At bedtime, let him cry or help him catch the dream?

On the web, in 2.0, in the forums I visit, on Facebook and in the blogs I read, the behavioral methods of letting the baby cry so that he can take the dream on their own are already quite overcome. Come on, the usual thing is for people to speak badly about Estivill and company and to defend that a baby does not do that.

In the real world, on the other hand, that world in which you unintentionally hear conversations from other mothers or talk to recent mothers or fathers, it seems that the typical method of ignoring children is still quite valid because of that "if you are not hungry , thirst or have a dirty diaper, cry because he is teasing you. " However, we have known the answer to the question for years: Let him cry or help him catch the dream? And so today we are going to talk about it, although perhaps these words remain, as always, on the web, and do not reach people in the real world.

There was life before Estivill and Ferber

Many parents of whom I comment, of those of real life, of those of everyday life, speak of Estivill as if before his book there was a black hole, as if the world had begun with his method and all the adults of the world have always slept badly except the "stilted". Well, to be correct, I should say before Ferber, that he was the first to write a method of letting him cry for a little while, from which Estivill later took out his version.

For those who do not know them, they are the authors of a method of sleeping that involves leaving the baby in the crib, only in his room, to teach him not to claim the presence of parents. As usual, they do, that is, they cry, parents should go to the room after a few minutes and try to explain to the baby, with love, that they do it for their own good, but without taking it. They leave again and, if they cry again, they come again after another defined time interval. This is done every day, day by day, until the baby stops calling.

They explain that when the baby stops crying it is because you have instilled a healthy habit and have got him to sleep alone. Others argue that what is achieved, in fact, is that the baby learns that, no matter how much he calls mom or dad, they will not go to give him what he really needs: arms, containment and affection. Come on, they won't help you calm down.

Do children know how to calm themselves?

No. Not really, because even though the days have passed and babies no longer cry, there have been changes in their brain that show that, despite not crying, they are quite alert, more stressed than if they had been treated from the beginning. This happens because when you are a baby your upper or rational brain is still immature enough to understand that you are safe at night. In other words, a baby of 6 months, or 9, or even 12, is not able to reason to the point of being clear that nothing will happen at night and that in the morning he will wake up with a New day, as healthy as he lay down. As he doesn't know, he demands the attention of the parents to be and feel safe.

You will probably say "what nonsense, of course nothing is going to happen, why is it stressed if the house door is closed and we are in the next room?". Well, she gets stressed, gets nervous and claims your presence because she doesn't know what a house is, she doesn't know what a door is, she doesn't understand the concept of "it's closed, nobody can come in" and probably, not seeing you, hearing you or feeling you close, it is not too clear if you are next or not.

Neither understand nor, in fact, current babies should understand, that there are those who say "let's see if they evolve anymore, that we no longer live in the Paleolithic", precisely because there are babies who do not live in a flat, apartment or house with a door , but they live in the jungle or in countries where there are wild animals and numerous dangers. Imagine a baby born there, who is so calm as to sleep anywhere, even alone. He will always run more risk than one who cries more and demands the presence of the parents even when he closes his eyes, precisely because the first one can sleep a little apart from mom or dad, but the second one does not.

Consequently, as babies do not know how to calm themselves, we adults have to help them. Do you want your baby to sleep peacefully, peacefully, knowing safe, accompanied or do you prefer to sleep after crying for a while, exhausted after asking for help and not getting it? I vote for the first, but there are those who opt for the second, although they are babies who often sleep worse because they get tired and nervous.

But my baby, despite crying, stays quiet and calm

It works. The method usually causes children to stop calling. It is not that they have learned that nothing happens to them at night, it is that they adapt to the situation: "Why cry and cry if nobody comes here." Experts say that when this happens children enter a primitive state of defense. The heart speeds up, also breathing and cortisol levels (stress hormone in the brain) increase. Studies with monkeys have shown that the longer the animals are separated, the higher the cortisol level and that, when the monkey stops complaining about loneliness, the levels remain as or higher, as if they had entered a state of "ok , I stop complaining, I am alone in the face of danger. "

This elevated cortisol state for quite a few nights causes children to become very sensitive to stress, to affect them too much. Come on, that if it is not solved, if they always live that way, if the educational style entails not helping the child to calm down too much, but in leaving him or ignoring him so that he can find a way to calm down, there is a risk that in adulthood be a person with difficulties in managing stress, one of those people with a very strong character, who explode easily, with little patience and who even look for moments and attitudes that generate cortisol. Something like a fish that bites its tail: its brains are so accustomed to living in stress, with elevated cortisol, which seems to seek to raise it unconsciously. Once raised, they have difficulty controlling it, precisely because as a child nobody helped them to lower levels with love, contact, arms, etc.

It won't be that bad, right?

Explained in this way it sounds truly problematic. Sounds like it seems that by letting your son cry you are going to raise a future psychopath and maybe you say that "they all let us cry and we are not psychopaths". Well, in the worst case yes, but it is not usual. We always talk about character, about ways of being, about actions that we accept today as normal. We all know people with a strong character, difficult to control, with little patience ... or people who immediately care about everything and drown in a glass of water, that at least have a problem and are not able to find solutions ... or people who they do not feel comfortable at close distances, or so accustomed to the little contact of children, who are not too capable of harnessing the power of hugs and affection and, nor do they receive them (because they do not know how to receive them, which seems to bother them) or They give them.

People like that are everywhere, because we see them on a daily basis. They are not crazy, they are not psychopaths, but they drag problems derived from the education they received as children, of the lack of contact and affection, of the absence of parents in moments like the one of the dream, when before the question "to let him cry or to attend to him?" they opted for the first, believing that it would make them more independent and more capable, when what they achieved is that they were, perhaps, more lonely and antisocial.

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