Before I was a father, I used to laugh watching Chris Rock say in his live stand up events that every adult dinner out with other parents turns into talk about the baby. The baby this and the baby that. Well, that's exactly what happened to my dinners and inevitably with a young child sleeping, eating, walking and talking are the go to conversations about the baby.
What I have learned after a year and a half of this is you can never tell another parent that you don't think they do things correctly, you can only say what you do and they can listen and follow along or not. After all, it's their baby and their project. Unless you have kids you can't imagine the night times games that ensue. One of my friends calls is the walking zombie days for parents referring to the first 10-12 weeks after birth. It's amazing you just don't have a concept of how often a newborn is awake until you go through those first 2-3 months. It's like the unsaid bond parents have that's just not worth the time explaining to those that have not had the opportunity.
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As far as sleeping goes, it seems very clear to me that all the parents who express that they can not stand to hear their baby cry, believe that it's the one time in their child's life that they should be constantly soothed and " why let them struggle " when I can help them and they believe it's crazy for others to let their baby's cry when just picking them up will stop it. Result: Their babies are exhausted during the day and appear extra cranky or sleepy and often eat less while parents express that they are just not good sleepers.
Now, of course, all babies are different and doing the exact same thing to two different kids can produce different results. The point I am making is there seems to be a similarity with parents who are not capable of letting their own children struggle in bed and cry themselves to sleep in order to sleep train them. Starting at 12 weeks a of age, it usually only takes a couple of nights and once the child realizes the parents are not coming in to pick them up and soothe them in the middle of the night they cry less and less and after a few days whalla, they sleep great and feel great all day. Obviously it is difficult to hear your child cry at night, but if the doctor says they eat enough during the day than stop feeding them at night or they get used to getting up and eating, the same way you as an adult would.
In my situation, our little boy cried for about an hour the first night we did not go in his room, about 20 minutes the second and third nights and the fourth, boom, all night. We had a sleeper. We still soothe him if he just had his shots and if we see his teeth are coming in because there is legitimate pain. Otherwise, get used to staying away so if they do cry for a bit one night you know there may be something wrong as opposed to just being the usual.