their way.

The
problem – lately she's been
female clingy lately, and quite the mama's girl.  Last night / this
morning she screamed – and I mean hysterical screaming at the top of
her lungs – for 45 mins when my husband came in to relieve me after an
hour.  (The hour she was with me, she just laid in my arms awake and
calm). I
went back into her room after the 45 mins of scream to take her back
from my husband, and he pitched
a fit.  He feels that I'm rewarding her with what she wants (me).  I
don't see it that way at all – I feel that it's our job to comfort her
and if she feels she needs me, damn it I am going to her.  I think it's
really unfair to let her scream for 45 mins to "teach her a lesson". It
would be different if it was 5 or 10 minutes, but it isn't. That has
happened on occasion too, but she surrenders much more quickly.  I
guess I draw the line at over 10 minutes.

So, first off, your baby is likely at a good age to start to make some changes in her sleeping habits if you're not keen on how they're going. In another part of her email, B. asked how separation anxiety affects sleep. We've talked about what could be going through a child's mind starting just before 1 years old and why those changes are likely to keep a child awake at night. But the peak of separation anxiety will likely have subsided by now. That doesn't mean the baby's not sensitive to separations  — now that she's passed through the "object permanence" gates of the 8-11 month period, your disappearances will always be somewhat fraught with meaning. But she should be settling down with the understanding that mommy doesn't disappear forever. So, if you want to apply your favourite, non-CIO sleep-training method (because you say you don't want to use CIO), I'd say go for it. It sounds like these long periods of wakefulness are tiring out your baby and certainly tiring for you and your husband.

I
don't know who's right, and I don't know how I'm supposed to tell the
difference. I ovbiously don't want to give in to any tantrums and spoil
her, but I really think something going on.  She is usually a pretty good sleeper at night. But testerday she didn't nap at
daycare (an in home provider) – she just wanted the to be held.  She was exhausted and so I know
she isn't really staying awake this morning for fun. She's tired, so if
she is up, something is going on.

Oh yes… I so feel for you. NO ONE is right or wrong in this situation. You both are just tired, frustrated, and you both desperately need a break. If you DO decide to use a systematic approach to sleep-training, I
think it's CRITICAL for you and your husband to get on board with a
plan TOGETHER. It is probably the only way you can maintain any consistency in your sleep-training approach.
If SOMETIMES you hold the baby for an hour and SOMETIMES your husband
goes in and attends to the baby and SOMETIMES he stays there and
SOMETIMES you can't take it and get the baby from him, it's going to be
very difficult for your baby to learn new sleep habits. So… my
suggestion would be for you to sit down one night after the baby IS
asleep and pour a glass of wine for the two of you (if you're into that
sort of thing… I find it a delightful way to begin a marital
discourse on any given parenting issue ;-) Then work out a plan
that BOTH of you feel good about following. If you don't think you can
allow your husband to do the soothing part of the sleep training, then
you make the commitment to always be the one doing it. This is a
perfectly reasonable strategy if your baby is going through a MOMMY
ONLY stage. Most babies do go through this. It's exhausting and often
infuriating and it can feel awfully rejecting to the parent who is
being… rejected. But I can assure you from a developmental perspective that your baby is not being manipulative (she doesn't have the cognitive capacity for that yet), nor will you spoil her to give her more mommy than daddy time; her behaviour is simply
evolutionarily adaptive. And VERY likely, she'll so get over you sooner or later and it'll be all about Daddy and how COOL he is and what a DRAG
you are. But until then, the mommy game may be the only game in town. That doesn't mean you can't sleep-train her; again, I won't tell you what method to use, but whatever you choose, it's likely to work a whole let better now than at 17/18 months. So, if you DO decide that you want to sleep-train and you want to be the one to take
on the major part of the soothing, that's fine; that's what feels right for you. But then I urge you to also give your husband responsibilities
during this sleep-training phase. Not only because you need some help, but also because he IS a valuable part of your family "team" and he needs to feel that his efforts are valued. Those efforts, at this stage, may not be best aimed at soothing the baby when she wakes because the baby has a clear goal of mommy. But he CAN do things to help. He can take the baby off your hands when she's less needy, for example, in the day or on the weekend and let you take a nap; he can rub your
feet while you go in and out of the baby's room at night, make you dinner, and
generally be a kick-ass cheerleader for you. You get the idea here… You guys are in this together and have the same goal: to raise a happy, healthy little girl.

Her screaming kills me emotionally. I feel so guilty when I give her to DH, like I instantly regret
it. I can't sleep when she is screaming like that, so I end up questioning why I didn't just
keep her so my husband can sleep, my daughter is calmer, and the neighbors don't think
we're murdering our child? 

It used to drive me BATTY to see my husband try to soothe the babies when he was unable to do it. I just wanted him to do it better or at least let me take over when he wasn't being effective. It is so hard for us mothers to remember that the father is, and should be, a large part of this child's world and even if our partners are not as good at soothing the baby as we are, they may need to give it a try, over and over, until they figure something out that works for them. 

I'll even go further… And please don't take what I'm about to say
as callous in any way. I have felt EXACTLY how you're feeling. But if
none of the sleep-training that you personally do works to minimize how
long your girl is awake at night, and you are really at your wit's end,
then try what I did the first time my boys were sleep-trained:
Let your husband take over the sleep-training, walk to your closest
restaurant, order a glass of wine (notice a theme here?) and a
main course. This latter part is crucial. Order a full meal so that
you are forced to stay away for an hour. (I remember that I actually had auditory hallucinations in the restaurant — I believed I could hear the cries all the way down the street). Repeat for three days. For
some, this may be disastrous. For others, like our family, after the
third day, I entered a quiet home, with children sleeping and a
husband who thought he was the most kick-ass Papa in town.

I think one of the crucial parts of B's email touches on the incredible stress
that a new baby puts on a marital relationship. There's a whole lot of
research on this "and baby makes three" phenomenon. Here's a review chapter
that you can actually read in its entirety, by one of the top scholars
in this field. This line of research has established that dealing with
the new challenges of infancy can put incredible, sometimes
irreparable, damage on a marital relationship. Did I need to tell most
of you this? Did you need tens of psychologists conducting 100s of
studies to prove this to you? My hunch: not so much. So many of us have
hissed at our partners to GET OUT NOW over our wailing baby's heads.
Countless mothers have felt the competing
desires to take a blessed break from our demanding child by handing him
off to our partner while at the same time wanting to grab the baby back
because YOU JUST AREN'T DOING IT RIGHT. So many of us have bit our tongues, sat on our hands, hid behind doors, willing ourselves to give our partner just 5 more min, just 2 more min, before we can't take the baby's cries for one second longer. It is so, so hard. For BOTH partners. But it DOES get easier, if the couple is willing to talk it out and even to have repeated conflicts that have the chance to repair. Withdrawing from one another, on the other hand, is often much more dangerous for the relationship in the long run. So if you can manage it — even in the middle of potentially the most stressful time in your marriage — keep the communication channels open. The whole family will be better for it.

When the all-night snack bar is closing: Some strategies for night-weaning

Night weaning, Sleep Training Methods to the Madness

Several readers out there are considering night-weaning, with the potential that this may make it easier to sleep-train their babies. I want to emphasize that night-weaning is NOT necessary for sleep-training, but your child may get the sleep lesson faster if he isn't SOMETIMES fed and SOMETIMES not. I wouldn't recommend night-weaning until your baby is eating solids during the day. So, probably not before 4 months and I'm more inclined to suggest 6 months or so. This is mainly because most babies' tummies before 4-6 months are still quite small and they need the round-the-clock feeding to continue to thrive. OK, let's talk about some strategies that might help.

The first consideration is if the mother is breast- or bottle-feeding at night. If you are bottle-feeding (either expressed breastmilk or formula) during the night, then there's a handy little trick that works for a lot of us. Oh… and if you're NOT bottle-feeding and you're dying a slow and painful death from sleep deprivation, you might want to consider handing your partner the bottle and showing him/her the way to the baby's room at 3 am — pump or mix up some formula and away he/she goes (and 3 or more hours of uninterrupted sleep could be yours). Ahem… I digress.  If you ARE bottle-feeding at night or you COULD be (in other words, if your baby DOES take a bottle and you CAN pump or are OK with formula), try this "graduated weaning process":

1. Plan on about 10 days for this process to work.

2. On the first night, prepare the bottle with one less ounce of milk than usual, and replace this ounce with water. This way, your baby is getting the same amount of liquid, but one less ounce of milk. (For example, if your baby usually gets 6 ounces of milk, put 5 ounces of milk and one ounce of water in the bottle instead).

3. Feed baby this amount every time she wakes up in the night, for the next 2 or so nights. Guaranteed, the child will not notice this first stage. Soothe baby back to sleep

4. On the third day, take out another ounce of milk and replace with another ounce of water (so now you have 2 ounces of water and the rest milk). Soothe baby back to sleep.

5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 until the baby starts with the HATE. In other words, continue to replace more and more milk with water. At some point in this gradual process, most babies start noticing and protest. Some protest A LOT. Others, remarkably, very little. Most kids will take a few sips of the now water-with-a-tiny-drop-of-milk and give up, but many will finish the water. Soothe back to sleep.

6. Usually, by the time the baby does start to notice (around the 10-day mark), you will be giving her almost NO milk and you will have been doing this for several days. That means, the child hasn't been getting much nutrition at all from these night feedings for days now.

7. Continue to give the baby water every time she wakes up. Or at this point you can substitute with a soother/pacifier if she takes one and if you're into that sort of thing. 

8. At the same time you're doing this gradual weaning, you should be trying to up the baby's caloric intake during the day. This can be through nursing, formula-feeding or solids.

9. That's it. At the point that your baby is waking up and only getting water from the bottle, your baby is night-weaned. If he's going back to sleep with your help after the water, then he is no longer getting hungry. The whole point of this process is to get to a place — GRADUALLY — where you know that the baby no longer NEEDS the nutrition that he usually got at night. He will compensate during the day.

This is a slow, gentle process by which the baby's body becomes gradually accustomed to getting fed only during the day. At night, the same hunger pangs need not arise anymore. For me, this process was critical to go through before I started sleep-training so that I could ensure that when my boys did wake up at night during the sleep-training phase, they weren't hungry (and I wasn't filled with doubts/guilt as to whether they really needed the food or not). 

Night-weaning is quite a different ball game if you're exclusively nursing during the night. In this case, transitioning usually requires a whole lot of support from your partner, if you have one (and if you don't, I would enlist the help of family or a close friend; otherwise, this can be a very painful process for one person alone… not impossible, but HARD).

Your partner needs to start doing more night soothing during times when the child is used to being nursed. Also, because it's very, VERY hard to just offer the breast for a couple of sucks and then take it away, it's harder to GRADUALLY decrease the amount of milk the child receives. So, sometimes, this is a more hard and fast weaning process. Many mothers report that cutting off the night feedings entirely was much easier than trying to cut them down to just one or two. Mostly because the baby doesn't get the idea that sometimes you're allowed to nurse at night and sometimes you're not. So, when the baby does wake up, the partner starts to soothe. As usual, it always depends on your child, but the partner's soothing could involve back- rubbing or cuddling in bed (especially if you co-sleep) or in the crib or, more likely, the process will involve being out of the bed, rocking and/or bouncing the child.  The first few days are going to be the hardest. Sometimes, mom needs to be out of the room every time the baby wakes up and wants to be nursed. If the child is old enough to understand words and some more complex ideas, saying things like this might help:  "boobie is empty now and needs to make more milk and will be ready in the morning", "you can have it when you see the sun", or "boob is sleeping".  In the morning, you'll need to be prepared to nurse for a long time.  The soother is a big help here, again, if your baby takes one and you're into giving her one.  Singing also has helped many women.  Instead of nursing to sleep, some kids quickly switch to being sung to sleep, some favourite songs help, but introducing some new lullabies can be helpful too. Some kids adopt new soothing behaviours like belly-rubbing (the baby's or yours), playing with mommy's hair, sucking their thumb, and so on. You can also try to introduce new items to soothe with like lovies, stuffed animals, blankies, etc.  Lots of love, affection, cuddling and discussion of what is going on (even if it's a wee lie) can help the older ones especially. Also, keep in mind that SOME kids are not big cuddlers and don't NEED the tight shmushing  to compensate — we as mothers often try to pull our kids physically closer during these times when they might feel best with a little space of their own. So, keep an eye out for these signals and try not to take it personally (HA!) when your child pushes you away a bit and starts to self-soothe instead.

This is a tough transition. For both the baby and the mother. Be kind to yourself. Cut yourself some slack. Try to ease the guilt you might feel with lots of playtime and cuddling during the day. 

Anyone been through night-weaning and have some extra pointers? Words of encouragement? Horror stories? Anyone want some support while thinking about starting this transition?

Lest we forget… (or do whatever works to get you through the day/night before 3 months old)

Naps

I've received several emails in the last month about short nap cycles. The questions revolve around 3 things:
1. Is it normal for naps to be SO SHORT (for example, 30 – 45 min) at around 2-4 months?
2. Is it ok to help make naps longer by [enter whatever means the mother has finally found to put her child to sleep and keep him that way for more than 10 min]?
3. How do I lengthen naps?

For once, I thought I'd be a little more succinct. My answer to 1 and 2 is: YES!  Babies before 6 months or so often wake up from naps very quickly, corresponding to their short sleep cycles. To answer #3: Oftentimes you can get them BACK to sleep, with some help from one contraption or another (swings, bouncy/buzzy chairs, slings, stroller, carseat — in or out of the car, breasts, bottles).

There are far too many books out there telling you NOT to use these "sleep crutches" because babies will get used to them and NEVER. EVER. EVER. SLEEP. ON. THEIR. OWN. I come from another perspective. Because most babies' nap cycles don't lengthen until about 6 months (and they often do so with no intervention on your part), trying to eek out a nice long nap from your infant warrants any arsenal out there. I went back through some very badly filmed clips of my many attempts at getting my boys to nap during this early stage, just to remember how crazy hard it was to put these little guys to sleep and keep them that way. As you can see, I used any strategy (and many more not filmed). Swings, bouncy chairs, slings and nursing… all for the elusive 1 – 2  hour nap. They never napped that long in one stretch until they were 5 months old or so. And after about 6.5 months, they were slowly weaned off all swings and such.

So, my bottom line based, in part, on my very unscientific sample of 2: In the first 3 months or so, I would use any means necessary to get your child to nap and stay that way for more than 15 min. I did…  (Please excuse the quality of the film. Oh, and the CHEESY, high-pitched squeaking with which I spoke with the camera/babies. My only excuse was SEVERE sleep deprivation).
Download Nap strategies

What are the long-term outcomes of letting your baby cry while sleep-training?

Reviews of studies

One of the main concerns that parents have when they first start considering sleep training is whether they will harm the child in any significant way if they allow her to cry for some set length of time.

There's a reason why the answer to this question is not common knowledge already. Believe me, if extended crying had a straightforward connection to any serious harm to children, you'd know about it already. This is why I hate giving newspaper and radio interviews sometimes. And it's why this post has taken almost a week to write. Most people want a one-liner. They want the bottom line: Is it good or is it bad to let your baby cry when you're sleep-training? OF COURSE you want the bottom line. You want to do right by your baby. But the one-liner just doesn't exist. ANYBODY that tells you that the research is straightforward, that science has come up with a real answer, is simply not telling the truth. Intentionally or not, WAY too many sleep experts — from the "Attachment Parenting" camp to the hard-core CIO fans — profess that science has come up with the answer as to whether crying harms children in the long run. It's simply not true.

Mother & Kids crying Having read far too many of the original studies that are related to the topic, here's my take. My best answer as to whether it harms a child when we let her cry for a while when sleep training is: It depends, but it probably doesn't damage children in any significant way (long-term outcomes, self-esteem, bond with parents, etc.). It depends because some kids are particularly sensitive to separations; it depends because parents can get so resentful of failed attempts at sleep training that they treat the child poorly and that, in turn, has detrimental effects (and we can't tease apart these effects from the amount of crying the child is doing); it depends because some children's crying, even the most minimal amounts, sends some vulnerable women into a tailspin of postpartum depression and we know that's not good for kids in the long run; it depends because some children become physiologically so aroused when they cry that they vomit or hyperventilate and, well, that's not good for some kids either; it depends because some children cry MORE when they're being rocked to sleep by well-intentioned parents than they would if they were left alone and ignoring that need that some kids have to be left alone (which they can't articulate) may actually be equally detrimental to some kids; it depends because many couples go through significant marital conflict when it comes to deciding how long to let their baby cry and marital conflict has repeatedly and consistently been found to have long-term negative consequences for children. So… how would you tease out whether it was the length of crying during sleep training or the marital conflict about the crying that made the biggest dent in a child's developmental outcomes? (You COULD do it, but the study would be very complex and it hasn't been conducted yet). So, yeah, it depends (and I could go on for much longer about all the factors that make this seemingly simple question so very, very complex).

But… however complex the issue may be, there are indeed studies that have been conducted to tackle the issue from various angles. Let me point you to some that have brought me around to my general conclusion:

In the review article in the journal Sleep that I keep referring to, they went through the best studies out there (a total of 52) and concluded that there were no appreciable differences in the effectiveness of the top 5 sleep training methods assessed (from CIO methods, to Ferberizing, to more gentle methods like "positive routines" or faded bedtimes). Then they looked for "collatoral damage" if you will. Here's the quote from the article directly: "A total of 13 studies selected for this review reported results pertaining to child daytime functioning such as crying, irritability, detachment, self esteem, or emotional wellbeing… Adverse secondary effects as the result of participating in behaviorally
based sleep programs were not identified in any of the studies [Did you catch that? NONE of the studies showed negative effects, even the CIO ones]. On the contrary, infants who participated in sleep interventions were found to be more secure, predictable, less irritable,and to cry and fuss less following treatment.Mothers indicated that behaviorally-based sleep interventions had no effect
on maintaining the practice of breast feeding or on infant’s total daily fluid intake."  If you go to the original paper I have linked, they cite all the studies that brought them to this conclusion — they're well-designed, published in reputable journals, reviewed by a committee of scientific peers.

Then there's a group of studies that don't directly address the question, but they're related in important ways.  Researchers have long been interested in whether crying itself is a bad thing for kids. Several groups of researchers have studied colic and its long-term impact on children. Most of them have come up with the conclusion that early, "excessive" crying (often referred to as colic) does not lead to poor outcomes for children (unless there are ADDITIONAL problems in the family like depression, marital conflict, poverty and so on). It may be that when crying PERSISTS over a longer period of time (rather than being temporary, which is the case for any sleep-training process) that negative outcomes become associated with crying. Here is one of many review articles that summarizes the findings.

Other researchers have been focusing more on the stress hormones released during crying fits and how those may impact on the long-term development of children. Crying is a physiological response to stress and it involves increases in blood pressure, heart rate, and cortisol levels (indicators of stress). A fantastic recent review article — by Megan Gunner, one of the most well-regarded neurobiologists in the field — goes through decades of research on stress levels and their neurobiological effects on children's long-term development. She, like many of her colleagues, conclude that PROLONGED high levels of stress (that are often, but not always, accompanied by lots of crying) leads to loads of poor outcomes for children. But again, this is PROLONGED stress — over months and years often — NOT crying that happens over a week or two and that lasts for short periods, relatively speaking (even an hour is a short period in this line of research). Just to give you an idea about the level of prolonged stress we'
re talking about here, these researchers study children from abusive and neglectful families (physically and emotionally), children who have recently been adopted out of institutions known to have neglected babies and children for years at a time (like the Romanian orphanages of the pre-Revolution era), and so on. Yes, stress can have a negative impact on children. Yes, of course, our jobs as parents is to try to minimize the amount of stress children go through. But the serious negative long-term outcomes associated with chronic elevated levels of cortisol are WORLDS away from even the most die-hard forms of CIO. And this is where I get on my soapbox: People who call themselves experts who cite this body of work as rationale for never allowing your child to cry (alone or in your presence) for some prescribed duration of time during sleep-training are seriously misrepresenting this body of research.

 One last point that I tried to emphasize in the book: We all want to have the most stress-free sleep-training experience for both our children and ourselves. EVERYONE wants to minimize their child's distress during sleep-training. The problem with picking the "right" sleep-training method for your child — the method that will provide the best results in the shortest period of "training" possible, with THE LEAST AMOUNT OF CRYING — is that, depending on the child, the most gentle sleep methods can have some kids wailing for hours out of frustration and the most hard-core CIO can have other children sleeping in 5 min. I have heard MANY stories from mothers who have used "no-cry" sleep solutions and been frustrated to high-hell with them because their child interprets these gentle methods as a big "tease." These children cry MORE when their mother is present, in the room, but shushing them and inching little by little away from them. They can cry for hours and hours in this type of frustrating experience. For other mothers, these same methods resulted in their babies sleeping through the night through a painless, cry-less transition. Just as many mothers SWEAR by "graduated extinction" or Ferberizing, claiming that before they Ferberized, their babies would cry in their arms for hours during rocking and bouncing sessions; during sleep-training, they cried LESS. And of course there are plenty of parents that have tried CIO methods and been traumatized by the amount of incessant crying their babies endured.

Crying in and of itself will not damage your child for good. There have to be other factors working to do that kind of damage. Yes, some children may show signs of insecurity the next day. Other children will show the exact opposite, seeming more jolly than they had PRIOR to sleep-training. If you feel that the method you're using is adversely effecting your child, then stop. Recharge for a few days. Try something else. Try again in the next optimal developmental window.

And as one who has ALMOST come through the other end of worrying about serious sleep concerns with my children, I have to say that I now have SO MANY more opportunities to screw up my kids. Sleep-training now seems like a drop in the "am I messing up my kids for good" bucket. Now I can yell at them for throwing food and worry about scarring them for life, I can be an irritable, tired, inaccessible mother when I get home from work and recall all that research on "the distracted mother", I can feed them things I don't know I shouldn't be feeding them because I don't do enough research, I can put chemical-ly sunblock and bug spray that will MESS WITH THEIR BRAINS FOREVER!

Ah… the joys of motherhood for all of us guilt-prone parents out there…