The little voices called Guilt & Shame

If you've been following along here for the past week or so, or have been actively reading the latest news in the world of breastfeeding advocacy, then you're probably well aware of the battle of words that raged last week during the Babble Debacle. If you missed it, you can catch up by reading the 3 articles that I posted HERE, HERE and HERE. I"m not going to get into all the details of it all, but I do want to address the ever present topic of "Guilt" and "Shame" that seems to haunt just about every parenting debate.

Babies don't come with an owners manual.  They don't come with instructions.  They don't come with even a rudimentary FAQ to refer to when you suddenly have a desperate question to ask.  It's up to each and every parent to figure it out all on their own.  Now, having said that, we do have the option of doing research to help us along the way to making the best choices we can. Some times we learn things in advance of necessity, sometimes we learn things in hindsight. And sometimes, in hindsight, we learn that we screwed up.  And we feel guilty.  Sometimes even shame.  That's life, and it sucks, but the reality is that we have to learn to live with our mistakes and get on with it.

But here's the kicker:  In order to "get on with it" and learn to live with our mistakes, you need to own it. The mistake, that is. Because if you can't OWN your mistake, if you can't admit that you made a mistake, then you will never learn from your mistake.

Here's the thing about Guilt.  Guilt is not something that happens to you from outside sources.  Guilt is internal.  Guilt is an emotion that we feel in response to something that we have said or done, or even thought about.  No one can MAKE you feel guilty.  No one can FORCE you to feel guilty. If you are completely confident in your choices and actions, if you feel in your heart that you have done exactly the right thing..... you will not feel guilty..... no matter what any one says to you!!! Only you, or at least, only that little voice in the back of your head, can make YOU feel guilty.  A good friend of mine once said this about guilt:

~On guilt~

No one can make any one else FEEL guilty. Guilt comes from within. You either feel it, or you don't. And actually, guilt is a very good thing! It causes us to re-evaluate things, lets us know when we are no longer in line with our own principles, our core values. It tells us that something is off, motivates us to......change whatever it is we're doing. In other words, guilt makes us uncomfortable for good reason!Rather than blaming OTHERS for making us "feel guilty", we really need to look within ourselves for the answers, and stop deflecting our issues away from ourselves, stop projecting our issues onto others. We need to be 100% accountable for our feelings, we need to OWN them. Because they are no one else's *but* our own." Emma Kwasnica

"We need to be 100% accountable for our feelings (such as guilt and shame), we need to OWN them"

NO ONE IS PERFECT.  Not one of us is the perfect parent.  Not one of us has raised our children perfectly without making a single mistake. Making a mistake is really hard, and sometimes emotionally devastating, but it gives us the opportunity to do better.  It gives us the opportunity to learn and to try to make better decisions the next time. We all make mistakes- what sets us apart as parents is what we do with that knowledge and how we deal with our mistakes. Guilt guides us to DO BETTER.

The same with Shame.  No one can make you feel ashamed.  No one can force you to feel Shame.  Shame is a part of your internal watchdog and shares the same house with Guilt.

I'm not a perfect parent- not even close- and I have made some horrible mistakes in my life.

- when my eldest son was 3 days old, I allowed him to be circumcised.  It was years later before I truly realized the magnitude of the mistake I made that day.  When the realization came, I was emotionally devastated and I still live with the guilt in my heart.
-when my son was 12 weeks old I allowed him to "Cry it out" all night long.... because that's what my mom told me to do.  I sat on the floor in the hallway, outside his room, and cried and cried and cried along with him.
- when my eldest son was 6 weeks old, I started giving him bottles, because that's what I was told to do. Suddenly at 4.5 month old, he refused to nurse.  After struggling for over a day, I finally went to my doctor, who told me that my son had "weaned" himself and that he only wanted bottles now.  I was crushed.  I cried on and off for days.  It was even worse though when I discovered a book in our Library called "The womanly art of breastfeeding" and found out that my baby hadn't weaned, he had classic nipple confusion, and that if I'd gotten help/support, I could of got him back on the breast again.

Just typing this out brings tears to my eyes, even though my eldest son is now 20 years old.

Guilt.
Shame.

Yes, I feel them both.  BUT.....I have accepted my guilt and my shame. I do not blame others for my shame and guilt.  When a good friend sat down and explained to me exactly what "Male Circumcision" was, and what it does, and how it's done, at first I wouldn't believe her.  I couldn't believe her, so I researched, and realized that she was right.  And I felt intense guilt. I was horrified and I felt completely ashamed. BUT.....

When "Intactivist" post articles about the truth of Circumcision I don't say to them "Stop!!  You're making me feel guilty!!"
When "Lactivists" post articles about the risks of formula feeding and the truth that infant formula is a vastly inferior substitute to breastmilk, I don't yell "NO!  Don't tell me this!  You're making me feel shamed because I formula fed my son!!!!"
When AP parents post studies that show that CIO methods cause permanent emotional damage to babies, I don't throw my hands over my eyes and say "Don't show me that!!!  You're making me feel guilty and ashamed because I let my son CIO as a small infant!!!"

Just because they are telling the facts- cold and hard- doesn't mean that they are "making" me feel guilty.

Yes, I feel guilty, and I feel ashamed of some of my decisions that I've made as a parent, but I accept that guilt and that shame and have turned it around.  I have learned from it. I have dedicated myself to helping others to NOT make the same mistakes that I did. I OWN that guilt.  I will never make those mistakes again, because I have fully accepted my guilt and shame.

Here's another thing about Guilt and Shame. Rarely are we the only ones responsible for our mistakes.  I made mistakes but I also acknowledge that I can't shoulder ALL of the blame.  I was let down by a system that didn't support parents to make informed choices.  That's another emotion that goads me forward:  ANGER.

So if you feel the emotions "Guilt" & "Shame" over parenting decisions you've made in the past, put it to work for you. Move forward and onward.  Make the changes necessary to get rid of the guilt.  Own it.

....Don't blame others for it.  It's not their fault that you have emotional baggage to deal with. Blaming them doesn't make the truth go away.
........and it doesn't make you feel any better.

6 month old babies develope stress from being ignored...

...for even just two minutes!!!  A new study in England shows that 6 month old babies not only have the capacity to be stressed out, but that they have the ability to anticipate stress and stressful circumstances!!

Stressed out: Studies show babies become anxious if ignored for even two minutes by mother

By Fiona Macrae

To investigate whether six-month-olds are capable of anticipating trouble, the Canadian researchers invited 30 mothers and babies into their laboratory and divided them into two groups.
Babies were placed in car seats and their mothers played with them and talked to them as normal.
The play was then interspersed with two-minute periods in which the mother simply stared over her child's head, keeping her face free of emotion.
The next day, she took her child back to the laboratory. Levels of cortisol were measured several times on both days. Amounts of cortisol shot up when the babies were ignored.
They then fell off, before rising again when the youngsters were taken back into the laboratory, despite them not being ignored on the second day....

Researcher Dr David Haley, of the University of Toronto, said: 'The results suggest that human infants have the capacity to produce an anticipatory stress response that is based on expectations about how their parents will treat them in a specific context.'
Professor Jay Belsky, of Birbeck College, University of London, said factors such as depression could affect a mother's relationship with her baby and send cortisol levels soaring time and time again.
This could lower a baby's immune system, while a troubled upbringing may also mean the child going on to become a less than perfect parent itself.

HERE to read the entire article

Sadly, people still refuse to accept that ignoring their baby, letting him or her "Cry it out" , effects their child physically and emotionally.   I know that on the two occasions that my baby monitor failed and I didn't hear my youngest- now just 6 months old- crying immediately, he show signs of distress every time I walked away from him for days afterwards. Seeing that panicked look on his face was just torture to me, and I'd spend hours holding and hugging him and consoling him- telling him over and over "I'm so sorry I didn't hear you!"....

Hopefully more and more studies of this type will be picked up by the mainstream media. Parents need to stop ignoring their protective instincts and answer their babies needs immediately, instead of listening to misguided so-called "parenting experts" who tell them not to allow that manipulative baby to get their own way and "be spoiled rotten"!

There is a reason that babies cry: it's because they need you.

"The Con of Controlled Crying"- Teleseminar

I thought that this free teleseminar might be of interest to many of you!

FREE Teleseminar
The "Con" of Controlled Crying and
Other Infant Sleep Myths

Are you.....

	Confused about baby sleep advice ?
	Worried about creating 'bad habits' ?
	Stressed that you don't have your baby in a 'routine'?
	Anxious that you may be depriving your baby of important skills such as learning to self settle and sleep 'all night'?

RELAX!
If you are feeling overwhelmed and exhausted but can't bear leaving your baby to cry in order to 'train' him to sleep, you will breathe a sigh of relief as you listen to this FREE teleseminar "The Con of Controlled Crying and Other Infant Sleep Myths".
In this important teleseminar (listen on the phone or your computer), Pinky McKay, best-selling author of 'Sleeping Like a Baby' and '100 Ways to Calm the Crying' (Penguin), International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and mother of five, Pinky McKay will reveal:

	Why the biology of mother-infant attachment makes it so heart wrenching to leave your baby to 'cry it out' - and why it's important to trust and honour this powerful connection.
	Why methods such as 'controlled crying' and 'ferberising' are not healthy options for your baby's development.
	How leaving babies to cry in order to 'teach' them to sleep may cause long term adverse changes to immature infant brains.
	The link between infant feeding and sleep - your diet, feeding routines and feeding to sleep, what's helpful and what isn't.
	Why do babies wake - is it 'behavioural' or 'bad habits' and when should you worry and what can you do to help your baby (and you) get more sleep?

HERE to watch a short video of Pinky and to register

A recipe for Disaster: or how to make an unattached baby

OK, this was just sent to me on Facebook and I had to read it three times to convince myself that it wasn't some sort of a prank!!  THis is for real- they actually think that they are going to sell this to parents and that this technology is a wonderful thing!!!  Let's all have a good look at this shall we?  How many horrifying things can you see/read in this ad? 

I'm going to go read it again... it's kinda like a train wreck, you just can't help looking!!

(Here's the link to the original article in case the pictures don't come through!)


Technology for New Parents

Breaux on June 1, 2010 at 1:00pm
Sometimes it feels like the hardest part of being a modern family is carving out time to relax and be simple. We all crave a certain measure of simplicity in our lives, and no one feels that more than parents, especially of little ones. The question is, does simplicity mean hearkening back to a time before there was so much distracting technology, or does distracting technology make life much easier? We’re not going to answer that for you, but we do have a product that features some pretty complicated technology promising to make life much easier.


LUNAR’S KOO Holistic Feeding System is designed for the new parent in mind. Understanding that new moms (and dads) have their sleep schedules interrupted quite dramatically by the addition of a newborn, LUNAR has come up with a pretty nifty system that allows baby to be ushered to sleep gently, mom or dad awoken gently when baby cries, a portable basket that warms milk bottles automatically upon hearing baby cry and even a portable light that mom can carry with her. More details of each element to Koo:

• A baby sleep-training mobile and monitoring unit This tree stand offers bedtime routine for the baby via a collapsing mobile as well as monitoring the baby. The stand is also the nesting and charging station for the bottle cooler/warmer.
• A transformable baby bassinet/rocker The bassinet easily unfolds to become a cozy feeding rocker. An auto-rocker integrated in the base soothes baby to sleep between feedings and becomes part of baby’s bedtime routine.
• A bottle cooling/warmer unit The portable basket keeps two prepared milk bottles cool (using thermolelectrics technology) while recharging on the tree stand. If the baby cries within the feeding timeframe set by the parents, a bottle will instantly be warmed.
• A parent lighting/monitoring unit soft as a light pillow The pillow lamp also acts as the “heart” of the system allowing parents to set up waking “turns” and bottle warming timeframe. As the baby cries, the electroluminescent fabric pillow softly lights up and the baby’s sound gradually follows to wake up the parent.

 Here's a neat chart explaining how it works:


What do you think about LUNAR'S KOO Holistic Feeding System? Too awesome or too complicated? Do you think a system of technology like this would help you? Is there any technology, related to baby or not, that you've incorporated in your life that you feel makes it infinitely easier? Let us know!

Baby wearing saves a baby

I read this blog last night and crumbled into tears. This is such an empowering story of one mother saying screw you to the system and all those around her- people, both medical personnel and friends who told her she was wrong, and who stuck to her deep mothering instincts.... instincts that saved the life of her sick baby girl.

We are mothers. We KNOW our babies. We need to listen to that inner mothering voice when it tells us what to do and how to parent and look after ourselves and our children.

Thursday, October 15, 2009

Saving My Baby

I gave birth on a February afternoon by repeat caesarean. A pink, squalling bundle was handed to me, and I gazed lovingly into eyes that seemed to recognize me. I whispered sweet words of belonging to this girl child of mine, and comforted her outraged cries. She was the daughter I so desperately wanted.

A week after her birth, a friend dropped off a ring sling. I snuggled my 7 lb bundle into it and went about my way with a mostly content baby. Within two weeks, I was wearing her constantly. Towards afternoon, she’d begin to sob and scream inconsolably. She would arch and thrash, refuse to nurse, refuse a soother, the swing, my arms. The only thing that would quiet her screams was the sling.

Screamy baby began to lose weight. I carried her – day in, day out – in the sling. Repeated trips to the doctor revealed nothing. She was unable to nurse, screaming hysterically within moments of latch on.I was told rudely “ Do breast compressions. Breast is best.” Breast compressions made her choke and gag... and scream. I began feeding her formula. We went back to the doctor. Reflux. Milk Intolerance. Delayed gastric emptying. Her weight gain was poor, and the screaming increased in volume. Nights were long, filled with arching, thrashing baby. There was many a night that I slept with her in the sling, sitting up on the couch, unwilling to move her from her comfort zone. People told me I was spoiling her. I told them “ We’re coping. This is all that works.” I was told to let her cry it out, but I had no desire to abandon my child to a dark room to cry out her angst. My responsibility to her did not end when the sun went down. I whispered in her ear that I couldn’t stop her crying, but I could hold her while she cried.

I paced the floors with her, snuggled tummy to tummy in the sling. At six months, I begged the doctor to hospitilize her – I knew something was dreadfully wrong. The paediatrician agreed. She was poked, prodded, xrayed, and force fed. The screaming continued.

A day before discharge, my pediatrician’s partner waltzed into our room with his holier than thou attitude. He told me I wasn’t putting in the effort to feed her, to put her in another room to sleep and let her cry it out. I banned him from treating my child.

I worked part time, baby in sling. I got a mei tai, two more ring slings. I carried her everywhere. In the shower. To the doctor, to the park, on playdates. People nastily asked me how she would learn to walk if I never put her down. I ignored them. Carrying her stopped the screaming.

Just before her first birthday, she developed a high fever and cough. I took her to the ER, still wrapped in my sling. We waited 7 hours. Xrays revealed her heart was enlarged. We were admitted. I carried her nonstop for the next few days – through a terrifying whirlwind of echocardiograms and finally a diagnosis. During one particularly memorable screaming fit, a nurse turned to me in tears, and handed me my sling. My daughter quieted, safe in her sling.

She was in heart failure. A rare and very serious heart defect had been causing massive heart attacks. Fatality rates were 90% in the first year. The screaming was her suffering from crushing chest pain. In the hallway, the cardiologist turned to me and quietly told me that it was my parenting – the constant carrying – that had allowed her to survive against all odds.

My daughter never cried alone, left in a room. Had I ever practiced CIO, I would have woken to a lifeless baby. I held her through months of gut wrenching doubt, moments when I cried too. But today, I watch my daughter play and run, and laugh. I carried her through a mom’s worst nightmare... and we both survived.

Sarah Kaganovsky

HERE to go directly to the original Blog Post on Fierce Mamas

"Hell No CIO!!"

A Continuation of Woman Uncensored's article from last month about Crying it out: "Just let her cry" That I posted Dec 31 09.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

HELL NO CIO!

I realize that my post "Just let her cry" left some things unsaid. Quite honestly, I knew that when I wrote it, but I had to write it late at night and was exhausted both physically and from the strain of even writing something so emotional. I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to write everything I feel on this issue, but I do have some more to share at this point.

It's funny how life works sometimes. Just a couple days after I wrote about CIO ("cry it out"), I had a gut-wrenching conversation with my own mother. We were talking about my teenage brother and his issues, and she ended up launching into her own experience with "sleep training" him as a baby. It was interesting timing, considering she doesn't even know about my blog.

To understand the full scope of what my brother went through, you need to know the other trauma he suffered as a baby. His father would beat our mother right in front of him, when he was only an infant. My brother screamed for hours on end every day and night, and the doctors said he had "colic". His wails indicated extreme pain. Later, we were told it was truly just from the traumatic events he witnessed. It lasted til he was about 15 months old (at which point it just started manifesting in a different way). Up until then, he had been used to being rocked and nursed through his misery. At that point, the doctors told my mother that she had to make him go to sleep on his own, without rocking, nursing, or anything of the sort. According to them, she should be able to just set him down in his crib and he should be able to fall asleep by himself. After the hellish 15 months he had been through, he was expected to suddenly change EVERYTHING in a very short period of time. He was still a broken and scared child, and now he was also to be "broken" of his desperate needs for the loving arms he was used to. Our mother worked all day, so now with this "sleep training" he was to be deprived of her presence around the clock. When did she get to be his mother? When did he ever get to feel her arms around him?

Anyway, my mom went on about the experience. All of it was strictly laid out by the doctor, and my mother was assured that it was the only way he could become a "healthy sleeper" and she would be doing him a huge favor. He was to be laid down awake in his crib, and she was to walk out of the room. If he cried, she was "allowed" to go in after 5 minutes and pat his back briefly. Lather, rinse, repeat. This went on for FIVE HOURS, with my mother weeping as quietly as possible in a heap outside his door in the times she "couldn't" go be with him. Fast forward a few more nights of the same thing, and he "finally learned". My mother expressed her deep distress in the same sentences that she sang the doctors praises. I said to her "I'm sick just listening to this, I can't imagine living through it" (either as the mother or the child!). She expressed more gratitude toward the doctors.

HERE to read the entire article

Yet another Great article about the dangers and negative impacts of CIO type "baby training systems". Attachement parenting brings the greatest rewards to parents and children alike.

Crying for Comfort: Distressed Babies Need to Be Held

By Aletha Solter
Issue 122 Mothering Magazine, January/February 2004

The term “cry it out” refers to the practice of leaving babies in their cribs without picking them up, and letting them cry themselves to sleep. A modified version of this approach is to go to the baby every few minutes to pat her on the back or reassure her verbally (but not pick the baby up), and to increase the length of time gradually so that the baby eventually “learns” to fall asleep alone.
But there is no doubt that repeated lack of responsiveness to a baby’s cries—even for only five minutes at a time—is potentially damaging to the baby’s mental health. Babies who are left to cry it out alone may fail to develop a basic sense of trust or an understanding of themselves as a causal agent, possibly leading to feelings of powerlessness, low self-esteem, and chronic anxiety later in life. The cry-it-out approach undermines the very basis of secure attachment, which requires prompt responsiveness and sensitive attunement during the first year after birth.1

The attachment parenting movement is a healthy reaction to the harmful promotion of crying it out found in many parenting books. Attachment parents are aware of the possible emotional damage from leaving babies to cry alone, so they strive to meet their babies’ needs for physical closeness and responsiveness. However, attachment parents can overlook the beneficial, healing function of crying, and believe that their job is not only to respond to, but to stop all crying. This article describes how parents can further promote babies’ mental health by learning to recognize stress-release crying, and implementing what I call the “crying-in-arms” approach.....

...After the industrial revolution in the 18th century, the notion of “spoiling” became widespread in industrialized countries, and mothers were warned not to hold or respond to their infants too much for fear of creating demanding monsters. If the home was big enough, parents moved cradles and cribs to a separate room. With the infants sleeping alone in another room, it was easy for parents to follow the cry-it-out advice, even if it went against their gut instincts.

The decline in breastfeeding further contributed to the separation of mothers and infants. With bottle-feeding from birth on, the last remaining link to the mother’s body was removed, resulting in the deplorable, detached methods of child-rearing that predominated in Western civilizations during the 20th century....

...

Advantages of the Crying-In-Arms Approach
There are numerous advantages to allowing your baby to release stress by crying in your arms. First, you will help him heal from trauma, thereby avoiding the possible lifelong impact of prenatal or birth trauma. He will also heal regularly from the minor upsets of everyday life. Releasing pent-up stress from daily overstimulation or frustrations will allow him to have a longer attention span and greater confidence in learning new skills. He will probably also be more relaxed, and less whiny or demanding.

Your baby will also sleep better. Many parents who start using the crying-in-arms approach with older babies are delighted to find that their babies begin to sleep through the night, sometimes after months of frequent night wakings. The parents accomplish this shift while honoring their babies’ attachment needs, without ever leaving their babies to cry alone.

Another advantage of this approach is that toddlers who have cried enough as infants (while being held), and who continue to be supported emotionally as they grow older, are calm and gentle. They do not hit or bite other children. Toddlers who do not have opportunities to cry freely can become aggressive, hyperactive, obnoxious, or easily frustrated. These disagreeable behaviors are often caused by an accumulation of pent-up stress, or the impact of early trauma that has had no healthy outlet.

HERE to read the entire article

"just let her cry..."

A really brilliant blog by Woman Uncensored about CIO with a twist that drives home the importance of not neglecting our children at night.

Thursday, December 31, 2009

"Just let her cry"

...My husband was loving during the day, but things would change at night. He would leave me in the bed, tell me it was time to sleep, shut off the lights, and walk out. I would say "But honey, I'm not ready to sleep yet" but he would ignore me. It was confusing. Sometimes, I'd be having a day where I felt I may be able to eat or drink something, and I would call out to him, asking for something. Again, he would ignore me. Sometimes he would poke his head in, but it was only to tell me that I needed to go to sleep and I was "fine". I had times where I grew very depressed. On top of being sick and miserable, I missed my husband's loving arms. Sometimes I just needed to be held and comforted. Still, he would ignore me. I began to wonder why my needs were valid during the day, but not at night. At times, he would leave the room far too cold or warm. Sometimes I desperately needed to use the bathroom. Sometimes the pain all over my body became unbearable. Sometimes I was just very scared and lonely. Alas, no matter what I felt or needed, my husband ignored me...

HERE to read the entire blog

"Crying it out" may damage baby's brain

A great blog about the dangers of "Cry it Out" baby training, including information from Dr. Stephan Juan and Dr. Margot Sunderland. Check out the end of the blog for an excellent list of reading resources.

Research suggests that allowing a baby to "cry it out" causes brain damage.

by Dr. Stephen Juan

Experts warn that allowing a baby to "cry it out" causes extreme distress to the baby. And such extreme distress in a newborn has been found to block the full development of certain areas of the brain and causes the brain to produce extra amounts of cortisol, which can be harmful.

According to a University of Pittsburgh study by Dr. DeBellis and seven colleagues, published in Biological Psychiatry in 2004, children who suffer early trauma generally develop smaller brains.

Here to read the entire blog