Hushabye and Goodnight

Okay. It's almost been a year. Our little one cannot sleep on his own. Some people say, "So what? He'll grow out of it eventually." It's not that he won't sleep in his crib that is getting old; it's that he can hardly sleep without us holding him or nursing him; it's that we don't get any time as individuals or as a couple after he goes to sleep because we can't put him down; it's that we haven't had one night of uninterrupted night of sleep in a year. Of course caring for an infant involves sacrifices and challenges, but some of us hit a wall and feel like we can't take it anymore- what do we do?

I have been very resistant to the idea of letting our son "cry it out." I cannot bear the idea of letting him cry- hearing him cry makes me want to cry. When he cries and it seems like he's suffering, how can I not pick him up and comfort him? That's problem number one.

Problem number two is my fear of harming our relationship. Attachment parenting advocates are strongly opposed to this sleep technique. First of all, they say, if your instinct says to pick up your baby when he cries, then that's what you should do. Dr. Sears feels that letting a baby cry it out damages the baby's trust in his or her parent because the baby learns that the parent cannot be relied upon to respond to its needs. This can cause lasting damage to the parent-child relationship, and to the child in the long term. I certainly don't want that to happen.

I have read the attachment parenting sleep techniques and have not had any significant success using them. Our pediatrician and a child psychologist have both recommended letting the baby cry for a few minutes, checking in on him and comforting him, then leaving again, for a slightly longer time, and repeating until he falls asleep my himself, allowing longer periods of time to elapse between each check-in. My husband and I feel like we could try this out, but are afraid to start because of how hard it is to hear our baby cry in his room by himself.

Some glimmers of hope have come from friends or other mothers. One of my dearest friends, who is trained in international disaster psychology and knows what attachment disorders look like, told me that when she was a baby, her parents finally let her "cry it out." Her parents hadn't had any trouble when her older brother was an infant, but she refused to sleep without being held and they were worn out. It only took a few nights, and it was excruciatingly difficult, but it worked. Moreover, of all the people I know, she has the closest, most open relationship with her parents.

Other mothers that I know have tried different sleep techniques with varied results. One mother said that she never let her older child cry, but she did let her younger child cry- the younger child is a better sleeper. Another friend has started letting her baby cry it out and she has gone from sleeping only two hours at a time, to four hour stretches. None of them have reported negative effects on their relationships with their babies. All of them are sleeping better than I am.