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What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

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Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#201

Post by Fire-Dragon-DoL »

spookthesunset wrote: post #186
cycrutchfield wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but you’re wrong. Not only wrong, but confidently and smugly wrong. You think you know best but haven’t bothered to actually do any real research on this topic.

What does it mean to be "wrong" in this context? Maybe they've looked at the information and decided that the pros outweigh the risks? Who gets to decide that when such a decision is well outside the scope of science or facts? Such decisions fall into a persons values and risk assessments. No expert can, nor should, make such a decision for an individual.

Yes that's what I meant, but I don't think my statement reflected that correctly, it came as "this should be what you should do" and in a certain way, I'm arguing exactly against that behavior.

I apologized in a separate comment.

Yes, we did a risk assessment (we were literally terrified of having the baby sleep with us), I read ~5 books about the topic before the baby was born and talked to various professionals. It was a weighted risk: me and my wife don't roll while asleep (I sleep tummy down and she sleeps tummy up), and I wake up when I have to roll.

We also adopted various strategies to check on any babies movement: for example, I had an arm in physical contact with baby's body. Later on the baby just slept on mom's breasts, in which case she had full control (any movement would wake her up) at that point.

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#203

Post by jjulius »

metabagel wrote: post #110

Having read "The Boy Who was Raised as a Dog", which goes into a fair amount of detail regarding attachment and attachment disorders, letting an infant "cry it out" strikes me as child abuse. Infants have no control over their environment, and crying is almost their only way to communicate. I'm not enthusiastic about sleep training either - the gradual, controlled removal of sleep time emotional support by the parent…

>Edit: I saw another comment which talked about "checking in" on the infant during sleep training. I think there is some middle ground I would be comfortable with after 6 months of age, where you don't rock the child to sleep for an hour, but you check in on them, gently touch them, talk to them soothingly for a little bit, and then you leave them for a little while. Come back in a little bit and briefly soothe them, and then leave again for a little while. As long as they know you are there. And you could stretch those periods out to see how the child does. But, again I would suggest to be very conservative and cautious and don't try this at too early of an age.

I have two children under the age of three, so this has been a topic I'm innately familiar with. What you are describing is the commonly taught method of "crying it out" or "sleep training", and yes, it's commonly suggested to wait until at least six months of age.

It's incredibly frustrating how many people in this thread seem to think that we are just abandoning our children for the evening and calling it abusive, even earlier in your own post.

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#204

Post by aaomidi »

sanderjd wrote: post #199
afandian wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents' generation (in the UK) were physically beaten as children. It was a normal part of parenting and part of school. My hope is that one day we will consider this emotionally abusive behaviour as seriously as we we now look at physical abuse. Though I don't hold out much hope. Especially as there are still some people holding out for the right to hit their children even now.

Comparing a 9-month-old spending 15 minutes calming themselves down before falling asleep to physical abuse is laughably absurd. A big problem with this "debate" is that people conjure images of newborn babies being left to cry for hours, when what is actually predominantly practiced is older infants 6-12 months old being allowed to cry for less than half an hour. After being fed and given a clean diaper and a safe p…

Yeah…cause they’re human and as the parent you’re their only human interaction.

Why is them wanting to be soothed seen as a bad thing? Like, what the fuck do we think these babies are actively scheming to find ways to get soothed?

I swear our brains are looking for adversaries in infants now.

Your infant child can not manipulate you. The brains barely understand action and consequence. Your infant child is trying to communicate its needs, and having it unmet with indifference is honestly hilariously sad.

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#205

Post by afandian »

sanderjd wrote: post #199
afandian wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents' generation (in the UK) were physically beaten as children. It was a normal part of parenting and part of school. My hope is that one day we will consider this emotionally abusive behaviour as seriously as we we now look at physical abuse. Though I don't hold out much hope. Especially as there are still some people holding out for the right to hit their children even now.

Comparing a 9-month-old spending 15 minutes calming themselves down before falling asleep to physical abuse is laughably absurd. A big problem with this "debate" is that people conjure images of newborn babies being left to cry for hours, when what is actually predominantly practiced is older infants 6-12 months old being allowed to cry for less than half an hour. After being fed and given a clean diaper and a safe p…

“A little rap on the knuckles” is less severe than full on beating, but it’s on the gradient of physical violence.

Teaching a child that their call for help will not be answered is unkind and damaging. And I’m not sure a baby has the same perspective on 15 minutes as the average adult.

I’m pretty sure most adults are walking around with unresolved emotional trauma issues that do not serve them, or those around them, well.

Again, on my opinion as a human. Opinions clearly vary wildly.

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#206

Post by jjulius »

afandian wrote: post #164
johndhi wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have children?

Not the commenter you replied to, but I am a parent. I see attachment as one of the most important aspects of human experience. Forcibly severing this is, in my opinion, emotional abuse.

>Forcibly severing this is, in my opinion, emotional abuse.

When you think of parents letting their kid "cry it out", what do you picture? What is your understanding of the process?

Edit: Seems the answer to my question is over here[1].

[1]https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34177882

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#207

Post by aaomidi »

vmilner wrote: post #184
afandian wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents' generation (in the UK) were physically beaten as children. It was a normal part of parenting and part of school. My hope is that one day we will consider this emotionally abusive behaviour as seriously as we we now look at physical abuse. Though I don't hold out much hope. Especially as there are still some people holding out for the right to hit their children even now.

My Uk school was still doing collective punishment beatings (“Who spoke?” (No-one replies) (30 boys get caned) ) in the early 80s.

Physical punishment is still legal in school & home in ton of US states.

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#208

Post by retrac »

Insanity wrote: post #154
jjtheblunt wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not regarding a human child, but my spouse thought leaving our rescue dog, still a youngster only a few months old, in a cage in another room overnight was somehow proper, which frankly incensed me as cruel and abusive nonsense, because it's not the way of the wild, not what any of us were evolved for. And I'd lived with and worked with rescue animals for decades, so felt strongly about this. (i put my foot down and…

Crate training is a good thing (imo) but should be done properly. Not just sticking them in a crate overnight in another room and ignoring them. Our dog is crate trained, which makes travelling with him way easier for example. (He is 1 year old now, so at night he just walks into his crate whenever he feels tired. We don’t have to put him in his crate anymore). You have to make sure they associate positive experience…

We picked up a young stray. Too rambunctious to be left out overnight. Well-behaved generally but around 3 am he jumps on top of us and wants to play. Not working. A crate though? Seems barbaric. But we did it gently, in slowly increasing increments. If he became distressed, we let him out. I think that's probably key. Oh, sleepy time? Let's try to get him to do it in the crate for an hour. Then a few hours.

Now, around bed time, he goes in on his own, lies down and waits for his treat. He usually prefers to sleep in the crate, and he goes there during thunderstorms too; it's a good safe place. We don't usually have to lock the crate door anymore, but when he's rowdy it's "no! bed!" and he goes and lies down in the crate, and we can cinch him in, for a few more hours of rest. Even that's increasingly rare.

I think a major mistake is to use it to separate the dog from people. It's very important that he can hear us nearby, even just sleeping. If he can't hear us, it becomes separation anxiety and he needs to get out because he's trapped in an isolated place. About five minutes out of the bedroom and the whining will start. I'd guess that it's probably also important that it be predictable and associated with daily routines. And it should never be used as punishment.

Re: What happens when babies are left to cry it out?

#209

Post by LAC-Tech »

vmilner wrote: post #184
afandian wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My parents' generation (in the UK) were physically beaten as children. It was a normal part of parenting and part of school. My hope is that one day we will consider this emotionally abusive behaviour as seriously as we we now look at physical abuse. Though I don't hold out much hope. Especially as there are still some people holding out for the right to hit their children even now.

My Uk school was still doing collective punishment beatings (“Who spoke?” (No-one replies) (30 boys get caned) ) in the early 80s.

Well has it worked? Have you knifed anyone?
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