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From: svb@teddy.UUCP (Stephen V. Boyle)
Newsgroups: misc.kids
Subject: Re: 1 year old sleeping problems
Message-ID: <3382@teddy.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 16-Oct-86 12:57:12 EDT
Article-I.D.: teddy.3382
Posted: Thu Oct 16 12:57:12 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 16-Oct-86 22:58:55 EDT
References: <1376@ihlpl.UUCP> <2132@mtuxo.UUCP>
Reply-To: svb@teddy.UUCP (Stephen V. Boyle)
Organization: GenRad, Inc., Concord, Mass.
Lines: 57

In article <2132@mtuxo.UUCP> ahj@mtuxo.UUCP (a.johnson) writes:
> Our 1 year old is having some problems sleeping at night. It seems that

We currently have two girls, (three and five), and are awaiting the arrival
of small person #3 in January.  We decided long ago that we would not let
the children cry themselves to sleep, neither when they were put to bed nor
if they woke up at night.  This is not to say that we did not try letting 
them settle down by themselves, because we did. However, we were not com-
fortable with the method, and so we abandoned it.  Pediatricians invariably
tell you to let them cry a while (a while is defined as anything less than
a half-hour). But, as has been pointed out before, the persons dispensing
this advice aren't the ones listening to *your* baby cry. 

We feel (in our own amateur psycho-analytical way) that what is most impor-
tant to us is that our children know that we will *always* respond to them
if they call us. (This obviously begs the issue of 'what if you're not there'?).
There are ways to mitigate the effects of this philosophy. When a child is put
to bed, or if they wake up, it must be made clear that it is time for them to
be sleeping. This means no 'rewards' for not sleeping, such as food, etc.
(A sip of water can be nice on a hot or dry night.)  Basically, we talk
briefly and quietly about how it's time to sleep, and then are quiet. Being
quiet yourself is a good way to make the point that it's time to sleep. In
the case of nightmares, quiet, gentle reassurance, and rubbing their back or
head usually helps everyone to get back to sleep quickly.

Our children have both been non-sleepers. Some of our friends contend that
this is because of the way we treat the issue, although we contend that we
did the same things in the same way that they did in the child's early life.
The whole issue of hwo to deal with this problem tends to inspire responses
that are intensely personal, and sometimes very fervent. The fact that the
children seem fine either way is probably more a measure of human beings'
resiliency than it is a paen to the parents' wisdom. I do not mean to say 
that carrying out our philosophy is easy, because there have certainly been
some very trying nights, but both of us have done things in our lives that 
were much harder, and those actions often had nothing to do with our children.
I am not stating or implying that this is the absolute, only way to deal with
this problem, but it's one that we feel very comfortable with, and derive
some satisfaction from. (To paraphrase Dave Barry in 'Babies and Other
Hazards of Sex', We feel satisfied because our children are ages 3 and 5, and
neither one of them has become an axe-murderer yet.:=)

The point of all this is that you have to do what you feel comfortable with,
and if you're not comfortable with letting your child cry, then that just
won't work for *you*, even though it works great for {a neighbor, your friend,
a relative, someone else on USENET}.

I feel like I haven't gone into a lot of detail, but this is getting long.

							Good luck,
							Steve Boyle

{decvax,linus,wjh12,mit-eddie,cbosgd,masscomp}!genrad!panda!svb
svb@suntan
-- 
		Steve Boyle
		{decvax,linus,wjh12,mit-eddie,cbosgd,masscomp}!genrad!panda!svb
		svb@suntan