There has been quite a lot of contentious debate lately, and a fair bit of name calling, on the topic of Controlled Crying and whether or not it is damaging for the infants and children who are left to cry themselves to sleep at night. Some call it Baby Torture while others call it Salvation and people can’t seem to agree to disagree.
I personally am not an advocate of CC, it makes me cringe, but I’m not going to assume those who do it are negligent parents. Some kids fall asleep within minutes of being put down in their cot and never feel any sense of abandonment (which I think is the parenting equivalent of winning the lottery).
I myself am an AP or, Attachment Parent, which means (in our family) that:
- I baby wear using a sling or pouch;
- breast feed on demand for as long as my child wants to;
- bed share with my children and allow my babies to feed to sleep at night;
- follow the principles of Baby Led Solids;
- make use of cloth nappies to reduce our financial strain and the strain of disposable nappies on the environment;
- parent as gently as possible without yelling, spanking or other physical punishment.
I can’t imagine life any other way.
Unfortunately, several CC parents, in defensive mode, have suggested that Attachment Parenting should be investigated and reported on to see what damage it causes because, surely, if CC causes children to feel abandoned and isolated, AP must make them overly dependent and demanding. It’s complete hogswash obviously, a little immature and reminiscent of antiquated Victorian thinking if I’m brutally honest, but I thought, why not? What are the dangers of Attachment Parenting?
(Sarcasm and Tongue-in-cheek warning! Read on at your own risk!)
One of the biggest dangers of AP is of course that you will become a lazy parent.
Yep, I am a totally lazy parent. Here’s why:
Breastfeeding means no measuring out formula, no sterilizing bottles, no checking water temperature, nothing. You never forget to pack baby’s milk when you leave the house because you aren’t likely to forget your boobs, no matter how badly you’re affected by baby brain.
Bed sharing means you don’t need to get up over night and in the morning you know exactly when your kids have woken up in the morning. You have the excuse to take naps during the day because you feed baby to sleep lying down. With fewer beds in the house there is less bedding to change and wash and you never have to worry about baby being too hot or too cold because your body will help to regulate their temperature.
If you’re out and about when baby gets tired and needs a sleep you don’t have to rush off home because you have your trusty sling in which bubs will happy sleep in for an hour or two which means that your mothering duties don’t have to affect your social life.
And Baby Led Solids means that you don’t have to waste time steaming and pureeing that carrot. All you need to do it cut it into sticks and place it in front of them. (And if they throw it on the floor you just pick it up and give it straight back to them because every baby will tell you - albeit in baby talk - that floor food tastes way better than plate food and highchair food.)
You may end up becoming obsessed with wraps, slings and gorgeous cloth nappies.
This is a serious danger to the bank balance and collecting cloth wraps is particularly addictive. Before long you’ll be finding excuses to put bubs in a sling and may even take up walking as an excuse to show off your mastery of the ruck wrap.
The expensive pram which was bought for you by well-meaning relatives will still be used, of course, to transport shopping at the markets or the towels and buckets at the beach. On days when my back is playing up my daughter actually sits in her pram but likes to have her sling across her legs for reassurance. We had a particularly unfortunate pram once which was converted into a wheelbarrow when we were doing up the backyard. It never fully recovered.
Cloth nappies are similarly dangerous because if you aren’t careful you may find yourself actually enjoying washing and hanging out nappies. From here it’s only a short step to a descent into complete domesticity and you’ll find yourself wearing a pinnie, house slippers and curlers while you cheerfully scrub floors and wash windows. And, because you’ll have your baby, and possibly your toddler too, in wraps on your chest and back, you’ll be able to do it!
(Which will be confusing for you because you are, at the same time, a lazy parent, as explained above.)
You’ll discover that you can have meaningful conversations with the older generation of ladies at church for whom cloth nappies were a way of life and they will be so impressed by your return to ‘The Old Ways’ that before you know it they’ll start bringing casseroles, soups and cakes around to the house and offering to help with the housework!
Your kids run the risk of becoming too independent.
I was warned by many people (mostly people behind me in the check-out line at the super market or at the bus stop) that carrying my baby all the time and not leaving him in a childcare while I went to uni would only make him super clingy and overly dependent on me. I was “pandering” to him, apparently, and that was a bad thing, apparently. In truth, this didn’t bother me. I loved my baby cuddles and the fact that my son never ran off in a car park and actually wanted to hold my hand when crossing the road. I tried to explain to people that he was of a certain disposition and that he needed the reassurance of my presence in order to feel safe. I tried to explain that I had started baby wearing because he required it, rather than because I wanted to stifle his curiosity and prevent him from walking. I tried, in vain, to explain that I didn’t think my son would still be sleeping in my bed when he was a teenager, and that I was sure he would sleep in his own bed one day. Still, I was told a lot that I was doing my son a disservice and that my son was missing out on learning the all important Independence which is apparently the most crucial thing a child can learn these days.
My son was fairly attached to me in the first year or two of his life. He likes to assess a situation before he dives in, and because of his Sensory Processing Disorder he finds it hard to calm down on his own when faced with sensory overload, yet has known instinctively from birth that being held close by someone he trusts will help him settle.
Sadly, when he was about two and half years old he discovered his independence. He chose to sleep in his own bed, chose what he wanted to eat, chose to wean from breastfeeding and chose to leave my side and go off to play with the other children on his own. I have to say I was devastated. He had discovered independence in spite of my efforts and without anyone forcing it upon him. Now he runs everywhere, often while pretending to be an aeroplane, and will only stop if I pretend to be Air Traffic Control giving him permission to land.
I have been informed that this tends to be the way with AP raised kids. They decide for themselves when they are ready to climb out of the sling and then you’d best beware because there will be no stopping them. They can be dangerously independent. They of course know that if they hurt themselves or get scared they can come back to the adults they trust for reassurance but their new found confidence may just mean that you’ll have a hard time stopping them from socialising, exploring and getting up to mischief.
They take their time and make the decision as to when they are ready for independence and it is, therefore, a genuine and joyful independence, which is of course, a dangerous thing (it may lead to independent thought).
You feel the urge to run over and pick up crying babies and cuddle them, especially when their mums seem to be ignoring them.
Once your own kids are busy - one having run off to climb a tree to get a closer look at an interesting beetle, the other to sit under said tree eating bark chips - you will, sadly, be left standing in the playground looking rather lonely and forlorn. You’ll be looking for a small person to cuddle because your single heartbeat is just not enough, not complete without a little one beating in unison against your chest. This may lead you to over-respond to the cries of other people’s babies. You’ll turn at every cry and, if you’re a lactating mum, you’ll probably feel that tell-tale tingle that signals your milk let-down. A baby is crying and your body is telling you to feed it. This is dangerous because, obviously, you can’t run off with other people’s children and, less obviously, because it could lead your child to ask why some mummies and daddies don’t understand that they should carry their kids and feed on demand. While I have learnt to restrain my desire to pick up strangers’ babies my son will, upon hearing a baby cry, rush over and tell the mum to, “give that baby some booby quick!”
And the most dangerous thing of all...
Your child may not fit in with our modern, stressed, self-centered society.
Yup, without the early exposure to stress that CC gives your kids they won’t be acquainted with it and will struggle in competitive classrooms and with their mounds of nightly homework. This is turn leads to dangerous ideas and crazy notions and before you know it you’ll decide that homeschooling is a legitimate option because you now have an independent learner on your hands who doesn’t understand why they should obey adults for no better reason than that they’re older, bigger and uglier. They will be too sensitive and won’t understand that bullying is just a part of life. You may even start to doubt the validity of bullying yourself.
I meet so many AP raised kids who just don’t seem to understand that they should put themselves first. They cart their younger siblings around in pouches and slings - because they want to! - have an over-developed sense of empathy and, at the tender age of 18 months, will fetch toys for a friend who can’t walk and offer her kisses and pats on the head. They just aren’t normal and if we aren’t careful, our whole Western way of life will be challenged by these children who have been coddled in the name of nurturing and bonding.
Attachment Parenting is truly a dangerous thing after all. Who knows what impact it will have on our society and our values.
I hope I’ve set the record straight.
(I think I should emphasize that this post is extremely tongue-in-cheek and the result of a day in bed with a suspected kidney infection. Most of it was written while breastfeeding my 18-month-old while my 4-year-old fetched me drinks of water and stories to read. It’s another danger of AP - your children start trying to nurture you.)
