Ferberizing - Columbus,OH

Ferberizing: a not so nice "technique" used to train a baby to go to sleep on their own by letting them cry. There are many better sleep solutions out there that take the baby's feelings into consideration. good luck and Iwould stear clear of methods that involve ignoring a baby's only form of communication.

Hello C., I didnt know that was what it was called but I did that with my 3yr old when she was 4 months and by the third night she knew to just go to sleep and I have never had any sleep issues with her. She went into a toddler bed really early and never got out because she knew what bedtime meant. It was extremely hard to do, but well worth it. I have a 10 month old now and I have not done it and she is still not sleeping thru the night. I have to give her a bottle to get her to go back to sleep. I am tired! Good luck.

Hi C.,

Like other moms have mentioned, it can be a hard thing to do, to dlet your baby cry.
I can attest to two friends who chose not to do it and at 2 years of age neither of their children know how to self-soothe.
In fact, one of them has had to go to first steps for therapy to learn to self-soothe since he can't do it without breastfeeding and the mom has been trying to wean him for a year. He throws horrible tantrums and she breaks down in tears as he gets older since they get harder.
The other one resorts to driving her child to sleep ;)
No thanks ;)

My kids will never remember crying for a few night, I didn't do it until they were 7 and 8 months and since (they are now 1 and 2) they self-soothe, put themselves to sleep, wake up happily playing and nap and bedtime has never since been a source of conflict.

Amy

Letting a baby "cry out it" to soothe themselves to sleep. Very very hard the first time around (I used the method with all 3 children) As a single mother, it's just not practical and darn near IMPOSSIBLE to constantly rock a baby to sleep or have them attached to my hip. With my first born, I sat outside the nursery and cried right along with him... peeking in every once and again to make sure he was okay. It eventually got easier. So easy that ALL my children moved from cribs into toddler beds by their 1st birthday because they just lay right down and go to sleep with no issues at all. I swear by Ferberizing!! :) Good luck Grandma!

Ferberizing:
Something that should never be done.

Well, I never heard it called that before, but letting your child cry themself to sleep is OK. My daughter was absolutely addicted to the bottle. I had nursed her for 8 months and then she was sick and could not nurse for 2-3 days, by then I decided not to go back to it, so I gave her a bottle. She would not sleep without it, but being a little chubby, I had to put water in it. If she woke in the night, I would give her another. Naturally, she was soaked by morning.
I talked to her doctor. He said to make her go cold turkey. He told me to put her in bed, then go where I could not hear her, so I ran the bath tub and took a hot bath. She cried for an hour or so the first night. Only about 15 minutes the second night. ANd then she never cried again. It was great being able to put her to bed by herself.

Hi C..

"Ferberizing" is a term that comes from Dr. Ferber's sleep methods for getting your infants to learn to sleep on their own. No method is fool-proof, but we used an adapated/modified version of this with our children, and it's great!

I 100% agree with JessicaAnn. This is a widely contraversial issue. But, babies do not have to cry themselves to sleep. Yes, some may take longer than others to "learn" to fall asleep on their own, but they do learn it. I never did it with my son & he did just fine by 15 months. Yes, my daughter is taking longer, but I'm not selfish enough to make her cry herself to sleep. She will get there. Just like every other milestone they pass, she will do this on her own and at her own pace.

I didn't actually know what it was either but I guess I did use a version of it with my children!!! I truly believe they need to learn to self soothe themselves to get to sleep.

However I guess some people don't agree with the method, must be a personal choice!!!

Good Luck with the newest grandchild

A.

Go to www.askjeeves.com
tons of informaiton on the subject. I just looked it up as I was curious.

Grandma,
Go here :
http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Plains/7503/SLEEP.HTML

I wondered the same thing. A my sister-in-law told me it is the old, check on the child when they are crying to make sure nothing is wrong and then just let them cry it out. Make them self sufficient and learn to be self sufficient.
Gee, I guess I used this method and didn't know it had a name with both of my children and the grandchild I am currently raising.
I never let them cry so long they got sick or anything, but the idea of constantly carrying them around wasn't practical then and I am sure it isn't practical now either. I just didn't know it was called Ferberizing back then.

I am in your shoes on this. I have no Idea what this is and if you find out I would also like to know. Could you please contact me in what you find out. I am a double gram with a 1yr old and 1 month old granddaughters. I am sure they didn't have this when my sons were young. Thank you

If you are planning on doing some reasearch anyway why don't you also check out www.askdrsears.com and read "The Happiest Baby on the Block" or "The no cry sleep solution". All offer differnt alternatives to the cry it out method.

it's a method used to help your baby fall alseep on their own, you lay them down when it's nap/bed time and let them cry for 5-10 min then check & make sure they are ok then leave them alone again & let them cry more. i found a better way that worked for me, i would get my daughter almost to sleep then go put her in her crib, i started this when she was 4mo. old, & let her get herself the rest of the way. she's 8 1/2 mo old now & now when it's nap or bedtime i just lay her down, cover her with her blanky, & turn on her humidifier and after about 5 minutes of goo goo's & gaa'gaa's she's out like a light.

Ferberizing is what is often referred to as letting your baby "cry it out" in order to break bad sleep habbits or cructhes. I was really on the fence about it, but we have twins that would not nap in their nursery and would sleep through the night, but it would sometimes take us an hour to an hour and a half to get them down. At our six month doctor visit we asked our pediatrician (who I thought would advise us against it) and he shared his experiences and recommended it. We got the book (most recent by Ferber), did it the right way and our lives have been dramatically better! This method is often described as harsh etc, etc, but you continuously check in with your baby and let them know you are there... you just don't pick them up. In a matter of days, we could put the girls in their cribs awake and they now put themselves to sleep. A once skeptic and concerned mother now highly recommends trying it!

i want to know too!

I'm sure that this, just like anything else in raising your children, is a very personal decision. To me, "Ferberizing" is just a catchy marketing term to something that was common sense to me. In fact, I only recently learned that it had a "name", LOL

I do not, however, agree that children need to be put to bed awake and screaming in order to learn to "self soothe". The children in my family, in addition to my own child have ALWAYS either been nursed or given a bottle before bed. This makes an immense amount of sense to me; I always sleep better on a full stomach.

These children have NEVER had issues going to sleep on their own, even if wide awake after their bottle or after nursing. Of course, they're going to be more content if their diapers are clean and their tummies are full.

I do follow a nightly routine of bath, nursing and bottle then rocking, then prayers and kisses on the forehead. Most times anymore, my baby is wide awake after the routine, at which point, I simply place her in her crib and walk out of the room. She never cries; instead she'll play until she falls asleep.

One of the drawbacks (if it is a drawback) to this, however, is that she doesn't cry or make noise when she wakes up either, so we have to keep checking on her. She's been known to play for an hour in her crib in the mornings while we sleep in the next room without even a peep over the baby monitor. Again, some may see this as a positive, but I always worry about what she might be getting into. ;)

If she fusses in her crip while awake, we do not pick her up - rather, we wait until she stops fussing to walk in and collect her. This is not fair, however, if there is a possibility that one of her basic needs hasn't been met (ie: a messed diaper or hungry), so yes, we do go in and pick her up if she's crying because of an issue.

Again, this was just something that came along as common sense to me, and what worked for us, and I feel that others need to do what works with them, rather than relying on one Dr's opinion of what worked for him. Every baby is different.

Hello grandma C. I did not know what ferberizing is either so I went to google to look it up. I had to search for a while but what I understand when the baby cries let them cry for five minutes then you go in and pat his/her tummy until they go to sleep then if it continues you wait ten minutes and on and on making the time between visits longer each time repeat the tummy pat. I would think this would wear a mother/grandma out so to me being from the old school let them cry at a reasonable amount of time and then go in and try to soothe them. I raised three children and helped with two grandson's and did not know anything about this. My daughter in law also did the swaddeling and I had never heard of that but it work wonders. You will love being a grandmother it is wonderful. I was with our daughter when she had her two boy's but when our son and daughter in law got their two daughters I was 3000 miles away and It was all I could do till we finally got to go see them. good luck grandma K.

Here is a link for you that is pretty good and explains about the method as well as the doctor that developed it.

http://www.babycenter.com/0_the-ferber-method-demystified...

In short its the school of thought that too much cuddling/coddling can create a dependence for this type of security from the parent, that the parent then later attempts to wean the child from- therefore the practice of allowing the child to learn how to self soothe early on ( I think )