4 Common Infant and Toddler Sleep Training MYTHS.

The sleep training world (sleep trainers themselves, pediatricians who recommend the practice, big brands and product manufactures) is only selling one side of the story when it comes to the realities of sleep training. They make a promise that simply cannot be kept. They share research that either is incredibly flawed or just missing altogether. They make sleep training sound like the cure all for your family and assure parents that it has no potential side effects.

This post outlines four of the most common sleep training myths (there are many many more sleep training lies out there but those will be debunked in future posts)

Let’s start with the most popular:

SLEEP TRAINING MYTH NUMBER 1- babies can be trained to sleep.

Sleep is a biological function, not a skill that can be learned. Just as it is for adults, falling asleep is not within the conscious control of an infant, toddler, or child. The more you try to force it, the harder it becomes.

An infant’s sleep-wake homeostat and the circadian clock are the two biological sleep regulators that make sure that their bodies’ fall asleep when they need to. During the day, a baby’s sleep producing hormones cause their sleep pressure to build up. Naps are meant to take the edge off of this sleep pressure build up so that they can make it to bedtime, when we typically see longer stretches of sleep/more sleep than naps. Sleep happens when a baby needs it and is calm and regulated.

But sleep training works!” Sure! If by works you mean they no longer single for you. But it doesn’t teach a baby to sleep. Unsupported crying results in heightened stress levels and as a defense mechanism, their body shuts down and goes to sleep. A study by Middlemiss, et. al (2012) has shown that even after they quit signaling for you, stress levels still remain high, and by the third day the baby and mother were no longer attuned to each other.

Eventually they do learn to no longer signal for a caregiver because it’s useless (which, as we know, crying is a baby’s main form of communication, so them learning that it isn’t an effective tool to get a caregiver’s attention when they need one is pretty sad.)

Other studies have shown that sleep training doesn’t actually reduce night wakings, it’s just that we don’t know about them (Hall et. all 2015).

“The best sleep outcomes long-term come about if our babies’ or children’s sleep-times are consistently pleasurable and easy. That is, if the sympathetic nervous system is consistently dialed down for sleep, creating positive associations, the biological sleep regularity will kick in easily at bed-times and this becomes a habit.” Possums Clinic, 2015

I’ll also add- even if sleep or self soothing were skills we could teach an infant- we would never teach them when an infant is in distress. As a former teacher, I know from my education but also through my own teaching practice, that you would never try to teach a new skill to someone who is emotionally disregulated. No learning can take place when someone is in an elevated state of stress. Our brains simply do not work this way. If a student of mine was in distress there is no way I would think that was a good time to teach them a new skill. Instead what I would do as an educator and a person of compassion, is to offer connection and a safe space for their emotions.

So what do I do now??

1) pay attention to wake windows and sleepy cues.

2) practice good sleep hygiene.

3) pay attention to total sleep over 24 hours.

4) add in sleep associations.

5) ensure a good, calming, and comforting sleep environment.

6) consider room sharing or safe bedsharing.

7) go to bed earlier.

8) ask for help and limit as much extra work as possible.

9) stop looking at the clock.

10) lower your expectations.

11) make sure there isn't a health concern causing excessive wakes (see hourly wakes post)

12) meet with a baby led sleep specialist for support on how to make actually gentle changes.

SLEEP TRAINING MYTH NUMBER 2- babies can self-soothe and need to self-soothe in order to sleep through the night.

What is self-soothing anyways? Self-soothing was a term created by Dr. Thomas Anders in the 1970’s to mean the opposite of signaling. Simply put, some babies signal (cry out) for a caregiver when they wake at night and other’s do not. The term self soothing was never meant promote the idea that a child could calm down from a state of extreme stress (and relax), eventually falling asleep peacefully.

Why can’t a baby self-soothe?

A baby has six arousal states - being asleep, drowsy, hypo-aroused, calmly focused and alert, hyper-aroused, then flooded. When a baby gets to the point of being hyper-aroused they are burning a lot of energy. The only way to help them out of this state is to help them down-regulate and this involves an adult caregiver contact and support. It is not something that can be done by leaving a baby/child alone.

If a parent or caregiver does not help them down-regulate in their hyper-aroused state, they will go up the arousal scale, become flooded, and at this point, the baby burns so much energy that they may fall asleep - NOT BECAUSE THEY SOOTHED THEMSELVES, but because they are passing out from sheer exhaustion.

"It is the brain's last mechanism for protecting itself from severe energy depletion." Dr. Stuart Shanker, 2016

Why would leaving a baby alone at night send them into a hyper-aroused or flooded state?

According to Dr. Gordon Neufeld “Facing separation is one of the most wounding experiences of all.” “Once you know that attachment equals survival and that separation is the greatest threat. Once you recognize the signs and symptoms of the impact of separation - elevated alarm (and cortisol), elevated frustration, elevated pursuit, signs of defensive reattachment, defensive dominance and a flight from vulnerability.” This is what happens with separation.

As Deborah MacNamara points out, “Young children don’t do separation. Separation is alarming for them. When you leave their room, all they feel is your absence.”

According to Dr. Neufeld, separation is going to send them into a flooded state. They may stop crying, which may lower the stress levels/cortisol levels of the parent, but the baby’s levels are still high.

As Tracy Cassels, PhD mentions, “What all parents need to know is that ‘cry it out’ and all modified forms of it are based on early behaviorist beliefs that if you stop the crying, you stop the distress. But what we now know is that this is not at all close to the truth. Infants and children often have a behavior-physiological mismatch. For example, a child that is upset, but is being held and comforted by an attached caregiver, may not show physiological signs of distress. Whereas a child that is silent can be experiencing huge internal distress.”

Simply put, sleep training doesn't teach the baby to sleep better or to self-soothe, it teaches them to stop using their main form of communication when they need help. We are basically asking them to stop communicating because no one is coming, no one is going to respond to their need with a snuggle or a hug or milk or to hold & rock them. We are waiting for the brain to kick in and shut the baby down.

SLEEP TRAINING MYTH NUMBER 3- it is important for babies to sleep independently.

In order for babies to grow up and become independent, they need to have a strong attachment to a parent. In fact, the biggest predictor of how well a child turns out is whether they have a secure attachment with at least one person (Branious, 2017).

In order to build this attachment, we need to respond sensitively and consistently to help them to trust that their needs will be met - both day and night. According to Neufeld and Maté (attachment experts), attachment happens in stages. You must meet their attachment needs in the first stage in order for them to move to the next.

A secure attachment happens when “we have experiences between the caregiver and the child where the caregiver allows the child to feel that predictably, their needs will be seen and responded to. They are connected and protected. They feel safe, seen, soothed and secure.” Allan Schore, Branious, 2017. They need all of these things to then move them to the next stage, which then moves them closer to independence.

This is important to understand - they need this closeness and security in order to become independent.

SLEEP TRAINING MYTH NUMBER 4- sleep training works.

Sleep trainers PROMISE sleep training will work. That in just a few days you’ll all be sleeping peacefully and if it doesn’t work it’s something YOU did wrong, not their methods by any means.

Maybe sleep training has “worked” for you or for someone you know. What we need to remember is WHY it works. It is the baby shutting down as a survival mechanism, not the baby self-soothing, self-regulating or being trained to sleep.

Again, babies cannot self-soothe or self-regulate, they require a caregiver to co-regulate during times of distress.

The issue is that 1) sleep is not a skill (again a lie they tell you) that can be learned. Can you fall asleep ON DEMAND? Nope, no one can. 2) babies who have been sleep trained don’t actually “sleep through the night” they wake and no longer call out for a caregiver because they’ve been taught not how to sleep, but taught that their caregiver will not come in their time of need so they stop calling out.

In a recent study of 411 babies, ages 6-12 months, who had been ‘sleep trained’ using cry-it-out or some form of this (some up to 4 times), it was discovered that leaving the baby to cry only reduced the crying by 14%. It reduced night wakings significantly for 24% of babies but 42% of the time, sleep training had no effect on night waking at all (Gordon, et al.)

Babies who have been sleep trained still go through all of the normal sleep challenges that others do, but if they have been taught not to signal, many will lay awake in bed and not call out. For others, every time they hit a progression or a new developmental milestone, they will need support and if a parent goes in, the parent will need to re-train again once the baby has passed this ‘tricky time’ with sleep.

Sleep training often happens several times in the first two years - a few nights or one hard week just isn’t the case for many families. It’s also important to note that by two years of age there is no difference in sleep behaviors between those who were sleep trained and those who were not.

“It is true that when parents report unsettled baby behavior in the early months, a small percentage of those children then go on to have more disrupted sleep and learning and behavior problems at school-age. We don’t know what causes the link. But it is not that applying conventional sleep training techniques protects against sleep and developmental problems down the track. In fact, worrying about sleep worsens sleep. The evidence is very clear that the application of conventional sleep training in the first year of life does not result in improved sleep or developmental outcomes in later childhood...” Possums Clinic, 2015.

There are lots of studies, research and experts that all have ideas on leaving little ones to cry and sleep training. Many will tell you that it is completely fine and that there are no lasting effects. Many will make a promise of sleep that they just cannot guarantee.

My simple rule of thumb is to treat children in the same way that we would treat any other human that we love. We know exactly how it would feel to be left alone to scream for hours and add to that the fact that babies cannot take care of their basic needs and the world is a new and scary place to be for them.

As I’ve stated many many times, I do not judge families who choose sleep training. However, I do think it is important for families to be able to make an educated decision around the topic and not only be fed lies from sleep trainers (or other businesses) trying to make a buck.