Sleep Easy Solutions
This is my first blog post reviewing a book. I’m a big fan of using books as a resource for myself and my clients, and my goal is to review them for you, so you can get the perspective from a clinical professional to know if some of those self-help books are great or garbage.
While I have a degree in child learning and development and have worked with ABA techniques for a number of years, when I was a new mother, I was searching for something to help me obtain something most new parents have a paucity of, sleep. My newborn would NOT sleep alone and she was bursting out of every swaddle product by the time she was 6 weeks old. I had to find some type of solution to where she and I could both get more sleep and better quality sleep. So after doing a bit of internet researching, I settled on the book The SleepEasy Solution by AUTHORS.
For someone with my type of personality, it was a great fit. They presented empirically validated information to educate me about the importance of sleep (although they were preaching to the choir) and then gave me a very clear road map for how I could find the best solutions for me and my child and our living/sleeping preferences. The book is meant for children ages 4 months to 5 years old, and they have suggestions for how to navigate tricky developmental milestone bumps in the way (nightmares, teething, potty training, etc.). I honestly referenced this book multiple, multiple times over the years in all three of my childrens’ lives. Very rarely was I unable to find some type of guidance or suggestions on how to handle difficult problems that may have been robbing my children (and me!) of sleep. It is very structured around tried and true behaviorist techniques and while all three of my children have very different personalities and sleeping styles, this book was able to help me handle it all.
The thing you should be aware of: this book will suggest that you let your child cry. It will be hard, but it will be worth it (think of it as potty training – it’s a life skill). And the thing that I think is most important with cry it out (CIO) methods is that the authors are not suggesting that you put your child down and let them cry without any support until they just cry themselves to sleep. They are suggesting to do what we call behavioral shaping and scaffolding. We provide an appropriate amount of support to the child and gently fade out that support until they no longer need it in a very precise and planned way. So it is far from “lazy parenting” that is often suggested in CIO methods. If anything, it requires quite a bit of intention, and strength on your part to allow your child to learn coping mechanisms that will serve them the rest of their lives. Sleep is a complex, neurological process that is greatly impacted by our behaviors. When we teach our children from a young age how to manage their sleep, that is a gift that will help them for the rest of their lives.
Also, from a self-care perspective, one of my mantras if you cannot pour from an empty cup – in other words, if you are drained – emotionally, physically, mentally – then you cannot help others. Children especially. Children are still needing to learn self-regulatory techniques and if you yourself are unable to assist them, it makes that process all the more difficult. Training your children to become independent in their sleeping habits, that opens up the opportunity for you to get longer, better quality sleep, as well as more time to yourself (or with your spouse) in order to renew yourself. It is critical as a parent to take care of ourselves so we can take care of our loved ones.
So I cannot recommend the SleepEasy Solution highly enough. I have bought it for many new parents and they have loved it. I still use it to this day to help my youngest child as he meets new developmental milestones or has life events that may impact his sleep. And because of this, my children sleep, and so do I – which means I’m able to renew myself in order to help others.