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Ask the Expert

Question:
“I have infants where I work. I have many in the 6-9 month age that are strongly manipulating their parents. I would gather that many would say that babies do not have the capacity to manipulate. They wake up at night anywhere from every hour to at least 3-4 times. Some of these parents even get up and walk their child for an hour at a time. I was asked by one if they were spoiling their child. Do you have any information that would help guide my parents into dealing with the situation at hand differently or about spoiling or not spoiling a baby?” ~Debby, child care teacher

Response:
Thanks for this question! Sleep challenges can be difficult and require a lot of patience.

Recognizing and responding to your baby’s cries and helping them calm down is not spoiling them. This is especially true in the first year of baby’s life. Responding to the baby teaches him an important skill of how to calm down and trust that they will be taken care of. An infant can’t be spoiled because that would require them being able to anticipate the future in order to formulate thoughts of “I am going to cry until they give me everything I want!” They don’t yet have this capacity to manipulate.

Below are some general strategies to help with sleep.

Use a bedtime routine to help your baby settle down and learn when it is time to go to sleep.

Provide a patient and consistent plan with how to handle night time waking. This consistency helps the baby self-soothe and go back to sleep more quickly.

Put the baby to bed while he is sleepy but still awake. We all wake up several times in the night as part of our natural sleep cycles. When you put baby down sleepy but still awake, he will learn how to fall asleep on his own.

Studies show that babies whose parents tried to respond promptly to their crying actually cried less and were more independent as preschoolers compared to babies who were left to “cry it out.” Responding to your baby’s cries builds security and trust and helps them to better handle difficulties by themselves later on.

Sometimes children can be soothed by being held closely or rocked, as they need this kind of touch and body contact in order to relax and calm down. This is okay and should not be seen as “giving in.” It is okay to wait several minutes or so to see if they can get back to sleep on their own and help develop skills of self-soothing. In the examples you provided above, the parents could also be setting up a pattern that they do not want to maintain.

Refer to www.zerotothree.org for more resources related to supporting infants and toddlers.

Janna Hack, LCSW
Infant Mental Health Consultant

 

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