As I’ve mentioned in a previous blog, I’ve been reading the No-Cry Sleep Solution by Elizabeth Pantley. Basically, it’s a book for building a plan to help your baby sleep longer periods at night and learn to go back to sleep. This is done without ever having to use the “cry it out” method. I finished the book tonight and oddly(I say oddly because often books like this are dry and a struggle to get through) found it to be an enjoyable read. The author wrote in a very casual voice and included a lot of anectdotal stories, quotes, and pictures from her test case mommies. I’m sure I enjoyed it even more because the author showed a thinking similar to mine and made me feel better about some of the choices I’ve made for parenting (such as co-sleeping and not forcing Brianna to cry it out and letting her go at her own pace).
In any light, in the first few chapters, the author discusses why she is NOT a proponent of crying it out and was not able to use it with her (four)children and why she would not recommend it to others. She quoted a number of well known “authorities” on child care, including Dr. Sears. But she also included a passage from an anthropology volume written by Jean Liedloff in 1977. Regardless of my feelings on the subject, I thought this passage was incredibly vivid and so rich with imagery. I tried to read it aloud to Josh but couldn’t even make it through the tears choking me. But I think that has some to do with mommy hormones and lack of sleep š Anyhow, it’s been almost a week since I read this passage and it’s stuck with me for its descriptiveness, so I had to share.
This passage is Copyright of Jean Liedloff, from The Continuum Concept (1977) describing a baby waking in the middle of the night:
He awakes in a mindless terror of the silence, the motionlessness. He screams. He is afire from head to foot with want, with desire, with intolerable impatience. He gasps for breath and screams until his head is filled and throbbing with the sound. He screams until his chest aches, until his throat is sore. He can bear the pain no more and his sobs weaken and subside. He listens. He opens and closes his fists. He rolls his head from side to side. Nothing helps. It is unbearable. He begins to cry again, but it is too much for his strained throat; he soon stops. He waves his hands and kicks his feet. He stops, able to suffer, unable to think, unable to hope. He listens. Then he falls asleep again.
Sniff. I’m going to snuggle my little monkey now. My heart hurts.
I could never let my boys cry themselves to sleep. (We’re not talking two-year-old no-nap tantrum). I’ve heard that babies who have to cry themselves to sleep have more separation anxiety, and I believe it.
My little sister had to cry herself to sleep, no matter how long she cried. My boys could fuss a wee bit, but if they cried, I went and rocked them a little.
My boys learned that if they needed Mommy, she was there. She may have funny-looking hair and be cranky as hell, but she was there. My little sister learned that sometimes when she needed her mommy, mommy didn’t come. My older boy and my little sister are both 9 now, and I HAVE seen a difference.
I don’t mean this as a ‘my way is the right way’ kind of comment. My sister’s a great kid, and she certainly doesn’t need therapy. Just an observation.
And have you read Operating Instructions by Anne…Lamott, I think her name is? She’s a very, very honest writer, and the way she talks about the highs and lows of the first year is amazing. It’s my number one book recommendation for moms. It’s not a how-to (like there is such a thing with babies) so much as a…I don’t know. She’s just very honest about putting what she’s feeling on the page. See if your library has it if you haven’t read it!
Oh, man. That made me tear up, Angie. Also made me want to cuddle my babies…though they are 23 and 25 now and would think I was insane *g*
Jaci