I have had one terrible sleeper and one amazing sleeper... And you know what I did differently? Not a damn thing! It is so important to not to judge other parents. Babies are not all the same... By a long shot...
I've been very lucky to have 2 great sleepers...i know this...i credit it to luck and genetics, but i also did a few things that I feel helped. 1) My babies were ALWAYS in their own bed. 2) At bed time, my babies went to their cribs awake. 3) Their bedrooms were cold and dark and my babies wore sleep sacks. 4) If they cried, i would go reassure them every several minutes, but i never picked them up. 5) I used some sort of musical toy in the crib. 6) I stuck to a strict schedule.
One of my favorite doctors talking about one of my favorite topics - WHAT IS HAPPENING!!! Pro tip: You can (and I would encourage you) to use extinction AT BEDTIME without ignoring all wakings throughout the night. Sleep disruption is largely linked to what happens AT bedtime. If your child falls asleep independently AT bedtime, you can still feed baby later in the night without re-establishing the sleep association you used extinction to break out of at bedtime. Why would you do this? Because: - Full adherence to all-night extinction is UNBELIEVABLY stressful for parents - All-night extinction will work but is a pretty crappy way to night wean a baby who is used to eating a lot at night - Nursing moms may want to substantially improve sleep without fully night weaning due to concerns about supply Great video - thanks for sharing!
I sort of mentioned this in other comments but basically here is my thoughts on the process. I did what I felt was easiest on us as parents while still making sure we took care of our daughter and her safety being first concern. This coupled with my stance that I didn't bother fighting with a child that can't talk yet I decided to just go in there and get her back to sleep and sometimes sleep on the floor next to her bed just so I could get back to sleep. This made it easy in the end and I can honestly say I don't think we had a hard time during this period looking back compared to some other people's experience I have seen. This might be because my daughter was a calm baby or could be the fact I just took care of issues and accepted that was what I was going to do till I could communicate with her. Once she got older and understood 'go to bed' or 'no' , I don't remember the exact age, I then decided to ween her off doing stuff by walking in and asking questions then explaining to go to sleep because I need to sleep. Also I found this seems to solve itself a lot because as he said no teenagers are waking up at 2am crying and for that sake no 4-5 year olds I know of are either. This is my 2 cents.
I did the "graduated extinction" with my now 1 year old. I did this after MANY (6 weeks plus) sleepless and teary eyed nights (from both of us). This was my last resort. It was INCREDIBLY stressful for me, but believe it or not, it only took two-three nights!!! That's it! This was around 8 months of age for him.
Wait. It only took two or three nights? I'm not sure that's how graduated extinction works...? I dunno what you were doing beforehand, but it sounded like your kid just wanted a few nights of the opposite, lol.
I keep hearing people say that it worked in only 3 nights for them too. I don't know what we are doing wrong. First night was good, every night after has been pain.
I also had one great sleeper and one stubborn sleeper with horrible separation anxiety. We tried all methods on the second and nothing worked except music! Nursery Rhymes, Lullabies and Ambient music was key. Music calmed him down I found after a week of trying it out. I added music to our nighttime routine while he is in the bath. By the time he was done with bath and in jammies, his eyes were closed for the night.
I went through his and had the same conflict, I can say from my experience I concur with his final thoughts that basically all end to the same outcome so do what you think is best for the best result. I found personally I would prefer to go in there and help my daughter get back to sleep quicker so I could sleep quicker than have her cry for hours while stressed listening to her. The end effect means later she wanted us to come in there more but once she was able to understand reason I could explain 'no' and expect she didn't sit there and cry. Basically we offput the hassle of trying to solve it till she could understand words. I liked this for us and would do it again if I had another child.
This is what i did. and agree WHY CAUSE STRESS to baby/parent when there is a method that does not cause stress or causes little stress. In my opinion if it FEELS wrong, don't do it. I personally could not NOT go to my baby/toddler if she is crying in the night or in the day. why does it being at night make a difference??? if they are upset - comfort them.
We coslept. Baby in the bassinet in the room. When they were 7-8months old, we put them in their crib in their own room. It was harder on our son than our daughter, but we let them cry for a few minutes each time, then calmed them back to sleep. They actually learned to go to sleep on their own. Due to house size and my spouse's dangerous tools, all 4 of us are in one room again. The two share a full-size mattress on the floor, and my spouse and I share a queen size on a box spring on the floor. Occasionally, my 19mo son awakes and crawls into bed with us, but while the first few months of solo-sleep were hard, he only wakes scared a night ir two a week and goes right back to sleep. Sometimes, he'll just move his pillow closer to our bed and I'll rub his back, no cuddling needed. And my 3yo daughter wakes with far less nightmares.
I really recommend this teaching for every parent, it works wonders for kids. 16 years ago wanted to learn something new about babies and I got information from a mother and baby magazine. It’s not easy at first but after few day the baby adapt. To date my teenage daughter is very organized with everything and very independent compare to her big sister. Thank you Sir for taking your time and share this information with parents to be and new parents... your video is a gold mine💗
part of the vehemence by some in support of their specific method is that fallacy that if another method is better that makes them bad parents. If what they did might be less than optimal some believe that makes them horrible parents and thus their method must be defended at all costs.
As a father of 3 going on 4, I'm absolutely sick of the kind of judgmentalism (and self-judgmentalism) that we've let grow up around parenting. Parents differ. Not everything different harms.
I believe the strict pure extinction approach HAS been linked to attachment difficulties as children grow up though, or at least that was the latest research five years ago when I was in school. Even if that turns out not to be the case though, extinction makes me cringe because I always worry, "But what if this time the baby is crying because something is actually wrong? Like this time it's not because they're lonely or whatever, it's because there's a spider in their bed that's biting them or something?" I feel like the graduated extinction approach where you at least go in to check that nothing's wrong makes far more sense.
It has been, though the research isn't as good as it could be all around. This video didn't do a particularly good job of summarizing what's out there. This channel's general philosophy has always been: if we can't prove there's a problem, do what you want. I didn't notice this at first, probably because I found myself agreeing with most of it. Once we started to hit topics where I disagreed, the issue became apparent. To me this is a poor method of decision making -- it would be better to make choices based on the balance of probabilities, and a risk-reward assessment, in combination with knowledge of the available research. The research that we have suggests (albeit tangentially) that extinction isn't in line with the benefits of attachment. So my conclusion is that extinction only becomes the best choice when it is psychologically necessary. If you're able to avoid it without causing yourself psychological damage, then it should be avoided, because in those circumstances the potential harms of extinction are far greater than the potential harms of having kids get into a proper sleep cycle a bit later. Even if you come out with a different answer, that's the only logical way of making decisions: How likely are possibilities A and B based on current knowledge and data? What are the harms and benefits of each? Therefore, which has the best risk profile?
Could you share the research linking extinction with attachment disorders? Because I've spent an enormous amount of time digging into this issue and have found nothing that remotely suggests that. Thus I haven't seen the research that suggests extinction is not in line with attachment. Nor that there is any risk of psychological damage. There is however ample evidence that it's effective. There is also strong evidence that severe chronic sleep deprivation is linked to PPD. And that PPD impedes parental emotional responsiveness. So it's not just a figure of sleep to say that sleep training makes us better parents. My experience is that visits or checks (a la Ferber) exacerbate the crying significantly. So if your goal is minimal crying (and really, it always is) visits aren't helping.
You're totally right. I think that because this channel is aimed at a general population, it only points out things that we have strong evidence behind it and deliberately chooses to not go into the nuance of different benefits and risk analysis. Which most of the time is fine because they choose things we have strong evidence for or against it, which is not the case in this video. And as someone point it out in the comments, parenting is extra tricky because of all the judging and self-judging of what it means to be a good parent, as so some people swear this method is the right one and other people that that method is the right one, etc.
I don't have time to provide a full analysis. But just to give you a couple of random examples... We know that attachment leads to positive social outcomes, and that stress and attachment are related: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10749084 We also know that (contrary to what this video claims) cry-it-out methods do increase immediate levels of stress hormones. Generally, studies that measured these hormones during or immediately after found elevated levels: Middlemiss, W., Granger, D. A., Goldberg, W. A., & Nathans, L. (2012). Asynchrony of mother-infant hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity following extinction of infant crying responses induced during the transition to sleep. Early Human Development, 88, 227-232. Note, these are not the best studies. Just two random studies I could find inside a few minutes. There are many studies on these topics, though frankly I'm yet to see a truly excellent one supporting either side. I did a full informal literature review of this topic a couple of years ago, but didn't keep referenced notes since it was just for personal curiosity. Sorry about that. Studies that I've seen which found no change in stress hormone always used dubious procedures like measuring it the next morning, and using that to claim there was no continuous effect (and that somehow it therefore can't be a problem). Here are some review pieces to read with references. If you dig into those references, and then dig into what those pieces themselves reference, that would be a good place to start. my.vanderbilt.edu/developmentalpsychologyblog/2014/05/the-ferber-method-gain-sleep-now-but-lose-sleep-later/ www.parentingscience.com/Ferber-method.html www.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201407/parents-misled-cry-it-out-sleep-training-reports For what it's worth though, it's highly likely that if a parent is suffering from or at elevated risk of PPD, then any harms of sleep training will be outweighed. Every individual situation may lead to a different risk-benefit analysis. However, that doesn't mean we should be making cry-it-out standard. Even if we look at something with clear and proven benefits like breastfeeding: we know it should always be the goal, but that doesn't mean it's going to work for everyone. The psychological state of the parents is a big deal and must be a factor in any decision. This is more about figuring out whether there is an ideal that should be encouraged.
Also, side note: "My experience is that visits or checks (a la Ferber) exacerbate the crying significantly. " I've read books and literature which directly contradict this. Breastfed babies with responsive parents cry less, because they don't need to. This is especially prevalent in studies of co-sleeping behaviors. www.parentingscience.com/infant-crying.html
I've always loved Crash Course and Healthcare Triage, but am a new working mom to a 10 month old, and thank you for making this video. It has been keeping me up at night (sometimes the baby and sometimes my own worries) that stress would negatively impact my daughter or that I'm spoiling or stunting my daughters brain growth. This helped me put it all into perspective, and as a sleep derived parent I needed to hear it.
Thank you for this informative video! Perhaps in a future video, you can discuss age appropriateness of each method and what can be considered realistic for healthy parent expectations.
I don’t know about you but every child I have cared for has a different cry for something is wrong and I’m just crying. Plus with all the child monitoring systems available I have never had issues with stress when baby cries before bed. My rules are communication, preparation, habit, and consistency. One baby just needed to be told that it was time and have three books read. Another cried until self soothing kicked in. Another played quietly until falling asleep with stuffed toy. Another bottle fed until asleep.
None of this worked for my daughter, but serious sleep issues run in my family. I remember not being able to sleep all night as early as 5 years old. My little sister was born soon after, and my parents were so surprised at how soon she "slept through the night." She didn't. My room was next to hers, and I would go (quietly) sing to her until she went back to sleep. My daughter is 21 now, and her sleep issues are worse than ever. Trying to get a doctor to take it seriously is maddening. They all seem to believe that sleep hygiene is a magical ceremony that always works, and won't even consider sending her for a sleep study or trying actual meds to help her sleep that aren't antidepressants (those make her nuts, and she doesn't have any mental illness. The drugs _cause_ her to have mental illness-like symptoms).
Sleep training is one of the hardest things to do if your little one doesn't want to go to bed - luckily my cub was quick to learn but really was trying when he cried for me
What about just bringing the baby into your bed? Because as you stated, I know of very few teens that sleep in their parents beds. The key to early parenting is get everyone some sleep, by any means necessary. It's only temporary!
My biggest concern with extinction would be, that I might be ignoring a serious issue or pain. If it were my child I wouldn't be comfortable doing that, even if it were a relatively tiny risk. A baby is helpless. I couldn't ignore it. But then, that's why I'm not having children. Too many tiny risks like that!
I have found in my experience in having two kids now 6 and 8 years of age in reducing the stress of bed time and staying asleep is having a regular schedule of afternoon naps. Not for the kids but the parent. My personal studies have shown that a routine of daily naps for even ten minutes day can greatly reduced the stress and long term trama of realizing no matter what you do the baby is going to sleep when it wants to sleep and be awake when ever it it lest convenient for its parental unit.
Not sure if it was, but if that last blank space was intentional, that was brilliant. Like, "Go to sleep, it's okay." Kind of like the end of that episode of "Off the Air", Nightmares.
I heard that there was something called sleep training. It is supposed to help your baby to get on the right schedule when it comes to sleeping. I want to know if anyone has heard about this.
My parents have tried all of these methods and they still can't get me to go to sleep. They haven't yet figured out that the "sticky" door hinges have actually been fitted with generators. SOON, THE BABIES WILL RISE.
Being non-parent and a college student I have plenty of time to decide which of these methods to use when having a child down the road. I can see the benefits in most of the approaches. With that being said, I too cringe at the thought of using the extinction method. I have recently taken a child psychology course where we have talked about how the pure extinction approach has been linked to attachment difficulties as a child. But like others have commented the risk of a serious issue occurring. Even if I chose this option in the first place I doubt that I would be able to follow through and I would end up making things worse. The approach that I found to be most appealing was graduate extinction. Even with this option of gradually increasing the time each night before entering the room and not picking up for comforting I think I will still find it incredibly stressful.
We were recommended "Graduated Extinction" (or the Ferber Method) by my pediatrician, but no one told us what to do when we got into the room - how long to be in there, etc. It's been two weeks and our 6 month old isn't sleeping through the night yet. The first night we used the method was great; after only three cycles she slept until 6am (started sleep routine at 8:30pm), but nights after that we had bad night after night. Once we got to 15 minute intervals, she lost her voice, crying for what felt like 3 hrs straight. We stopped.
You mentioned one *small* study that said there appeared to be no long term effects of the interventions used. Are there any more corroborating studies on the issue, or is this something that might need further research to replicate the results? I'm interested because my fiancée believes very much in always responding and coslept with her first child. Of particular concern to her was a study that appeared to show that infants who were left to "cry it out" appeared to have less oxygen delivered to their brains, and thus brain damage was a concern. Was there any basis for this?
I was saddened by the fact that you made no mention of the AGE OF THE BABY when using the methods or the ages of the babies in the studies. To me that is a HUGE importance.
At a certain age baby has no WORDS to tell you WHY it has woken up - maybe it is cold/hot/wet nappy/needs to know you havn't abandoned it..... and even when the do have WORDS to tell you, they don't have the ability to 'fix' those problems themselves and so will need to call out for parental help.
I agree but most babies don't talk much either, they might but not really much until they become toddlers at 2. I assume most of this is the first year and maybe a little of the second when they stop having the crazy newborn sleep schedule.
What about letting babies sleep in the same room as their parents? We did that with our kids, and it worked pretty well. Because our bed is only a couple of feet away from the baby's bed, we can easily sooth them, often without needing to get up ourselves. Is there any data on how that sort of arrangement compare in effectiveness with the methods described in the video?
Are we talking about infants or about toddlers and children? Because of course you should take care of your infant, once they are old enough to start understanding that crying doesnt earn them anything, like when they start acting independently, walking around and such, then you can show that crying doesnt earn them special treatment, and if the behavior continues up until they start learning speech, then you can LITERALLY explain to them that crying doesnt earn them anything, and start modifying their behavior that way. Granted, no one wants to wait three years for their baby to stop crying, but if its walking and talking, babies crying shouldnt be an issue. Ive always considered treating babies like PEOPLE instead of coddled objects of affection, is better, giving them the respect and teaching they deserve rather than wiping them under the rug.
Extinction (Called something else at the time - Controlled Crying maybe?) Did this as a parent, knowing it was best for all concerned - and it took about three nights. Though I did go in and check but no more. Didn't find it particularly hard either (though the mother did) as it was a short term pain for a very long term gain *for the child*.
Graduated extinction is amazing when you're on the other end of it, but in the thick of it, it's torture! The thing that helped me was reading a small study that came out of Australia that showed there was zero cognitive difference between kindergarteners who were sleep trained vs. no sleep training. But there was a real difference with the mothers having more signs of depression for babies not sleep trained. But when your kid is screaming their head off, all you think is that they will grow up emotionally disturbed, you're a failure as a parent, and every worse case scenario you can think of. It's awful. I can see why people don't do it, but on the other end of two weeks of living hell is SANITY! I had so many times I had playdates over my house, and it was nap time, and my mommy friends were shocked I just set my kid down in their crib and they're happy to fall asleep on their own.
The problem is lack of good evidence on long-term psychological impacts. And no, age 5 isn't long term. Not knowing doesn't mean something is okay by default. It's highly likely that there are some differences and impacts, even if we don't know what they are. Here's a referenced review piece critiquing the media's apologetic approach to these topics, and improper interpretation of the research (some of which this video is guilty of): www.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201407/parents-misled-cry-it-out-sleep-training-reports
Agreed, I was surprised he didn't make any comment on the potential impact on attachment behaviours later in life. No they're never entirely causal to future problems, but they certainly contribute to the challenges faced by all parents in managing their children's behaviour appropriately.
I mean, there could be so, so, SO many other things that could influence the outcome...how would you even control for that? That study sounds like it would be impossible to draw conclusions.
That's the problem with social and psychological research in general. Pinning down causation can be incredibly difficult. Of course that doesn't mean we shouldn't try, and it also doesn't mean that a practice can be assumed to be harmless.
I feel like Darcia Narvaez is simply unwilling to believe the research and instead of do any real peer reviewed research to show them to be incorrect. Her attack on “Behavioral Treatment of Bedtime Problems and Night Wakings in Infants and Young Children: An Academy of Sleep Medicine Review.”, is almost certainly intentionally miss leading. She dismisses 42 studies because she claims them to have "poor data" as they are only up to a Level 3 AASM sleep monitors level. While she dismissal claims seem reasonable, it is only because she omits what there levels mean. Level 1, top, is ONLY perform in-laboratory testing, this is likely the WORST way to test Bedtime Problems, Level 2 is a comprehensive portable devices that monitors a large range of sleep patterns, Level 3 and 4 are still monitored, but with a devices. She did not explain the fact that this was JUST about the way that sleep was monitored and suggested that any infant study about sleep that does not have a high end sleep monitoring device is "poor data". That is BS. I most assume she knew it is BS and intentionally did not explain why she though the level of sleep monitoring device was critical and why lower level sleep monitoring devices gave poor data. cdn.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201407/child-sleep-training-s-best-review-research clevemed.com/cms-aasm-guidelines-for-sleep-monitors-type-i-type-ii-type-iii/
The grasp reflex present in the first 5-6 months of life, is a token of our primate nature; babies cling on to their caregiver and even sleep while being carried. Mammal babies aren't left alone too long, and they have a natural fear of being separated from a caregiver, as they are vulnerable to predators and the elements. Why do babies and kids cry and wake up and beg to be in bed with their parents? Because they're biologically programmed to want that, to sleep on comforting piles of warm bodies. Full regression is not my recommendation; that would be the naturalistic fallacy. However, fully denying nature altogether and dismissing it as irrelevant is as stupid as it is risky. As Carl Sagan said it, of course kids see monsters in the darkness when they're trapped on their own in a dark room. How many decades of research will we need to understand the obvious? Very disappointed in the lack of evolutionary, developmental, and psychological aspects of this conversation. I guess it's like circumcision; we'll have to wait some more before common sense catches up with the remnants of thousands of years of self-hating culture.
When I was 7 I would wake up at 2 am and wait in the bathroom until the time I was allowed to go downstairs, which was 6 am. Now I am always tired no matter how long I sleep. I don't know if they are related.
Have you spoken with a physician about the problems you have? You said you don't know if they are related which suggests you haven't researched it yourself or discussed it with someone that might be able to research it for you. What I can say is that being tired has to do with both the amount and the QUALITY of your sleep. Your life might not cooperate with spending more time in bed, but you can normally do something about noise, light, and temperature influences. You can also address proper positioning with good support which improves quality of sleep because it lets you breathe easily despite the slower respiration rate and it avoids discomfort/pain which may disrupt your rest.
I have looked into it and seen doctors and had blood tests. No luck. I am a very light sleeper so any light or noise can wake me up, but even without that I'm still tired. It's better but I still feel my mind fading when I have to focus on things. Nice of you to care though.
From a non-parent standpoint, and after asking my own parents I was not coddled as a infant/baby and I believe that children that are this young should not be coddled either. Granted they should be checked on in case something is wrong (Falling out of crib, diaper change, etc.) but other then those afore mentioned issues, the infant should be left alone to self-sooth just as I was a child. Coddling an infant could lead to continued hand-holding into there later childhood years which, in my opinion, will not benefit them as adults. Children who self-sooth, and aren't coddled throughout their childhood have the interpersonal and life skills to succeed in the work force and or college.
On a firm surface like a bed with a mother who is breastfeeding and is not under the influence of drugs or alcohol babies are not crushed by their mother the risk is that they are suffocated by pillows or other soft bedding which is why cosleeping on a couch or very soft surface is an extremely bad idea babies can slip between the cushions and suffocate. There's also a risk of babies falling out of bed. The general recommendation is that babies should sleep on their own surface near their parent, for the sake of parents convenience within arms reach is best and there are cots and cradles specifically designed to go right beside the parent so that night time feeds are pull baby out of cot, feed, put baby back all without getting out of bed. The Red Nose foundation specifically deals with SIDS and has guidelines for safe co-sleeping rednose.org.au/article/sharing-a-sleep-surface-with-a-baby
Not unless you are drunk, high or morbidly obese. Those three things dramatically increase the chances of something bad happening. Otherwise it's safe. And awesome, btw.
There's plenty of studies about it, I'm disappointed it wasn't discussed as an option (co-sleeping and then transferring to their own bed when they start sleeping through the night). We've done it for our first and are in the process for our second and it's been great. There certainly are rougher nights (which are unavoidable no matter the method used), but it's very important to my wife and I that our kids feel like we're always available to them and our love and affection is never withheld when they're upset. Being there for your child and showing them love to help them sleep isn't "giving in". If they're happy and comforted by you then they'll fall asleep and they grow to rely on it less over time on their own (at least in my experience with my kids).
I always figured we could run nursing homes in the cry-it-out method. Change them, put them in a diaper, give them a drink and then lock them in their rooms for 12 hours no matter what. I mean, they have no more needs than an infant and they definitely should have learned to self-soothe by then.
Would you go to another family member EG your husband or teenager if you heard them crying in the night? why not give the same respect/caring attitude to your baby/toddler????? no other animals won't go to a crying baby - why do we mother who go to our crying baby get shat on???
Doom and gloom! Please, new parents, it may not be so bad! 'anguishing over one thought: “I’m never going to be well rested again”.' There's a problem starting right there. I'm sure many parents have lack of sleep problems, but they're not inevitable, and, in my admittedly limited experience, can be *caused* by over-anxious parents. Anxiety is not good for sleep! I'd expect that solutions are as much about treating the parents as the children.
This is so disgusting. These methods have been proven to be psychologically detrimental to infants. You're not teaching your infant to "self-soothe". You're teaching them that they're going to be ignored whenever they cry out for you. You're teaching them that they're being neglected. Even if you know that "nothing is wrong with them, they're just wanting me", you're still neglecting their emotional needs.
I have had one terrible sleeper and one amazing sleeper... And you know what I did differently? Not a damn thing! It is so important to not to judge other parents. Babies are not all the same... By a long shot...
I've been very lucky to have 2 great sleepers...i know this...i credit it to luck and genetics, but i also did a few things that I feel helped. 1) My babies were ALWAYS in their own bed. 2) At bed time, my babies went to their cribs awake. 3) Their bedrooms were cold and dark and my babies wore sleep sacks. 4) If they cried, i would go reassure them every several minutes, but i never picked them up. 5) I used some sort of musical toy in the crib. 6) I stuck to a strict schedule.
My babies are 7 years apart and my routine worked on both of them. I hope this can help someone!
One of my favorite doctors talking about one of my favorite topics - WHAT IS HAPPENING!!!
Pro tip: You can (and I would encourage you) to use extinction AT BEDTIME without ignoring all wakings throughout the night. Sleep disruption is largely linked to what happens AT bedtime. If your child falls asleep independently AT bedtime, you can still feed baby later in the night without re-establishing the sleep association you used extinction to break out of at bedtime. Why would you do this? Because:
- Full adherence to all-night extinction is UNBELIEVABLY stressful for parents
- All-night extinction will work but is a pretty crappy way to night wean a baby who is used to eating a lot at night
- Nursing moms may want to substantially improve sleep without fully night weaning due to concerns about supply
Great video - thanks for sharing!
These methods do not work in apartments. We have neighbors.
Then use a b-ball gag or chloroform
I sort of mentioned this in other comments but basically here is my thoughts on the process. I did what I felt was easiest on us as parents while still making sure we took care of our daughter and her safety being first concern. This coupled with my stance that I didn't bother fighting with a child that can't talk yet I decided to just go in there and get her back to sleep and sometimes sleep on the floor next to her bed just so I could get back to sleep. This made it easy in the end and I can honestly say I don't think we had a hard time during this period looking back compared to some other people's experience I have seen. This might be because my daughter was a calm baby or could be the fact I just took care of issues and accepted that was what I was going to do till I could communicate with her. Once she got older and understood 'go to bed' or 'no' , I don't remember the exact age, I then decided to ween her off doing stuff by walking in and asking questions then explaining to go to sleep because I need to sleep. Also I found this seems to solve itself a lot because as he said no teenagers are waking up at 2am crying and for that sake no 4-5 year olds I know of are either. This is my 2 cents.
I did the "graduated extinction" with my now 1 year old. I did this after MANY (6 weeks plus) sleepless and teary eyed nights (from both of us). This was my last resort. It was INCREDIBLY stressful for me, but believe it or not, it only took two-three nights!!! That's it! This was around 8 months of age for him.
We did graduated extinction, too. It worked reasonably well (at night). And he's still as snuggly as ever.
Wait. It only took two or three nights? I'm not sure that's how graduated extinction works...?
I dunno what you were doing beforehand, but it sounded like your kid just wanted a few nights of the opposite, lol.
Guy Boo Seriously! Only two or three nights! I promise you! I didn't think it would work as quickly as it did, but it certainly did!
I keep hearing people say that it worked in only 3 nights for them too. I don't know what we are doing wrong. First night was good, every night after has been pain.
I’m going to try this tonight with my 5 week old
Listen to your doctor and your instincts and then do what's best for your family. Don't let anyone shame you and don't shame anyone else.
Don't let anyone shame you and don't shame anyone else. If only all of the parenting media world could hear and understand this.
I also had one great sleeper and one stubborn sleeper with horrible separation anxiety. We tried all methods on the second and nothing worked except music! Nursery Rhymes, Lullabies and Ambient music was key. Music calmed him down I found after a week of trying it out. I added music to our nighttime routine while he is in the bath. By the time he was done with bath and in jammies, his eyes were closed for the night.
As an expecting father, I found this very informative! Thank you!
ditto
I went through his and had the same conflict, I can say from my experience I concur with his final thoughts that basically all end to the same outcome so do what you think is best for the best result. I found personally I would prefer to go in there and help my daughter get back to sleep quicker so I could sleep quicker than have her cry for hours while stressed listening to her. The end effect means later she wanted us to come in there more but once she was able to understand reason I could explain 'no' and expect she didn't sit there and cry. Basically we offput the hassle of trying to solve it till she could understand words. I liked this for us and would do it again if I had another child.
Good luck. In the immortal words of Red Green, "I'm pulling for you, and we're all in this together."
This is what i did. and agree WHY CAUSE STRESS to baby/parent when there is a method that does not cause stress or causes little stress. In my opinion if it FEELS wrong, don't do it. I personally could not NOT go to my baby/toddler if she is crying in the night or in the day. why does it being at night make a difference??? if they are upset - comfort them.
I'm also expecting ................. a large pepperoni pizza. They said 30 minutes ..... It's been 35 and I'm getting worried
We coslept. Baby in the bassinet in the room. When they were 7-8months old, we put them in their crib in their own room. It was harder on our son than our daughter, but we let them cry for a few minutes each time, then calmed them back to sleep. They actually learned to go to sleep on their own. Due to house size and my spouse's dangerous tools, all 4 of us are in one room again. The two share a full-size mattress on the floor, and my spouse and I share a queen size on a box spring on the floor. Occasionally, my 19mo son awakes and crawls into bed with us, but while the first few months of solo-sleep were hard, he only wakes scared a night ir two a week and goes right back to sleep. Sometimes, he'll just move his pillow closer to our bed and I'll rub his back, no cuddling needed. And my 3yo daughter wakes with far less nightmares.
I really recommend this teaching for every parent, it works wonders for kids. 16 years ago wanted to learn something new about babies and I got information from a mother and baby magazine. It’s not easy at first but after few day the baby adapt. To date my teenage daughter is very organized with everything and very independent compare to her big sister.
Thank you Sir for taking your time and share this information with parents to be and new parents... your video is a gold mine💗
part of the vehemence by some in support of their specific method is that fallacy that if another method is better that makes them bad parents.
If what they did might be less than optimal some believe that makes them horrible parents and thus their method must be defended at all costs.
As a father of 3 going on 4, I'm absolutely sick of the kind of judgmentalism (and self-judgmentalism) that we've let grow up around parenting. Parents differ. Not everything different harms.
I agree and want to add: children differ as well!
Not everything works for every child.
I believe the strict pure extinction approach HAS been linked to attachment difficulties as children grow up though, or at least that was the latest research five years ago when I was in school. Even if that turns out not to be the case though, extinction makes me cringe because I always worry, "But what if this time the baby is crying because something is actually wrong? Like this time it's not because they're lonely or whatever, it's because there's a spider in their bed that's biting them or something?" I feel like the graduated extinction approach where you at least go in to check that nothing's wrong makes far more sense.
It has been, though the research isn't as good as it could be all around. This video didn't do a particularly good job of summarizing what's out there.
This channel's general philosophy has always been: if we can't prove there's a problem, do what you want. I didn't notice this at first, probably because I found myself agreeing with most of it. Once we started to hit topics where I disagreed, the issue became apparent.
To me this is a poor method of decision making -- it would be better to make choices based on the balance of probabilities, and a risk-reward assessment, in combination with knowledge of the available research.
The research that we have suggests (albeit tangentially) that extinction isn't in line with the benefits of attachment. So my conclusion is that extinction only becomes the best choice when it is psychologically necessary. If you're able to avoid it without causing yourself psychological damage, then it should be avoided, because in those circumstances the potential harms of extinction are far greater than the potential harms of having kids get into a proper sleep cycle a bit later.
Even if you come out with a different answer, that's the only logical way of making decisions: How likely are possibilities A and B based on current knowledge and data? What are the harms and benefits of each? Therefore, which has the best risk profile?
Could you share the research linking extinction with attachment disorders? Because I've spent an enormous amount of time digging into this issue and have found nothing that remotely suggests that.
Thus I haven't seen the research that suggests extinction is not in line with attachment. Nor that there is any risk of psychological damage. There is however ample evidence that it's effective. There is also strong evidence that severe chronic sleep deprivation is linked to PPD. And that PPD impedes parental emotional responsiveness. So it's not just a figure of sleep to say that sleep training makes us better parents.
My experience is that visits or checks (a la Ferber) exacerbate the crying significantly. So if your goal is minimal crying (and really, it always is) visits aren't helping.
You're totally right. I think that because this channel is aimed at a general population, it only points out things that we have strong evidence behind it and deliberately chooses to not go into the nuance of different benefits and risk analysis. Which most of the time is fine because they choose things we have strong evidence for or against it, which is not the case in this video.
And as someone point it out in the comments, parenting is extra tricky because of all the judging and self-judging of what it means to be a good parent, as so some people swear this method is the right one and other people that that method is the right one, etc.
I don't have time to provide a full analysis. But just to give you a couple of random examples...
We know that attachment leads to positive social outcomes, and that stress and attachment are related:
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10749084
We also know that (contrary to what this video claims) cry-it-out methods do increase immediate levels of stress hormones. Generally, studies that measured these hormones during or immediately after found elevated levels:
Middlemiss, W., Granger, D. A., Goldberg, W. A., & Nathans, L. (2012). Asynchrony of mother-infant hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis activity following extinction of infant crying responses induced during the transition to sleep. Early Human Development, 88, 227-232.
Note, these are not the best studies. Just two random studies I could find inside a few minutes. There are many studies on these topics, though frankly I'm yet to see a truly excellent one supporting either side. I did a full informal literature review of this topic a couple of years ago, but didn't keep referenced notes since it was just for personal curiosity. Sorry about that.
Studies that I've seen which found no change in stress hormone always used dubious procedures like measuring it the next morning, and using that to claim there was no continuous effect (and that somehow it therefore can't be a problem).
Here are some review pieces to read with references. If you dig into those references, and then dig into what those pieces themselves reference, that would be a good place to start.
my.vanderbilt.edu/developmentalpsychologyblog/2014/05/the-ferber-method-gain-sleep-now-but-lose-sleep-later/
www.parentingscience.com/Ferber-method.html
www.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201407/parents-misled-cry-it-out-sleep-training-reports
For what it's worth though, it's highly likely that if a parent is suffering from or at elevated risk of PPD, then any harms of sleep training will be outweighed. Every individual situation may lead to a different risk-benefit analysis. However, that doesn't mean we should be making cry-it-out standard.
Even if we look at something with clear and proven benefits like breastfeeding: we know it should always be the goal, but that doesn't mean it's going to work for everyone. The psychological state of the parents is a big deal and must be a factor in any decision. This is more about figuring out whether there is an ideal that should be encouraged.
Also, side note:
"My experience is that visits or checks (a la Ferber) exacerbate the crying significantly. "
I've read books and literature which directly contradict this. Breastfed babies with responsive parents cry less, because they don't need to. This is especially prevalent in studies of co-sleeping behaviors.
www.parentingscience.com/infant-crying.html
I've always loved Crash Course and Healthcare Triage, but am a new working mom to a 10 month old, and thank you for making this video. It has been keeping me up at night (sometimes the baby and sometimes my own worries) that stress would negatively impact my daughter or that I'm spoiling or stunting my daughters brain growth. This helped me put it all into perspective, and as a sleep derived parent I needed to hear it.
Thank you for this informative video! Perhaps in a future video, you can discuss age appropriateness of each method and what can be considered realistic for healthy parent expectations.
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The dad not getting any sleep?! Yeah right! 🙄
My husband gets tons of sleep, I’m the one who doesn’t sleep!
I don’t know about you but every child I have cared for has a different cry for something is wrong and I’m just crying. Plus with all the child monitoring systems available I have never had issues with stress when baby cries before bed. My rules are communication, preparation, habit, and consistency. One baby just needed to be told that it was time and have three books read. Another cried until self soothing kicked in. Another played quietly until falling asleep with stuffed toy. Another bottle fed until asleep.
None of this worked for my daughter, but serious sleep issues run in my family. I remember not being able to sleep all night as early as 5 years old. My little sister was born soon after, and my parents were so surprised at how soon she "slept through the night." She didn't. My room was next to hers, and I would go (quietly) sing to her until she went back to sleep. My daughter is 21 now, and her sleep issues are worse than ever. Trying to get a doctor to take it seriously is maddening. They all seem to believe that sleep hygiene is a magical ceremony that always works, and won't even consider sending her for a sleep study or trying actual meds to help her sleep that aren't antidepressants (those make her nuts, and she doesn't have any mental illness. The drugs _cause_ her to have mental illness-like symptoms).
Sleep training is one of the hardest things to do if your little one doesn't want to go to bed - luckily my cub was quick to learn but really was trying when he cried for me
What about just bringing the baby into your bed? Because as you stated, I know of very few teens that sleep in their parents beds.
The key to early parenting is get everyone some sleep, by any means necessary. It's only temporary!
Pfft, obviously in the pocket of big baby.
"In The Pocket Of Big Baby" is the name of my polka-punk band.
genius
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Thank you for this! New father and my wife and I needed this info.
My biggest concern with extinction would be, that I might be ignoring a serious issue or pain. If it were my child I wouldn't be comfortable doing that, even if it were a relatively tiny risk. A baby is helpless. I couldn't ignore it. But then, that's why I'm not having children. Too many tiny risks like that!
I have found in my experience in having two kids now 6 and 8 years of age in reducing the stress of bed time and staying asleep is having a regular schedule of afternoon naps. Not for the kids but the parent. My personal studies have shown that a routine of daily naps for even ten minutes day can greatly reduced the stress and long term trama of realizing no matter what you do the baby is going to sleep when it wants to sleep and be awake when ever it it lest convenient for its parental unit.
Not sure if it was, but if that last blank space was intentional, that was brilliant. Like, "Go to sleep, it's okay." Kind of like the end of that episode of "Off the Air", Nightmares.
I heard that there was something called sleep training. It is supposed to help your baby to get on the right schedule when it comes to sleeping. I want to know if anyone has heard about this.
A great review of different options to help parents get their baby sleeping. Thanks so much for sharing! :)
My parents have tried all of these methods and they still can't get me to go to sleep.
They haven't yet figured out that the "sticky" door hinges have actually been fitted with generators.
SOON, THE BABIES WILL RISE.
Being non-parent and a college student I have plenty of time to decide which of these methods to use when having a child down the road. I can see the benefits in most of the approaches. With that being said, I too cringe at the thought of using the extinction method. I have recently taken a child psychology course where we have talked about how the pure extinction approach has been linked to attachment difficulties as a child. But like others have commented the risk of a serious issue occurring. Even if I chose this option in the first place I doubt that I would be able to follow through and I would end up making things worse. The approach that I found to be most appealing was graduate extinction. Even with this option of gradually increasing the time each night before entering the room and not picking up for comforting I think I will still find it incredibly stressful.
We were recommended "Graduated Extinction" (or the Ferber Method) by my pediatrician, but no one told us what to do when we got into the room - how long to be in there, etc.
It's been two weeks and our 6 month old isn't sleeping through the night yet.
The first night we used the method was great; after only three cycles she slept until 6am (started sleep routine at 8:30pm), but nights after that we had bad night after night. Once we got to 15 minute intervals, she lost her voice, crying for what felt like 3 hrs straight. We stopped.
Is the blackout at 6:04 one of the interventions in the study?
You mentioned one *small* study that said there appeared to be no long term effects of the interventions used. Are there any more corroborating studies on the issue, or is this something that might need further research to replicate the results?
I'm interested because my fiancée believes very much in always responding and coslept with her first child. Of particular concern to her was a study that appeared to show that infants who were left to "cry it out" appeared to have less oxygen delivered to their brains, and thus brain damage was a concern. Was there any basis for this?
Please, just don't let your Baby cry...
I was saddened by the fact that you made no mention of the AGE OF THE BABY when using the methods or the ages of the babies in the studies. To me that is a HUGE importance.
At a certain age baby has no WORDS to tell you WHY it has woken up - maybe it is cold/hot/wet nappy/needs to know you havn't abandoned it..... and even when the do have WORDS to tell you, they don't have the ability to 'fix' those problems themselves and so will need to call out for parental help.
I agree but most babies don't talk much either, they might but not really much until they become toddlers at 2. I assume most of this is the first year and maybe a little of the second when they stop having the crazy newborn sleep schedule.
What about letting babies sleep in the same room as their parents? We did that with our kids, and it worked pretty well. Because our bed is only a couple of feet away from the baby's bed, we can easily sooth them, often without needing to get up ourselves. Is there any data on how that sort of arrangement compare in effectiveness with the methods described in the video?
S O O T H E
THE WORD IS SOOTHE
Are we talking about infants or about toddlers and children?
Because of course you should take care of your infant, once they are old enough to start understanding that crying doesnt earn them anything, like when they start acting independently, walking around and such, then you can show that crying doesnt earn them special treatment, and if the behavior continues up until they start learning speech, then you can LITERALLY explain to them that crying doesnt earn them anything, and start modifying their behavior that way.
Granted, no one wants to wait three years for their baby to stop crying, but if its walking and talking, babies crying shouldnt be an issue.
Ive always considered treating babies like PEOPLE instead of coddled objects of affection, is better, giving them the respect and teaching they deserve rather than wiping them under the rug.
Thanks for the good advice.
Extinction (Called something else at the time - Controlled Crying maybe?)
Did this as a parent, knowing it was best for all concerned - and it took about three nights. Though I did go in and check but no more.
Didn't find it particularly hard either (though the mother did) as it was a short term pain for a very long term gain *for the child*.
How old was the baby when you did it?
Graduated extinction is amazing when you're on the other end of it, but in the thick of it, it's torture! The thing that helped me was reading a small study that came out of Australia that showed there was zero cognitive difference between kindergarteners who were sleep trained vs. no sleep training. But there was a real difference with the mothers having more signs of depression for babies not sleep trained. But when your kid is screaming their head off, all you think is that they will grow up emotionally disturbed, you're a failure as a parent, and every worse case scenario you can think of. It's awful. I can see why people don't do it, but on the other end of two weeks of living hell is SANITY! I had so many times I had playdates over my house, and it was nap time, and my mommy friends were shocked I just set my kid down in their crib and they're happy to fall asleep on their own.
The problem is lack of good evidence on long-term psychological impacts. And no, age 5 isn't long term. Not knowing doesn't mean something is okay by default. It's highly likely that there are some differences and impacts, even if we don't know what they are.
Here's a referenced review piece critiquing the media's apologetic approach to these topics, and improper interpretation of the research (some of which this video is guilty of):
www.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201407/parents-misled-cry-it-out-sleep-training-reports
Agreed, I was surprised he didn't make any comment on the potential impact on attachment behaviours later in life. No they're never entirely causal to future problems, but they certainly contribute to the challenges faced by all parents in managing their children's behaviour appropriately.
nice, thanks.
I mean, there could be so, so, SO many other things that could influence the outcome...how would you even control for that? That study sounds like it would be impossible to draw conclusions.
That's the problem with social and psychological research in general. Pinning down causation can be incredibly difficult. Of course that doesn't mean we shouldn't try, and it also doesn't mean that a practice can be assumed to be harmless.
I feel like Darcia Narvaez is simply unwilling to believe the research and instead of do any real peer reviewed research to show them to be incorrect. Her attack on “Behavioral Treatment of Bedtime Problems and Night Wakings in Infants and Young Children: An Academy of Sleep Medicine Review.”, is almost certainly intentionally miss leading. She dismisses 42 studies because she claims them to have "poor data" as they are only up to a Level 3 AASM sleep monitors level. While she dismissal claims seem reasonable, it is only because she omits what there levels mean. Level 1, top, is ONLY perform in-laboratory testing, this is likely the WORST way to test Bedtime Problems, Level 2 is a comprehensive portable devices that monitors a large range of sleep patterns, Level 3 and 4 are still monitored, but with a devices. She did not explain the fact that this was JUST about the way that sleep was monitored and suggested that any infant study about sleep that does not have a high end sleep monitoring device is "poor data". That is BS. I most assume she knew it is BS and intentionally did not explain why she though the level of sleep monitoring device was critical and why lower level sleep monitoring devices gave poor data.
cdn.psychologytoday.com/blog/moral-landscapes/201407/child-sleep-training-s-best-review-research
clevemed.com/cms-aasm-guidelines-for-sleep-monitors-type-i-type-ii-type-iii/
Great video gave me more than enough information god bless u !
Baby Merlin's Magic Sleepsuit... that's all you need to know!
The grasp reflex present in the first 5-6 months of life, is a token of our primate nature; babies cling on to their caregiver and even sleep while being carried. Mammal babies aren't left alone too long, and they have a natural fear of being separated from a caregiver, as they are vulnerable to predators and the elements. Why do babies and kids cry and wake up and beg to be in bed with their parents? Because they're biologically programmed to want that, to sleep on comforting piles of warm bodies.
Full regression is not my recommendation; that would be the naturalistic fallacy. However, fully denying nature altogether and dismissing it as irrelevant is as stupid as it is risky. As Carl Sagan said it, of course kids see monsters in the darkness when they're trapped on their own in a dark room. How many decades of research will we need to understand the obvious?
Very disappointed in the lack of evolutionary, developmental, and psychological aspects of this conversation.
I guess it's like circumcision; we'll have to wait some more before common sense catches up with the remnants of thousands of years of self-hating culture.
At what age is it safe to begin the graduated extinction method?
When I was 7 I would wake up at 2 am and wait in the bathroom until the time I was allowed to go downstairs, which was 6 am.
Now I am always tired no matter how long I sleep. I don't know if they are related.
Have you spoken with a physician about the problems you have? You said you don't know if they are related which suggests you haven't researched it yourself or discussed it with someone that might be able to research it for you. What I can say is that being tired has to do with both the amount and the QUALITY of your sleep. Your life might not cooperate with spending more time in bed, but you can normally do something about noise, light, and temperature influences. You can also address proper positioning with good support which improves quality of sleep because it lets you breathe easily despite the slower respiration rate and it avoids discomfort/pain which may disrupt your rest.
I have looked into it and seen doctors and had blood tests. No luck. I am a very light sleeper so any light or noise can wake me up, but even without that I'm still tired. It's better but I still feel my mind fading when I have to focus on things.
Nice of you to care though.
From a non-parent standpoint, and after asking my own parents I was not coddled as a infant/baby and I believe that children that are this young should not be coddled either. Granted they should be checked on in case something is wrong (Falling out of crib, diaper change, etc.) but other then those afore mentioned issues, the infant should be left alone to self-sooth just as I was a child. Coddling an infant could lead to continued hand-holding into there later childhood years which, in my opinion, will not benefit them as adults. Children who self-sooth, and aren't coddled throughout their childhood have the interpersonal and life skills to succeed in the work force and or college.
What if you sleep with your baby like it was always done? is there a risk of crushing him to death?
Yes there is. I have a friend that is a policeman in Australia, every year he gets cases of injuries and even deaths.
On a firm surface like a bed with a mother who is breastfeeding and is not under the influence of drugs or alcohol babies are not crushed by their mother the risk is that they are suffocated by pillows or other soft bedding which is why cosleeping on a couch or very soft surface is an extremely bad idea babies can slip between the cushions and suffocate. There's also a risk of babies falling out of bed. The general recommendation is that babies should sleep on their own surface near their parent, for the sake of parents convenience within arms reach is best and there are cots and cradles specifically designed to go right beside the parent so that night time feeds are pull baby out of cot, feed, put baby back all without getting out of bed. The Red Nose foundation specifically deals with SIDS and has guidelines for safe co-sleeping rednose.org.au/article/sharing-a-sleep-surface-with-a-baby
Would it be a bad idea for the parents to sleep with the child until they're old enough to sleep on their own?
Not unless you are drunk, high or morbidly obese. Those three things dramatically increase the chances of something bad happening. Otherwise it's safe. And awesome, btw.
Thank yooooou so much for this
Em maybe sleep with the baby so when they wake up they see you and just go back to sleep
Em no.
co sleeping worked for us.
There's plenty of studies about it, I'm disappointed it wasn't discussed as an option (co-sleeping and then transferring to their own bed when they start sleeping through the night). We've done it for our first and are in the process for our second and it's been great. There certainly are rougher nights (which are unavoidable no matter the method used), but it's very important to my wife and I that our kids feel like we're always available to them and our love and affection is never withheld when they're upset.
Being there for your child and showing them love to help them sleep isn't "giving in". If they're happy and comforted by you then they'll fall asleep and they grow to rely on it less over time on their own (at least in my experience with my kids).
yeah, if you want to stick something in a room and tell it to shut up; *get a dog*
We're social animals. An infant that is left alone for extended periods could experience abandonment symptoms.
yeah how is this not a form of neglect?
I think its a western cultural thing only.
Dylan T It's the idea that you'll spoil the child and then they'll be a needy brat. Which is the opposite of what happens.
I always figured we could run nursing homes in the cry-it-out method. Change them, put them in a diaper, give them a drink and then lock them in their rooms for 12 hours no matter what. I mean, they have no more needs than an infant and they definitely should have learned to self-soothe by then.
Very interesting.
Good stuff here!
6:04 to 6:17 is filled with black nothingness before the outro, is it only me?
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Your make up artist used a little to much bronzer for this video
Well, keeping a baby crying in an apartment is not going to work. We have neighbors on all sides. O_o
Not exactly sure what you're going to do. If the baby cries, he or she cries. Just go through the above methods and do your best.
Jeremy Williams
Well, it's better to comfort the baby ASAP. That way, neighbors don't have to listen to 20 minutes of crying.
Would you go to another family member EG your husband or teenager if you heard them crying in the night? why not give the same respect/caring attitude to your baby/toddler????? no other animals won't go to a crying baby - why do we mother who go to our crying baby get shat on???
thanks, now my kids will kick ass.
Stick it in the crib and let it cry. It’ll be fine.
Doom and gloom! Please, new parents, it may not be so bad! 'anguishing over one thought: “I’m never going to be well rested again”.' There's a problem starting right there. I'm sure many parents have lack of sleep problems, but they're not inevitable, and, in my admittedly limited experience, can be *caused* by over-anxious parents. Anxiety is not good for sleep! I'd expect that solutions are as much about treating the parents as the children.
How to start baby care.(your question)
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Amazing video and advice but check this out 😋
This is so disgusting. These methods have been proven to be psychologically detrimental to infants. You're not teaching your infant to "self-soothe". You're teaching them that they're going to be ignored whenever they cry out for you. You're teaching them that they're being neglected. Even if you know that "nothing is wrong with them, they're just wanting me", you're still neglecting their emotional needs.
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Wrong, someone commented 2 minutes earlier than you ;)