Place all 12 hungry, needy pounds of our daughter in her crib at 7 p.m. Close the door and return at 7 a.m. No checking, no consoling and definitely no feeding. She would cry — for hours, possibly — but in about three nights she’d get the picture that nobody was coming to her rescue and would begin to sleep through the night.
I stumbled on this piece that discussed a formula that can help infants sleep through the night. For most new parents, this piece of information I am about to share must feel like discovering gold but like the author asked I wonder if you'd have the guts to stick it through. Most new parents are faced with having to sacrifice their much treasured sleep hours to attend to the new addition(s) to the family.I remember that after having my child, I lost weight visibly and it became worrying for those around me seeing as I wasn't really weighty to start with.My eyes were a deep hollow and if one didn't know better, one would have thought I was suffering a withdrawal. I knew then that all that was wrong was the inability to sleep peacefully for the required hours. I had to get used to giving midnight meals and whatever reason my infant might find to keep me awake. If she whimpered, yawned , stretched, cried, I was there. I was consumed with the desire to be there for her even if that meant looking like a mess.One can't help the anxieties associated with being a new parent but this post I stumbled upon gave new parents the choice to either toughen up or stay exhausted.
It also brings me to my question, When can one start sleep training a child? I am fighting hard to find answers to this question seeing as it is past 10pm and my toddler is fighting to tap some keys on my keyboard as I type.
Find below some excerpts from the piece that was featured in the New York Times and written by Aimee Molloy.
A few months ago, my husband and I took our newborn daughter to her two-month doctor’s appointment at Tribeca Pediatrics, the largest pediatric practice in New York City. We were feeling tired, but happy with our daughter’s progress. She was gaining weight, nursing like a champ, and — best of all — giving us six- to eight-hour stretches of sleep pretty consistently. When we told our pediatrician, she seemed less impressed.
“She could be sleeping 12 hours a night,” she said. “It’s time to think about sleep training.”
Sleep training? An 8-week-old?
Our doctor coached us on the recommended technique. Place all 12 hungry, needy pounds of our daughter in her crib at 7 p.m. Close the door and return at 7 a.m. No checking, no consoling and definitely no feeding. She would cry — for hours, possibly — but in about three nights she’d get the picture that nobody was coming to her rescue and would begin to sleep through the night.
The promise that she (and we) could sleep longer was certainly alluring, and I’m no stranger to the idea of allowing your child to cry-it-out in order to learn to sleep. But I was surprised to hear it suggested at 8 weeks. Was it really O.K. to try cry-it-out on such a tiny, hungry, helpless little creature?
The man behind this idea is Dr. Michel Cohen, who founded Tribeca Pediatrics in 1994. His practice now sees nearly 32,000 patients at offices in New York, New Jersey and Los Angeles. “It comes down to this,” Dr. Cohen told me when I called to ask about this approach. “Do you have the guts to do what I’m suggesting? If so, you’ll see it works.” And if not? “Then I expect to see you back at six months, exhausted, asking why your kid is still getting up a few times a night.”
Please read full article HERE
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