On Becoming Baby Wise: Giving Your Infant the Gift of Nighttime Sleep

I was given this book while I was pregnant with my first child. I am not really much into reading books for parental advice, but I did it anyway. I wound up actually reading a couple of other things, but none of them made sense to me (for example: BabyWise teaches you to let your child self-soothe, without the use of a pacifier or you rocking them to sleep, while other books didn't seem to care other than the fact that it might interfere with breastfeeding...?). So I applied the BabyWise techniques with my newborn daughter, and she was sleeping through the night by 5 weeks. By 6 months, she was sleeping 12 hours a night. Her schedule was regulated, she was a happy baby (because she was getting the sleep she needed), and we were happy parents. Non-frazzled parents = non-frazzled baby! Think about it: can a 1 week old baby (or a 4 month old baby for that matter) really know how to make a schedule for themselves? Of course not! It's up to us as parents to steer our child in the right direction and then they will naturally become scheduled and responsible children. Now: my daughter is 2 1/2, and I honestly do see the benefits of this book. Her sleep schedule is still awesome (and I haven't gone back to this book since she was an infant), and she has NEVER fought with us when it comes to bedtime (unless we get home late and she is over-tired). She actually says "I think it's time for night night" (this includes her nap as well as nighttime). Everyone says what a well-behaved child she is. We incorporate time-outs still, but they don't happen too often. I am FAR FROM being a ridgid mother! My husband actually says I am too compassionate at times! I have at least 5 friends who have used this book (most of their children being around 2 or 3 now), and they all recommend it and have the happiest and well-behaved children. I am pregnant again, due any time now, and I plan to incorporate the exact same principles with this new baby, as I see (a couple years down the road) how well it has worked. My daughter is a very happy child, no tantrums. We all have our issues, but I know how much worse it *could* have been had I not established a predictable routine and actually consistently followed through. So all that to say, if you are having questions about this book, instead of automatically believing what you read (with my review or otherwise), just read the book yourself and decide. Actually apply the principles throroughly before reviewing, as some people don't do. One more thing: people who are reviewing Ezzo instead of reviewing this book, that is not what reviews are for. We all are supposed to be reviewing a book here, not the author. Obviously this has worked for far more people than not, so there is much to say about that. Update: I have now used this with all 3 of my children, my youngest being 6 months old, and all 3 have healthy sleep habits. I have 2 girls and a boy, and the only issue I came across was my second child; she had reflux, so I had to tweak it a little, but there is a chapter on that as well. After 3 kids, I still recommend this book. Good luck to all the mommies out there!!

I can't recommend this book enough!!! I originally balked at the idea of "scheduling" my baby, feeling that he'd adjust fine to whatever our plans for the day would be and wanting him to learn to be "flexible". That was our approach for the first 6 months of our son's life. I often found myself not knowing what he needed when he fussed though, and was still getting up 3-5 times a night too feed him. My husband was gone for weeks at a time for his job. Our son had colic and was frequently crying and straining from abdominal pain (so much so that he developed an umbilical hernia). Because of his frequent pain and fussing, I rarely felt free to take a shower, even late at night. On top of that, I couldn't really predict when he'd want to eat, so I found myself scrambling half way through my grocery shopping, or some other errand, to find a private place to nurse. All this to say...I was often frazzled and very tired! A friend recommended Babywise and I devoured it within a few hours. Desperate, I began implementing it's practical wisdom immediately. Within a week, my son was sleeping through the night! Having always thought of schedules as restricting, I was shocked to discover a far greater degree of freedom with our new routine than we had experienced before! For example: Knowing that my baby would not need to eat again for the next 3 hours made it possible for me to plan grocery shopping and errands so I could easily be back home in time to nurse again; or roughly when he would need to sleep, so I was able to plan time to clean, cook or rest myself. The applied approach of Babywise masse our home much happier -mama and baby were finally both well rested, and I became much more able to accurately interpret what my son's cries meant (simply by looking at the clock I could often eliminate either hunger or fatigue, or both). Please hear me! Babywise DOES NOT advocate a cold, harsh, or militaristic approach to caring for your infant! Rather, it helps you to better interpret your baby's cries, understand what he needs, by helping you to train healthy sleep, wake time and eating habits into your own precious child, to his benefit and yours! Seeing the incredible impact the methods of Babywise had on our son, my husband was all for it when our daughter arrived a year later! We started with it from the get go with her, and have experienced the same fantastic results.... enjoying full nights of sleep after only about 10 weeks. I was definitely a more rested mama with her than I had been early on with our son, and our baby grew day by day into a happy and sweet, well-adjusted, little girl! I buy Babywise for all of my friends who are new mothers, and often recommend it to others who have had little success with other approaches. I now know many mothers who have used and loved this, none whom have found it ineffective or unhelpful. If the LORD blesses us with more children, I plan to re-read Babywise before each birth, continue implementing it's tried and true training methods, and referencing it as an invaluable resource for the first year of life of each of our babies!

I have applied the Babywise principles with three babies now and each time my daughters were sleeping through the night 7/8 hours by 9 weeks and 11/12 hours by 3 months. They were also happy, alert and not fussy during the day when they were not sleeping. (My youngest is 6 months and still this way.) Like a lot of parents, I really believe that good sleep habits significantly affect how happy babies and children are: I have seen both sides of this with my kids! This books principles were so incredibly helpful to me in terms of setting up a loose routine that gave us a sense of order, calm and sanity in the early months of our daughters' lives and beyond. My daughters good sleep habits grew from this point and they still sleep solidly and well at ages 8, 5 and 6 months. This book is meant to be used as a guideline only. In all of the times that I have used it, I have never been able to understand the controversy surrounding this book. The principles are straightforward and involve setting up a loose schedule. The authors repeatedly say that if your baby is hungry you should feed him. Never in all the time that I have used this book have I denied a hungry baby food - the authors would not suggest that either. Also, I have friends who rocked and/or fed their babies to sleep and ultimately ended up with their babies waking up all night long needing comfort and feeding. My friends have been exhausted and their babies cranky in the morning. One after one, they have needed to let their babies "cry it out" at a much older age to get some sanity and rest for themselves and their children. By following these principles, I never had to "Ferberize" which to me seems much more traumatic. With Babywise, after a couple of times lightly crying before going to sleep on their own, my babies then did not cry before sleeping and just got used to sleeping on their own. They now sleep so well. If used correctly, as a guideline and not a hard and fast schedule, Babywise is truly an incredible resource.

If you are looking for a book filled with the latest scientific research on children and sleep, go and read Sleeping Through the Night by Jodi Mindell, PhD, associate director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Children's Hospital in Philadelphia. That book is based on science and explains why training your child to have good sleep habits (i.e., training your child to fall asleep on his own without your intervention) is important for their future as children and adults. Her book also lays out a method for sleep-training. Basically, once your baby reaches 12 lb., she has you put them to bed awake every night at the same time until they have learned to fall asleep on their own. (Obviously this is not the totality of the system. I'm summing up.) It works great. But it's really, really difficult on mother and child, and only a minority of people are willing to really go through with it because it means a week or two of nightly crying. Ugh. So then there is On Becoming Baby Wise. The book isn't written by a scientist. And it isn't perfect in that the layout is not as direct as it could be, while meanwhile there are a lot of editorial asides you may or may not agree with. HOWEVER, Ezzo* has basically devised (stumbled upon?) an approach that is very similar to Mindell's except a lot gentler on mother and child. Instead of waiting until the baby is physically capable of sleeping through the night (when he's reached about 12 lb.), he has you start setting the stage for good sleep right away by getting them used to a flexible schedule** of feedings and naps and by putting them down for their naps while they are still awake. Since newborns are so sleepy all the time, and especially after feedings, Ezzo's big contribution was the discovery that if you fed the baby, then interacted with the baby for a while, then put the baby to nap instead of the more natural tendency to nurse the baby to sleep for naps, it becomes actually possible to put a newborn to nap awake. Then, of course, since newborns will fall asleep quickly and easily (i.e. 5-20 minutes of crying max) even if they are put down awake (as opposed to the 3 or 4 month old you are trying to sleep train with Mindell's method who will cry for an hour), they learn really quickly the habit of falling asleep by themselves. By the time they are 12 lb., they are already sleeping through the night without any brutal sleep training. And voila! Ezzo has discovered (stumbled upon?) a better way of doing what the sleep scientists recommend. We used Mindell's method for our first three children. Then we used the Baby Wise method for our next three children. (Yes, we have six.) All six of them have slept twelve hours every night starting by about 4 months of age. All of them have continued to go to bed early, happily, and in their own beds. They all wake up happily 12 hours later, usually singing. We get told constantly that are kids are so content and well-behaved. Honestly, the only thing we are doing as parents differently than other people is training them to sleep. Both methods work, but Baby Wise is easier, so I continue to give it as a gift to new mothers. *I don't know anything about Ezzo except that he's controversial as a person. Maybe I wouldn't like him if I met him. I'd like to point out, though, that the how well his method works has nothing to do with how nice of a personality he has. Saying otherwise is a classic ad hominem attack. Like saying you don't believe in Einstein's theory of relativity because Einstein was unfaithful to his wife. ** For those who are against scheduling all together, I get it. I think that since attachment parenting/anti-scheduling is such a class marker (i.e. all upper class/respectable women cary their baby in a Moby wrap and feed on demand) and so strongly pushed by the la leche league-trained lactation consultant at the hospital, it can be hard to go against the grain and adopt a schedule. I would urge people to consider two things: 1) most (all?) NICU's will immediately put 4 lb. babies on a rigid (down to the minute) 3-hour feeding schedule. Ask your lactation consultant/well-meaning friend why it will hurt your 8 lb. newborn to be on a 3-hour feeding schedule but not a 4 lb. preemie. 2) If you take your baby to bed with you there is a good chance he will never leave. I know so many women who are chronically sleep-deprived because they have their five-year-old and their two-year old still in bed with them. At least one man told my husband, "My wife wants another baby, but the other two kids are in our bed half the night. I'm never going to agree to have another one." Yikes.

Just had my third child and purchased the updated version of the babywise book. It's been well updated and revised. The basic sleep concept of this book is consistent with other sleep books with a few exceptions. Babywise puts more explanation on the concept of helping your child develop a sleep, eat, wake pattern and how to functionally put into place a schedule for your family. Proof is in the outcome. It works and it's wonderful to have a happy baby that sleeps sooner than later with little difficulty. We all sleep better, eat better, and function better. As a mother, I have a predictable day that I can organize and manage all the kids well. I routinely have people ask me how I get my children to sleep so well and behave so well. Have found other books on babies sleep patterns to be a helpful compliment to this book as the babywise books are foundational vs. detailed. Really like the combination of babywise books with Kim West's book, Good Night Sleep Tight, The sleep lady's guide... (long title). What babywise doesn't do is break things down in a detailed month by month look at what your child's sleep patterns are like but who cares if they're sleeping well by week 3. I have had two premature children and complications with breastfeeding. I have bottle fed my children which may make this philosophy more simplistic. Babywise highly encourages breastfeeding and these books were recommended to me by two Mom's each with 4 kids, who breastfed. One thing I do notice in the criticism of this book is a judgement on the underlying Christian message. This is the first in a series of parenting books that are the mainstream version of a Christian ministry. Unfortunately, there is a lot of antichristian sentiment and tends to blacklist anything that touches that arena. Not wise. I'm a Catholic and this book is in line with Catholic Christian values. Babywise is overall initiating a parental philosophy that is very needed in our culture today. The updated version is more tolerant and courteous of the alternate views, which is "wise". Highly recommend this book. If nothing else, give this book a chance and add it to the list of research books on how to care for your baby. It's very helpful in many ways.

Two couples independently recommended this book to us. Two days after we started the system (reading as fast as we could) our baby slept through the night for the first time. She hasn't slept through every night, of course, but easily > 90%. We started "late" (when she was two months old) since we got the recommendation late. Your mileage may vary, and not every system will work for every baby, but I can tell you unequivocally that it worked for us and has been a life changer. Our baby is so much happier and so are we. Everyone (literally) else I know personally who has used this system reports the same results. I really don't understand all of the negative reviews. Frankly, based on the comments, I'm not sure if many of them have read the book at all because they often make claims about the book which are the opposite of the guidelines it gives. The book goes out of its way to stress that it is not a strict schedule system (it lies somewhere between strict scheduling and demand feeding) and that if your baby is crying for more than a short amount of time, you need to soothe him or her. But, it's also important to understand that not all baby crying is because of a problem (and this is well documented by the AAP). The basic concepts we took away from the book are: 1) Scheduled/regular feedings lead to a regulated baby digestion system which leads to happy baby (this is the most important point). 2) Make sure every feeding is a full feeding (e.g. don't let your baby fall asleep, periodically burp and re-feed until he or she won't eat any more). 3) The ideal cycle is sleep -> feed -> play -> sleep. Keep feeding as far away from sleeping as possible as it gives you the most time for burps to work their way out before the next nap. 4) Put your baby to sleep awake so he or she learns that nap time is normal and doesn't immediately cry when he or she wakes up alone. Our baby cries for two minutes max (normally less than 30 seconds) when we put her down (and it's not a fear/pain cry, it's much softer), sleeps for about an hour, wakes (gentle cry lets us know she's up), get a change, eats, and plays for whatever time is left. "Time left" is flexible (less if she gets a little cranky early so we know she's tired, more if she's happy and wide awake), but it's almost clockwork that she sleeps for an hour and is up for 1.5 hours (which purely coincidentally matches the book's guideline of 2.5 hours between feeding starts for babies her age). That's one of the big messages of the book: adjust the ratio of wake and sleep time, but do your best to keep the time between feedings as constant as possible. As far as sleeping through the night, this happened "automatically" after we got her on the schedule. She feeds every 2.5 hours during the day, and the last wake cycle of the day she gets a double feeding (once right away, once towards the end, and her wake time is a little longer). We put her down, turn off the lights (it's the only time there is no light in her room), and she's down for 9-10 hours. This is in complete contrast to before we started the system when she would wake every 2-3 hours to eat 24 hours a day, cry when left alone or even set down briefly, and had lots of gas issues. I really do believe in the basic premise of the book: the most important thing you can do to make your baby happy is to regulate his or her digestion. Pretty much the only thing that makes our baby cry are hunger, over-tiredness, gas pain, and burps. By regulating her eating, her digestion system "learned" to expect a meal every 2.5 hours during "light" and a big gap w/o food during "dark." This regulation led to much, much less gas. Less gas (and paying attention to full feeds) lead to better sleep. Better sleep and no gas made her not fear the crib so if something disturbs her and she does wake during the night (we hear her sometimes making noises but not crying), it's not pain and she just goes back to sleep.

With my first baby, I faithfully read Dr Sears' Baby Book, which emphasizes breast-feeding on demand and not letting the baby cry at sleeping time. By using his principles, I unknowingly encouraged my daughter to wake every 2 hours at night until she was 15 months old! Needless to say, it was exhausting. She was also completely dependent on nursing at sleep time to go to sleep, and when I finally weaned her, she became completely dependent on the pacifier, which lasted until the age of 4 years old. By the time my third child was born, I had read Baby Wise. I had heard many horror stories about how children had become dehydrated and some even had died from their parents using the principles in Baby Wise. However, once I read it, it seemed unlikely that those parents had followed the guidelines in the book accurately. The book is VERY clear that parents should be constantly aware of measurable conditions to make sure that the baby is well nourished at all times. For example, the authors recommend that the baby's weight be tracked to ensure growth, that the number of pee-filled and poop-filled diapers be counted, and that the number of minutes of breast-feeding on each side be ensured. If a parent does these things, there is no way a child can become under-nourished. I found that by keeping my breast-feeding to a 2 1/2 hour schedule, my milk flow was kept high. When I fed sooner as a habit, my milk would measurably diminish in volume. And the baby really had that time schedule internally anyway. Even if I didn't set the timer and feed him at exactly 2 1/2 hours, my son would often cry for milk about every 2 1/2 hours by age 2 weeks. This schedule had another advantage: I stopped leaking milk much earlier than with my first child. My body knew what to expect in terms of when milk would be flowing. In terms of sleep, by age 4 weeks, my child was waking on his own every 3-5 hours at night. Now at age 9 weeks he wakes on his own every 3-6 hours. He usually sleeps from 7pm to 1am, then wakes at 4am, then at 7am. He is on the verge of dropping his 4am feeding. It still is hard, but not nearly as bad as every 2 hours all night! And he is moving in the right direction to let me sleep in 5-6 hour increments soon. I recommend this book highly. It provides a structure to a baby and parent's life. Deviations from that schedule are acceptable, but it doesn't leave the entire day and night up for grabs...there is some kind of expectation for eating, sleeping and wake time/play.

Wow, I am so relieved to read the reviews of other people who found that this book didn't work for them either. The book is written in a very confusing way - it suggests things, e.g. "get your baby on a schedule" but doesn't tell you how to actually do this with a baby who is hungry at irregular times (let them cry until you want to feed them?) Also, when they say that it should be the parent who decides when a nap ends, they don't explain just how you are supposed to get your infant to sleep longer if they wake up after 40 minutes and you cannot get them to go back to sleep. Reading in between the lines - are they saying to just let your baby lie there and cry if they have woken up too early from a nap? Another example is the instruction to "make sure the first feeding of the day is at the same time every day" - how do you do that if your baby doesn't wake up at the same time every day? Make him starve for an hour if he's gotten up too early? I also really disagree with the concept of waking a sleeping baby so they fit in with your schedule. I would be very cranky and certainly would not want to eat if someone woke me up and told me to! Since my baby can tolerate being awake for about an hour, including feeding time (which is perfectly normal for a 10 week old according to every other sleep training book I've read), & can only nap for 40 minutes at a time (no matter what I do to try prolong this) - how do I push him to eat at the 3 hour mark? And if I did, how could I keep within the wake-eat-play-sleep schedule of he is then exhausted from crying for an hour before he gets fed? Every other book I've read says not to push your baby to the point of overtiredness, and at this age they can really only tolerate being awake for an hour at a time. Another comment that really irked me was about how a 3 month old baby who still wakes up for feedings during the night is responding to his mother's parenting style. My baby was born early. I'm not a pediatrician but even I know that premature babies have a "catch-up"period where they need to eat frequently and put on weight. A silly comment like that could make mothers of premature babies feel guilty about their parenting style, when it is absolutely normal for their babies to be doing that. I've read so many sleep training books, and of all of them I have to say the two I found most helpful are Dr. Mark Weisbluth's "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child" & Dana Obleman's "Sleep Sense Program". Both of these books are based on pretty much the same principles. Dr. Weisbluth's book is a bit heavier to read because he goes into a lot of detail on the biology & physiology of sleep. Also, his book doesn't always address what to do if your baby doesn't follow the recommendations. Overall, I have to say The Sleep Sense Program has been the best - common sense, light & easy to read & addresses a lot of "what if" questions (e.g. "what if my baby won't go to sleep and now it's time to feed him again?")

I was given this book by a great friend of mine when my son was born. I can honestly say we never had a sleepless night. My son slept 5 hours from birth and 8 hours as of 4 months, by his 8 month b-day he was sleeping 12 hours. I have bought so many of these books for friends and clients I should have bought them in bulk. If you know someone who's expecting the greatest joy in life, do them a favor and BUY THIS BOOK, they will love you for it. A good night's sleep is worth so much as a new parent. Enjoy and congrats to the happy parents.

Sleep and happiness for all families who take this book to heart. Can't recommend enough. The secret to happy babies, who will understand and know what's coming and be confident in their surroundings and get used to their new-found world of silence.

到着が予定より遅れる事態となりましたが、原因を早急に調べてもらい、送料分も返還していただき、対応に満足しました。

This book gives excellent direction on getting babes to sleep through the night. A must have for parents who want to get some nighttime sleep, and to have more content day time babes. An easy quick read with great results, fast! It encorporates scheduled feed, play , and sleep routine to achieve the goal of nighttime sleep.

Book arrived promptly. Gives a wonderful structured approach while leaving some flexibility and plenty of data to back up the theory