Mommy, Im scared of my bed...or is it my room?

That could be it if she is only waking up crying. She could be waking from nightmares.

every night?
are kids prone to that many nightmares?
poor baby...

Well, I was, but my kids are not. I don't know what's normal.

Do you still have the ghost?

oh yeah. nothing like the furniture tipping, or the 'smoke' in her play room. But it smacks drums in our house, makes the room TERRIBLY cold for a few seconds.. small things like that.
It is pretty cool. ;-)

Do you think maybe she's sensitive to it?

it has crossed my mind, but I doubt it.
it isnt around enough to be a daily 'fear' or discomfort for her.


but it is possible. ?? I cant dismiss that.

When I was a baby I used to cry in my sleep - similar to how many people talk in their sleep.

The landlord lived downstairs from my parents and she would yell at mom for being so cruel and letting me cry in bed. My mom had to explain that I was fast asleep.

I do something like that now as an adult.
I dont snore.. i moan. and loud!
It can be rather.... embarassing at times.

Hehe i can cry in my sleep too... and talk... and shout

I have to add that I am still very confused about the reasons, over the years, for all the emphasis on not picking up the wailing child. All my instincts are against that.

I can see if the child then keeps wailing for another five hours... well, what? something else is going on then. I just don't get not being there in the immediate baby and toddler needs.

I admit not rearing a child myself. I understand the ratcheted up level of unending crying with all it's variety of just sounds and total angst, because I was at my cousins' when they let Jack cry and cry night after night - we were friends more than cousins in those years and I stayed over fairly often in a kind of respite from my own very social life.

I just don't know if I buy the underlying premise about spoiling. Even the last link I gave is more conservative on the picking up than I think I am.

I think it depends on your parenting style. Some parents use structured routine to improve sleep habits and changing that routine because of crying can muck up the works.

Personally I see it the way you do, osso, but I can understand the reasons behind doing it the other way.

They used to let Jack cry til he stopped breathing and turned bluish, upon whence, as is I gather always the case, they just breathe again, just like I did when I was panicked about asthma last year. Still, geeze, it's a baby.

Jack is now approaching 40. A fine man, but he's a fellow with a history of problems, which I won't go on about here.

I am not blaming my cousins, they were and are savvy parents trying their best.

I am wondering if there have been double blind studies on holding versus, cry it out. There must be...

I suppose I should change his name here, in case he or his parents ever look at my posts, which is quite unlikely, but still. I'll name him Jack.

We've tried to chart a middle course. Hold and rock for a while, but then put her down and soothe her in the crib. We don't just let her cry.

Here's a book we found extremely useful: The No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night

I think the issue, at least for me, about not picking up a crying child is that the child becomes accustomed to being soothed by a parent and does not learn how to put himself to sleep. So for example, if a child wakes up in the middle of the night and nothing is wrong, but he can't fall asleep, he may fuss for a while until he gets comfortable and dozy and then will fall asleep again. If a parent rushes in every time this happens, the child will then "need" the parent to be there soothing him in order to fall asleep - basically a learned behavior. However, it is cruel to have a child cry for long periods. You can do a modified version where you periodically check on the child to ensure there is nothing wrong.

To me it is not spoiling the child. It is teaching a child how to fall asleep on his own. Parents teach children how to eat, go the bathroom, dress, etc on their own, children also need to learn to sleep on their own. In addition, a parent also needs a good nights rest in order to be a good parent. If they are getting up every hour during the night to sooth a child, they are not going to be a good parent the next day. You also need to remember that each child is different so the way in which you handle such situations can depend on the child.

All of the above was explained to me by my daughter's doctor. We had issues with one child and no issues with the other - completely different children.

You could almost compare this to the idea that if your child cries and whines to get something and you give it to him, you are rewarding this behavior.

However, that is not really for infants that may need to eat or be changed or need some other attention. It is also not if they are crying for long periods of time where something could be wrong. Basically a parent should attend appropriately - is this simply attention getting or is something wrong or really upsetting the child.

We had more problems with our second child because we were afraid she would wake up the older one with her crying, and so never let her cry. She is now the hardest one to get to sleep. I'm sure there is a happy medium. I would never let either child cry for prolonged periods, certainly not if they were turning blue in which case they obviously aren't learning how to soothe themselves.

Like most of these things (which is part of why it's hard for me to give advice), it varies by child. We never did any kind of cry-it-out with sozlet, at all, and she sleeps just fine now. If she cried, she got attention, throughout. She learned how to fall asleep on her own, all of it.

I completely agree about teaching a child how to fall asleep, but as with DrewDad's link (we have that one too), there are lots of ways to do that that don't involve tolerating crying.

But, the parenting board I mentioned as disliking for being too judgemental was WAY judgemental about this one, so I am careful to not be too strident, as I've seen it work for people and can't bring myself to say it's just 100% wrong for everyone.

I have two children and I tried the middle routine. I have one very good sleeper and one not so good sleeper.

The not so good sleeper though, we first did the no cry routine until we were getting little sleep. The doctor recommended the in between type thing. We did and taught her how to sleep on her own. She is still our difficult sleeper - gets up several times during the night here and there. It may be more her personality as she definitely requires more attention - high maintenance.

The second from the start we had doing the no cry routine (once she slept through the night and after checking to make sure there were no problems). She rarely requires any attention at night - even though both girls share a room and her older sister could be making noise or cry.

As sozobe states is soooo depends on the child. My older, if we were to go to her every time she cried or demanded it - we would be up all night long. She is one stubborn cookie! We had to do the cry routine - then check on, etc., otherwise mom and dad would not get an ounce of sleep. Even sleeping in our bed didn't work as she moved too much and kept us up all night. We tried the no-cry routine first, but with this stubborn girl it was not successful.

Basically, parents need to do what works best for the child and family, however, I cannot imagine letting a child cry hours on end without any attention can be good for anyone.

I have little patience for anyone that can be adamant about one technique only for any child rearing circumstances and be critical of others. Unless you had a child in a certain circumstance with a certain type of personality, you can not fully appreciate the situation. Each child is different and needs to be attended to their needs and personalities. If the no-cry routine worked for us from the start, we would have stayed with it. Unfortunately it was not working - mom, dad, and child were tired and grumpy all day. Fortunately for us, we did find a technique that worked for all of us.

I have seen parents do the cry it out method as well, and I cant fathom it working. I have seen parents completely look the other way and the child crying an abvious ' pain' cry, or 'fear' cry.And then explain that they want thier child to learn to soothe themselves.
But again, diffrent things work for diffrent kids and parents.
With Jillian, I have learned that a little self time helps her. Alot of times she is startled by something that just takes her a second or two to realize it is really ok.
When she wakes up screaming in the morning, I am finally to the point where I dont break my neck racing up the stairs to get to her because I know that is .. just how she wakes up. This doesnt mean that I sit down stairs, finish a cup of coffee.. or the dishes or what have you. I put down what I am doing, if I need to I wash my hands first.. then just go get her. Her screams are not ' emergency' anymore.. they are routine.
I feel that if I respond as if there IS an emergency everytime she howls, she will think that is the only way to get my attention. I want to show her that no matter what is wrong, I will be there. I know there is no problem. I have even gone as far as to sweep out every corner of her room, clean the window sills and other small places to make sure there are no spiders to bite her. Her cries at this point simply mean she is awake. Her discomfort is attended to.. but not with a panicked mother. If I approach her every time she cries, panicked, freaked out and scared myself, she will get to the point that , that reaction is only what comforts her. A neutral happy mom is what I always want to be, so that is what I give her.
In my mind, calm happy smiling mommy is more efficient then the one who is tired from racing up the stairs at break neck speed.
I have never been one for the complete cry it out method. I think in small amounts it can be a VERy effective parenting tool. Like Linkat said.. a little reassurance is perfect. But to step in and do everything for the child creates dependance.
Keeping this mindset is painful for parents. You ALWAYS want to do everything for your child, but learn quickly that it is next to impossible and actually hinders your child from learning how to be thier own person. Night sleeping being a great example . We all wake up at night. We all toss and turn but over the years of life we have learned to get comfortable and get back to sleepon our own. Usually well enough that we dont remember it in the morning.
Kids do the same thing. They toss, turn, wake up etc. My take on it is that , they need a minute to get back to sleep just like I do when I wake up. If I race in there and pick her up, rock her, then she will NEVER get back to sleep because I have just completely woke her up. Make sense?
I started this from the get go. Stayed with her all night in her room when she first started sleeping in her room by herself. Slowly backed away and reduced my ' responce' time. Now she sleeps fine all night long. Doesnt need me to put her back to sleep and sleeps the typical 12 hours a child does at her age. Her screams in the morning really caught me off guard, but have now become 'norm'. The only diffrent thing I do for her is to rock her for a few minutes in the morning to help ease her. I believe that keeping her morning ritual has helped her tons with the morning fear. The amount of time she cries now has reduced dramatically. Even the pitch she had has dropped. I believe it is because I have stuck to her rituals, have not freaked out and have stayed calm during the times she wasnt able to calm herself.
But.. again.. things are diffrent for every child.