Most parents, especially first time parents, buy parenting books. Books that help us get our babies on a sleep schedule, a feeding schedule, how to deal with teething, potty training and every other milestone kids have from birth to toddlerhood. Many parents align themselves with a method of parenting: Attachment parenting, Cry it Out, Permissive or another theory on how to best raise children. If they fail, they tend to beat themselves up or think less of their parenting skills. If we succeed, we are strong and helping our children.
One of the biggest battles parents face is bedtime. For parents, from the time babies are born, getting sleep becomes like the search for the Holy Grail. There are those of us who let their babies sleep with them and put off the bedtime battles until the kids are two or three-years-old. Others put their babies in a crib as soon as possible and teach their children to sleep on their own. One psychologist, Peter Gray, wrote that our children don’t fight bedtime because they are trying to manipulate parents, it is just in their genes. “When your child screams at being put to bed alone at night, your child is not trying to test your will! Your child is screaming, truly, for dear life. Your child is screaming because we are all genetically hunter-gatherers, and your child’s genes contain the information that to lie alone in the dark is suicide.”
His idea seems valid, they are genuinely afraid. If we choose to train them to sleep alone, are we to feel like we are helping them for the future? Are we fostering their independence? If we allow them to sleep with us and wait until they understand things better before putting them in their own beds are we teaching them they can depend on us? I don’t know how you decided which parenting styles were best for you, but it came down to what was natural to me. I found attachment parenting to be the most aligned to my personal beliefs. My children breastfed until they weaned themselves. I carried them in wraps and slings until they were too big to carry. They both spent their first couple of years sleeping with their dad and me. It was natural to cuddle with them when they cried, even if it was bedtime and they cried because they didn’t want to be alone. I whole heartedly agree with what Gray wrote: “We can do what the “experts” advise and engage in a prolonged battle of wills, or we can do what our genes advise and figure out some not too inconvenient way to let our children sleep close to us.”
You aren’t a failure if your child cries at bedtime. You aren’t a bad parent for letting your child sleep with you. We all have to do what feels right to us. What comes naturally isn’t always bad, just because a parenting “expert” says you should let your child cry it out, doesn’t mean it’s right. Just because another “expert” says children should sleep with you as long as possible, doesn’t mean it will work for you.
What parenting style do you align with? How did you choose which style was best for you and your family?
