Controlled crying
I’ve been doing some reading on co-sleeping and found a great article called “The Con of Controlled Crying”. Here’s an excerpt:
Controlled crying and other similar regimes may indeed work to produce a self-soothing, solitary sleeping infant. However, the trade-off could be an anxious, clingy or hyper-vigilant child or even worse, a child whose trust is broken. Unfortunately, we can’t measure attributes such as trust and empathy which are the basic skills for forming all relationships. We can’t, for instance, give a child a trust quotient like we can give him an intelligence quotient. One of the saddest emails I have received was from a mother who did controlled crying with her one-year-old toddler.
After a week of controlled crying he slept, but he stopped talking (he was saying single words). For the past year, he has refused all physical contact from me. If he hurts himself, he goes to his older brother (a preschooler) for comfort. I feel devastated that I have betrayed my child. - Sonia
Can you imagine? I can’t. I’m so glad that I read this article - on the nights when it’s the hardest, I’ll be able to remember that quote.
For more articles on baby sleep, co-sleeping, baby training, etc. check out this page. Enjoy!
