Yesterday we unveiled a method of sleeping from an author not too well known in our country, called Tracy Hogg.
It is a method that could be considered behavioral, for how it is carried out, but with better intentions and with more respect than the best known Estivill method.
After explaining a little the philosophy of this nurse today we will talk a little more about the method, showing how it is carried out and also explaining why we do not just like some points that the author exposes, with the clear premise that, despite it seems to us a good alternative to the mentioned Estivill method.
What is your method?
The best way to understand how his method works is to read the author's book where everything is explained with hairs and signs, however, so that you know a little about what it consists of, I will give you a short summary with some of the highlights.
Hogg says that to sleep a baby we must first decide what will be the most common method, because what we do will be what the baby will expect us to always do. Something like saying that if you sleep it for the first few days by rocking it for half an hour we will have to do it that way for a long time, because this will be what the baby will expect.
The truth is that this is not without logic, however rocking or lulling a baby is usually a solution to a lack of reconciliation of sleep and not a premeditated decision in plan “when my baby is born I will rock it for more than half an hour for him to fall asleep ”, that is, most of the time it is done because the baby cannot fall asleep alone or because he cannot fall asleep he begins to groan and cry of pure tiredness.
Too recommends that the child sleep alone in the crib to encourage independence but not at the cost of letting him cry. That is to say, assume that when a baby cries it is trying to say something and that is why we must attend to it. Once he has calmed down, we leave him in his crib again because his needs are already covered (and he shows it by not crying).
At this point I disagree a little because normally babies ask for contact (or food) and stop crying when they get it. Being calm again and in the arms of dad or mom they fall asleep again knowing that they are with them (their need is covered) and, by leaving them again in the crib, we stop giving them what they were asking, ergo we are stopping to cover really their needs (but as they sleep, they don't know). Even so, it is always better to do this than to let him cry for a certain time or until the child decides that it is not necessary to continue doing so because his need is not going to be met.
To sleep the children we says babies shouldn't rely on braces, which defines as those objects or acts to which they can get used and whose absence makes them feel nervous. According to the babies, they will never learn to sleep alone if we create a condition such as dad's shoulder, pacifier, a half-hour walk, mom's chest, etc.
Again I disagree, basically because of the issue of mom's breast and breastfeeding. If a baby is hungry and breast at night, the most logical thing is to fall asleep with the breast. It is not that breastfeeding is a support, it is a necessity and since they suck almost asleep, it is almost impossible to separate a baby who eats so that he stays awake.
If instead of talking about food you are referring to the chest as an excuse for suction (the so-called non-nutritive suction), as you could be sucking a pacifier, the thing changes (if only a little). From my point of view children have the reflex of sucking because it helps them calm down and calm down in the absence of other less physical and more psychic tools. If he is not allowed to take the breast to suck or a pacifier, he will most likely cry and ask for something to be put in his mouth (who knows if he will end up putting his hand or a finger). So, if he cries because he wants to suck something, it is we who do not allow him to use a “support” he needs and not vice versa, as she says, that by sucking his chest or a pacifier we are getting used to something that he will not be able to leave of using.
For example, it is as if someone says that adults who sleep on their side cannot sleep with a pillow because it is a support. It is true that I do not need it to sleep, but if I do not have it I will sleep worse and I will need to put an arm or something to be more comfortable. If someone suddenly gave me one, I would sleep better and, if I took it off again, I would complain, but not because I got used to it, but because I really need it so as not to wake up with a contracted neck.
Continuing with what he tells us Tracy HoggAccording to her, it must be taken into account that a support is not a transition object, such as a stuffed animal or a blanket, since the transition object remains with the baby while the support disappears and hence the problem. In any case, he says that he prefers that babies do not have objects to sleep, because they will develop their own means to calm down.
With this I do agree, because I am not very friendly with the transition between human warmth and loneliness through an inanimate object, however, the strategies to calm oneself arrive when a child is maturingly prepared to calm down alone (through tools that they appear as the rational brain develops). Until then, everything that is to calm oneself will be done erratically, probably causing very high stress in the child (crying to exhaustion, for example, or learning that no one is going to give you what you really need, despite living a situation as a potential threat).
To be continue…
Tomorrow, to finish, we will explain the technique that we must follow according to the author both to get them to sleep, and to get them to do it all night long.
