The Complete Sleep Guide For Contented Babies and Toddlers

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When I put it to her that her books might be an unconscious attempt to provide her mother with the tools that might have prevented her depression (and her father's departure soon after her birth), she replies: "Yes, yes, I think so. If my mother had had my book, I probably wouldn't be the way I am. I would be a solicitor or something, with three kids, and that would be no bad thing because it is quite difficult being the UK's leading childcare expert and being childless. People do love to have a dig at that." Basically the problem with routines is that they ignore the fact that different babies have different needs on different days. By ignoring this fact the parents are never given the chance to learn to 'read' their baby, understand what each different noise and wiggle means, and react to it (this includes getting it wrong and looking at your crying baby thinking, "What?!?!" - which can be very uncomfortable of course). It takes anywhere from a few days to several weeks for babies to learn to settle themselves to sleep without crying.

Ford was the only child of a single mother, born 42 years ago on a farm in south-east Scotland. Her father left the family soon after her birth, so she and her mother were desperately short of money. "We were so poor we didn't realise we were poor," she says. "To me, working-class people were posh. We were like peasants compared with them." Remember to make sure baby is not hungry when doing this method. This is especially important if you are breastfeeding and putting your child to sleep for the night since some moms have less milk at this time. Fortunately, the farm was a mini-community. "We had my auntie and uncle and my four cousins in the next-door house, and my grandfather lived with us," she says. She also recalls plenty of love in this set-up and does not believe there were tremendous pressures. Nonetheless, all was not well for her mother: "She suffered depression after I was born and, from about two or three months, she was in hospital. None of the family will tell me if it was for six weeks or six months, but we were parted for quite a while and I know for a fact that she never got over that. She suffered from depression and all her life was on tranquillisers. Very sad."When he reaches stage two, where he is settling within 10 minutes for several nights, you should try leaving him to self-settle using the crying down method. It is important to understand that crying down is not the same as controlled crying. Crying down usually lasts around five to ten minutes at which point it will turn into fussing before he drifts off to sleep. It will also help with the self-settling if your baby gets used to being happy in his bed if you put him in it for short spells during the day, when he is fully awake, with a small book or toy to look at, whilst you stay close by, talking and reassuring him.

Gina Ford has come to the rescue with her answer: the key to a good night's sleep for the whole family lies in teaching parents to understand the changing sleep needs of their growing baby. This book informs and reassures parents, dispelling many common myths and anxieties and offering practical solutions that work. The concept of crying down is pretty simple. "Provided a baby has been well fed and is ready to sleep...he should be allowed to settle himself." ( The Complete Sleep Guide, p. 40). What this means is that when baby is ready to sleep (see sleep cues) you do your It took me getting to near 40 and having a severe depression to begin to do what she is doing at 22. Thank goodness she won't have to wait so long to take possession of her own life! Gina Ford (born c. 1960) is a British author of childcare books in the United Kingdom and a former maternity nurse who has cared for over 300 babies during her career. [1] Ford's 1999 book The Contented Little Baby Book advocates a daily routine for both the baby and the parents, with the day divided up into very precise slots.

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However, she also believes that her concern for mothers might reflect a need for love and support for her "reclusive" Howard Hughes-like self. "I suppose I am doing to them what I would love someone to do for me: look after me," she says. "My clients say, 'I must be driving you mad,' and I say, 'Yes, you're driving me mad. I wish I could wake up every day and have Gina Ford looking after me.'" Gina Ford's bestselling The Contented Little Baby Book established Gina as one of the UK's most influential voices in baby and childcare issues. Her groundbreaking routines have been the salvation of hundreds of thousands of parents and her sound advice on weaning and sleep has guaranteed contented little babies in households around the world. Once you have ruled out genuine hunger as a cause, and are ensuring that your baby is well fed, I would advise that you try a solution that I call the ‘assisting to sleep method’. The aim of this method is to get your baby used to sleeping at regular times during naps and in the evening, which will help him to sleep through the night as soon as he is physically able. After genuine hunger and the wrong sleep associations, I find that too much daytime sleep is the most common reason why a baby does not settle in the evening, or wakes frequently during the night. When this happens a vicious circle soon emerges where the baby needs to sleep more during the day because they are not sleeping well at night.