Crying is a sensitive subject and is often the topic of strong debate over social media amongst parents and professionals. I often avoid entering into it as I feel that the topic of crying is a multifaceted one and there is never the perfect answer.

I wanted to write about my personal experience with children who cry when they are learning to sleep independently. I am writing it to provoke thought and discussion, not to add fuel to the fire.

I am regularly asked by concerned parents, “do you use ‘cry-it-out’ methods?” This is a difficult question to answer because one person’s idea of CIO can be completely different to another person’s idea. My response is always this, “when you make changes to any child’s sleep habits there will always be some crying as the experience is different and unfamiliar to them. I use a variety of gentle techniques and will always work within your comfort level of crying.”

Asking parents to work within their own comfort level of crying is important but the main drive of this blog post is to explore not only how parents feel about crying, but also how the child feels about it. I will share with you two very different scenarios that happened recently.

Family 1 – Thomas was 15months old and he was taking a really long time to fall asleep at night. Mum and Dad were very comfortable with leaving Thomas to cry and would leave him for quite some time on his own until he finally fell asleep. Unfortunately after many months of leaving Thomas to cry, there was no reduction in the length it took for him to settle at night. Once I assessed Thomas’ sleep issues, I decided to not only amend his daytime nap to avoid overtiredness at bedtime, but I implemented a strategy where Thomas was offered regular reassurance from his parents as he was falling asleep. Leaving Thomas to cry was not necessarily wrong; it was just the wrong strategy for him.

Family 2- Henry was 8months old and he had many sleep associations that were hindering him becoming an independent sleeper. Henry’s parents were clear that they wanted a very slow and gentle process for him with minimal crying. Taking that on board, I wrote a sleep program where Henry would be offered lots of reassurance (like Thomas), and with very reduced periods of time where Henry was to be left alone to cry. What was interesting was that it became very clear early on that Henry became more upset and hysterical each time his parents tried to reassure him. Henry was telling his parents that he wanted to be left to figure it out for himself. This was a difficult situation for his parents but they soon realised it was important to attend to Henry’s needs the way he wanted it, not necessarily the way they wanted to give it. Once Henry was given some space to figure it out, he began sleeping independently.

Here I have presented two very different scenarios where parents had different comfort levels of crying. It is important to work within YOUR comfort level of crying, but it is essential to use a strategy that is right for your child. What works for one, may not work for another.

So if you are looking at helping your child to sleep independently, it is important that you not only choose a strategy that is perfect for your child, but find a sleep consultant who has a range of techniques because if you try to apply a ‘one size fits all’ approach like many books offer, it often doesn’t work and you end up with a distressed child and frazzled parents.

Janelle Jeffery

Child Sleep Consultant for Sleepytime