How much "should" a baby cry?

[@melissasmuse]

Irene I don’t know if you will read this but thank you for this video. I read a book called baby wise 17 years ago. It’s written by doctors who believe you should let your infant “cry it out”. My son who I used this book on is now 17 and I can tell he is insecurely attached, and I know it’s because of this book. It breaks my heart that I used the tools in that book 😞

[@breezyncj]

As a mom of 4, it pains me whenever I hear of another mother telling another mother to let their child "cry it out." It's not natural. Hell, it pains me to think about all of the babies in cribs alone in rooms separated from their parents at night." That's also not natural, though I of course respect other people's parenting decisions as long as the child is properly cared for.

[@Gerhold102]

@@breezyncj I thought that 'crying itself out' was long discredited as a method. The baby is crying for a reason and needs a positive response. I looked after my niece just for one night when she was tiny and she cried for a solid four hours! She'd been fed and changed, but her mum had gone out on a specific journey so she was left with uncle. I never had children so I had no idea what to do. I just walked around with her, gently rocking her, until mum returned. I wouldn't have put her down in her carrycot and just left her. Babies' crying instinctively draws anyone in to try to pacify them - I guess it's how nature works. But I was exhausted after that 😩😥

[@maryannribble3254]

Gabor Mate ‘ and Bessel Van der Kolk and plenty of research can answer this question - too ! The Continuum Concept that Irene mentions - is also an excellent resource - we are mammals after all!

[@jjayneartworkx]

​@@Gerhold102babies can have attachment issues if they aren't around many other caregivers...❤...ur instincts were on par to nurture it.😊

[@breezyncj]

@@Gerhold102 It definitely is but I live in a part of the US that's.. let's say.. not the most educated on these types of things. You did the right thing for sure.

[@Gerhold102]

@@breezyncj I understand people have problems with 'new-fangled' ideas of parenting, but this Victorian harshness should have disappeared long ago. Why have children if not to cherish them? Both my wife and sister were less than 'indulgent' with children. Sis replicated my mother's way of raising us - dismissive, critical and distant. It's as if societal values are allowed to overwhelm natural instincts (although not every mother has maternal instincts). The English public school system made a point of providing wealthy parents with a way of relinquishing their children to 'toughen them up'. What it created were generations of emotionally insecure children who often went on to top jobs in government and industry. I could go on ranting, but the work for any traumatised child is to recover from that childhood and I guess that means healing the part of oneself that is hurting.

[@jjayneartworkx]

Yah...I'm chinese and regardless of the environment or curcumstances...we're not supposed to let the babies cry...they cry for reasons...it's their main form of communication...❤ I'm pretty sure it's supposed to mess with a paernts frequency on purpose...😊 I'm super empath and I always know when my boys are distressed even as young adults now.

[@kristinaschewenius6615]

Thank you! So many answers❤️

[@tarakadir9259]

Thank you 🙏🏻 ❤

[@crystallparker9247]

With two teenagers 16 and 19, today ,with all the information and thanks to your videos, I can see the damage it has done them. Coming from a childhood with an absent father ( being drunk most of the time ) and my way of coping ( coming from an abusive childhood and on top of that, an abusive partner and an abusive boss at the office), dubbel the trouble 😢😢. I never realised what I was doing to my self and my children. How do I get them to start healing so that they can have a better future?

[@IreneLyon]

Hello, Sophia here from Team Lyon. Thank you for your comment and sharing what is going on with you, we appreciate you sharing. Many folks find this nervous system work at its heart is about becoming who YOU truly are and finally learning what it means to go from living in a state of survival, stress and anxiety to a place of hope, possibility and solid well-being. While we don't often recommend children take our courses, as the verbiage will not be absorbed by them, it is possible that a teenager can participate in one of Irene's paid courses, but they would have to be excited about it on their own, so they would have to be that relatively rare teenager that is naturally interested in trauma, nervous system health, stress physiology, etc. It won't work if they are only doing it because the parent wants them to, but if they ARE keen and genuinely interested in the work then yes, I'd say it's something that could benefit them. The bare truth is --> if you (parent, caregiver etc..) do this important work for yourself, you will naturally begin to change and heal the relationship with your kids. You'll view your role as a parent through a fresh lens and you'll have more capacity to deal with any issues that arise. And, you'll naturally pass this knowledge and increased regulation down to your kids who can then bring this education on board and begin to understand their own nervous systems better. It's super cool to see it happen. It's like osmosis, they pick up the new behaviour and learned healing through you. One way you can begin the process of nervous system rewiring is in the 21 Day Nervous System Tune-Up course. This is a self-study online course that teaches you basics of healing trauma and nervous system health. It’s a perfect blend of polyvagal theory and somatic neurosensory exercises. Then, if you want to dive deeper, you can check out the more indepth SmartBody SmartMind (SBSM) program. SBSM is a 12-week online group program that runs once a year and teaches you how to become your own medicine. Its focus is to restore nervous system regulation through polyvagal-informed education, practical neurosensory exercises, and interactive support. All paid courses linked here: irenelyon.com/programs/ Irene does have a TON of free resources on our website and on her KZbin channel. Irene produces a lot of webinars and information products (e-books, audios, etc.) so you can definitely access those to see if the material is a good fit before investing in the program. You can also "search" on her KZbin channel and Blog for subjects like 'kids' etc... to see what she has said on various topics. Blog irenelyon.com/blog As well as her free resources here: irenelyon.com/free-resources-2/ I'm not sure if you saw these already but Irene created a KZbin playlist filled with informative videos for parents entitled 'Kids. Children. Raising Healthy Humans. Parenting.', which you can watch here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/iYGZnXqNr8ecq7M&pp=iAQB Let us know if you have any other questions.

[@tonyawilliams4053]

Another VERY INFORMATIVE video💕 Thank you

[@conciousgrowth8616]

It’s tricky to assume that parents can always resolve the cause of a baby's crying, especially only based on your (finite) experience as "evidence". While parents can address many issues, it’s not always possible to soothe a baby in pain. Historically, childbirth was natural but also often fatal, so it's not always mom who is not "in tune" enough - it's hard to realise people can simply have bad luck. For parents with persistently crying babies: please don't assume it's your fault. Yes try everything you can, and healing yourself more is always good, but sometimes babies experience pain or discomfort that can't be fixed. For example, my child cried hysterically despite doing everything "right" from organic food, natural childbirth, breastfeeding, cosleeping, constant holding, doing personal development work since 10 years.. Sometimes, all you can do is be there for them when they are in pain, but you can't take all pain away.

[@ClaudiaSt56]

Gabor is actually the last name, Maté is the hungarian version of Matthew. 🤗

[@RMKRMK-c6w]

So don't have a baby until you're fully regulated? People who have experienced trauma shouldn't have children? People who lose pregnancies - or children - can blame themselves and their failure to get regulated for their child? It feels like there's not a lot of compassion or grace in this message to women existing, and usually doing their very best, in a complex system that does not support their regulation. You don't seem to allow for the picture being more complex than this, there are so many factors involved not just the mother's nervous system, and it feels shaming to present (otherwise potentially useful) ideas in this way. It's too sensitive, complex, and potentially retraumatising a subject to treat this simplistically

[@ellenhendricks4606]

I get what you're saying because I felt this way for a while and I had to work through it. Irene's words are not shaming - they are informative. The shame comes from inside ourselves because we did something differently and have to live with that. Yes there is a lot of context with lack of support in modern society, but it doesn't mean that this is inaccurate from a mammalian perspective.

[@RMKRMK-c6w]

I agree they are informative. But they are also not careful or nuanced or contextualised enough for the subject matter. The shame absolutely does come from inside of me - and the same goes for multitudes of other women - and I am working through that every day of my life, but just because shame is there, doesn't mean it's appropriate to conclude I did something wrong (or 'differently') and caused my miscarriages - this idea is horrendously damaging, but I - like many women who have experienced losses, especially multiple times - am certainly not immune to it. It's far too simplistic, and unaware of how to speak to women who have loss-related trauma, to attribute *everything* to maternal dysregulation in such a black and white way. It's taking a helpful theory to a harmful extreme without due care. There are far more nodes in the system, it's a far more nuanced and complex picture, and to portray it this way *is* shaming and alarmist, and unaware of the impacts on women who internalise these messages

[@ellenhendricks4606]

​@RMKRMK-c6w can you give an example of how she could better communicate the info?

[@RMKRMK-c6w]

Well, I'm not sure that outlining or shaping content (beyond giving feedback) is really my role here, but I am happy to give a critique from a relevant perspective and experience. I never leave comments anywhere online, however, I am really keen to do so here for any other women who might be affected in the same way I have been by this. I am a million miles from where I once was with this in terms of my own vulnerability, but truly, at one point, just seeing *someone* give counterpoints to some of the implications here would have had a very positive impact on my ability to safely navigate grief and unhealthy shame. So I feel strongly about making these points, and inviting more nuance, care, and context on a platform with significant reach. I am a bit wary of giving examples that are too specific, but consider the woman who loses a baby right at the end of pregnancy or before birth. Irene has talked here about babies 'just dying' when they aren't attuned to, so are we really comfortable telling such grieving mothers that "sorry, you failed to be regulated enough, you really should have worked on your nervous system", given the complexity of *any* one situation? There is enough shame, blame, and hyper-responsibility laid on mothers, on pregnant women, without this kind of grossly oversimplified messaging. Neonatal and infant death are multifactorial (the leap from infant death to neonatal death is a small one, especially for women who experience it, and if this wasn't considered, then it simply should have been), and at present, the cause is often never known. Our minds can't handle the unknown, and so we fill in the gaps with theories, and lo and behold, these theories tend to make women responsible and to blame. I really don't know how it helps to imply to people who have already suffered those tragedies that *the state of their body* was the cause when, to whatever extent that may have been *a factor* (and putting aside all the evidence that any level of dysregulation cannot have anything even approaching a straightforward cause and effect relationship), when to do any differently in this system is so incredibly hard, not the norm, and a lifetime's work... When are we 'done'? At what point is my body 'safe enough' to carry a child? Who is 'regulated enough' and how can we tell? What if someone who thought they were regulated goes on and loses a child? Were they wrong? Should they have been more cautious? Are they to blame? Who is the judge or gatekeeper of all this? Where is the comparison to, and context of the vast numbers of women who are grossly dysregulated or endangered but do not lose children, or whose children go on to live overall positive lives they are glad of? This *context* is missing, and without it the message *is* alarmist and shaming. The context of just how many people are dysregulated and no great tragedy or difficulty befalls them, the context where life simply is imperfect and yet it is right and good to permit ourselves to live it all, where there is always suffering among the wonder, and that *yes we can probably all do better for being more embodied* , and there are those who suffer greatly as a result of various traumas, but some degree of dysregulation is also really, really common, and therefore not the failure or deciding factor in tragedy or suffering, or 'good' or 'bad' outcomes. While mammalian biology might be fact that we can't change (but also highly variable among mammals), and one node in the system that is useful to know about and work with, it's far from *all that is going on* and it's so careless to directly attribute specific tragedy (real tragedies that affect real people and lives - they're not just nebulous examples to pick up and use to make a point) to it - and only it - in this concrete way. If it were all that was going on, *so many fewer* babies would actually be born and survive, let alone go on to live those imperfect but wonderful lives. This message gives the impression that dysregulation in the mother is going to lead to disaster, and that all disaster is caused by it. I am one of millions upon millions of women who (often completely unknowingly, since we seemed to be functioning at least as well as most) 'did differently' to this idealised image, and yet none of my children are here while the majority *are* . The picture is so much more complex than the message given here implies. Much subtlety and alchemy is being missed by treating whole human lives and outcomes - whole living ecosystems - as simply the product of our nervous systems. I definitely don't adhere to the idea that scientific evidence is the only way to 'know' something, but all the same, much of this content is still experimental theory rather than having much empirical evidence behind it. And, as such, I know I would feel very uneasy about presenting these ideas around such complex and sensitive topics in such a black and white way, especially if I knew my own particular focus was fairly myopic. This all makes me pretty uncomfortable if I am honest. In short, I suppose the closest thing to a distinct answer to your question, would be along the lines of needing to take so much more care to make clear that these things are multifactorial, and for death to occur as a direct result of not being attuned to is very *rare* (if it's even possible to separate as a singular cause at all) - so much rarer than women with some degree of dysregulation losing babies, or than children coming to harm. And to be very mindful of the way the mind looks to find an answer amid the unknown or unknowable, especially in grief, and that women in our culture will be vulnerable to introjecting shame and blame. This due care is missing from the message. I also worry that this video would leave many mothers terrified of ever experiencing totally normal upset, fear, or the range of emotions, lest they harm their child - which is obviously totally counterproductive as well as unrealistic and untrue. But the message here seems to be that your baby will *always* pick up on it, and they will *always* be harmed by it. I do believe there are useful and beneficial aspects to this wider theory and its application, but supplying the nuance and context is everything when it comes to protecting the viewer/user/client, and that obviously ought to be paramount in this field of work.

[@conciousgrowth8616]

Thank you for sharing EXACTLY what I was thinking. ​@@RMKRMK-c6w

[@LlamaM2288]

10:13 I'm sorry but "have a homebirth"?? What?? Why should you ever do that?

[@Gerhold102]

Because it's at home - meaning that the mother to be is in familiar surroundings. Both I and my sister were born at home without any complications viewed as potentially threatening. It's wise to have resources available in case of unexpected issues and our incredible communications system, help is at hand and swiftly. But babies die in hospitals too and mother and child are exposed to all the rogue microorganisms lurking in locations where humans with illness are staying.

[@breezyncj]

Homebirths if you're not facing any complications during your pregnancy are quite more common than you might think. 😊 Usually most mothers are accompanied by a mid-wife, and there is usually a plan to get to the hospital if anything goes wrong, which is actually less likely of a scenario than in a hospital, if you can believe it. To each their own..I had 4 babies, the first at a hospital with an epidural, then my 2nd came early and I had to have an emergency c-section so that meant I had to have c-sections for the next two babies as well. Luckily for us everything went swimmingly. I could never do a natural homebirth lol but my partner has children from a previous marriage and he helped the mother birth all three at their home, which is quite amazing IMO. Hope this helps your curiosity! 😊

[@Happymomto9]

It’s the way babies have been born for more years than not.