Sleep Training Culture
Mar 28, 2022
For thousands of years, babies and young children have slept in close proximity to their parents, who fed them and responded to them when they needed to. There were no strict schedules and children were cared for with family and community support.
So when did it all change?!
After the industrial revolution more people had to leave the home to work and it became easier for wet nurses and other childcare minders to use strict schedules to manage several children at once.
From the 1800s onwards some popular paediatricians also recommended a non responsive approach to infant feeding, crying, sleep and behaviour. Essentially if you were ‘strong’ and could ignore the instinct to pick up your crying child, you were doing the right thing.
There was a shift from something that was instinctual and learnt from within families and communities, to something that was strictly controlled and learnt from ‘experts’.
We are still recovering from this approach over 200 years later! Even with research disproving these theories time and time again.
So what I want you to take away is that YOU are the expert on your child mama, not some middle aged man from 200 years ago!
As always, you’ve got this mama, and I’ve got you.
